TzviH

I want to explain where I’m coming from before responding (not just to your post, but to the others here).
– completely agree that reevaluating/reassessing/changing is necessary, and when the ‘wound is fresh’ is indeed OFTEN an appropriate time
– am in general solidly in the ‘hishtadlus’ camp, and get very very annoyed when people make every single thing into only a hashgacha-prati thing & ignore common sense (similarly, get infuriated when people profess to know the spiritual flaw/sin/gap that is the ‘real’ reason for a tragedy through their implied ‘ruach hakodesh’.. probably you’re of a similar mindset on that…)
– so basically, am coming from fairly down to earth perspective (at least in my mind, i hope it’s true)
– just wanted to get all of the out there, before I completely contradict myself.

Since the start of Taamuz this year, we have had 2 giant tragedies involving camping & water.
For sure everything is preventable after the fact, and everything can be improved.
But dude, come on – in your own daily life, is everything really done safely/responsibly/perfectly?
What if any time you messed anything up, or anything went wrong – there was an instant chat room set up with people discussing theories of how it should have been handled differently, etc.
(Ok – to be fair, that entire thing happens in my head almost every time i mess something up, but that’s NOT a good thing generally 🙂 Point is, hishtadlus is for sure important – and we should do it. But if you insist on a level of hishtadlus from others which is waaay above what is likely your own… then that isn’t entirely fair (i’m not judging any of you, but feel there’s a fair likelihood of that).

Much more importantly – my intuition of reading these discussions is that there are 3 types of people who write ‘well they need to start doing X differently so that Y shouldn’t happen’
1. trolling for sick reason (probably no one in this chat, but for sure have seen in other chats here)
2. a legitimate strong knowledge of this problem & sincere desire to raise awareness of solution (i.e. this is something you have expert knowledge of & didn’t just develop this strong opinion after learning about the tragedy & a bit of airmchair analysis/googling)
3. (and I think #3 is the vast majority) – <b>The tragedy that happened is not possible to emotionally grasp or intellectually comprehend, and taking thoughts to their logical conclusions – would lead you to admit that you don’t really understand how hashem runs the world, and therefore on a deep level you do not really have any real control/safety – and that is scary (emotionally, physically). Human beings (jew & nonjew alike) have a strong need to predict/control their environment – and if you believe in hashem (as I assume everyone here does their best to) then this is creates a very uncomfortable feeling. There is a very very comfortable way out of that zone – which is to focus on what could have been done to prevent said tragedy & shift control back to us (humans) so if we do a,b,c then x will not happen (or will happen much much less). That type of thinking isn’t wrong, but it is also a often an escape from facing (spiritual) reality – and I am speaking from experience</b>

Now if in your case I’m wrong and you belong to category #2 – then you have my utmost respect. But if you’re solidly in #3 (where I find myself most of the time) then I don’t have any real advice – but want to share a few thoughts that I’ve thought this week about this…

– On Tisha B’Av we read in Kinnos that Hashem is answering our lists of terrible tragedies that befell us, with: You talk about <X> but what about <Y> that you have done? You talk about but what about <B> that you have done – that you don’t talk about! There are so so so many ways in which I literally spit in Hashem’s face daily, and cause tremendous pain to the Shechina. I speak for myself, but I’m sure others here can relate. So yes this is an unimaginable tragedy that I can’t comprehend, but what we (I) do to the Shechina daily & the overal Matzaav of Golus (which we haven’t earned an exodus from yet) is also a horrible tragedy. Maybe if we treated it & felt about emotionally – as a true Tragedy, Moshiach would be here already. (I don’t want to elaborate, or do some sort of stupid meta-ruach hakodesh nonsense that I’m unqualified for – but on a personal level, the fact that the negative aspect of water is generally associated with pritzus, hasn’t escaped me, and I definitely feel there’s plenty of things to correct there. speaking just for myself)

(I was going to write some more, but this is already ridiculously long. If I wrote another 3 paragraphs, they would be about how it would be better for us all to do a cheshbon hanefesh & take things on in the neshama’s zchus. some of those could be safety imporovements – but many should be in middos/ruchnius mitzvos/etc. Anyways, i’ll stop here)