The Atlantic

Why Did This Happen in Canada?

The context of the Quebec shooting
Source: Mathieu Belanger / Reuters

At around 7:50 pm on Sunday evening, police received several emergency calls from the Centre Culturel Islamique de Quebec, a mosque and cultural center in Quebec City. They arrived to a scene of carnage: Six Muslim men, including a halal butcher, a university professor, and a government worker, had been shot and killed by a gunman. Nineteen others were injured. Of the five who were sent to the hospital, four remain, two in critical condition. The attack, one of the worst acts of violence against Muslims in Canadian history, shocked a nation that prides itself on being a paragon of multicultural inclusion. “We are a country of diversity,” the Syrian Assembly of Manitoba’s Tarek. “For something like that to happen here, it's very sad.”

You’re reading a preview, subscribe to read more.

More from The Atlantic

The Atlantic5 min read
The Strangest Job in the World
This is an edition of the Books Briefing, our editors’ weekly guide to the best in books. Sign up for it here. The role of first lady couldn’t be stranger. You attain the position almost by accident, simply by virtue of being married to the president
The Atlantic6 min read
The Happy Way to Drop Your Grievances
Want to stay current with Arthur’s writing? Sign up to get an email every time a new column comes out. In 15th-century Germany, there was an expression for a chronic complainer: Greiner, Zanner, which can be translated as “whiner-grumbler.” It was no
The Atlantic6 min read
There’s Only One Way to Fix Air Pollution Now
It feels like a sin against the sanctitude of being alive to put a dollar value on one year of a human life. A year spent living instead of dead is obviously priceless, beyond the measure of something so unprofound as money. But it gets a price tag i

Related Books & Audiobooks