Tuesday, September 30, 2008

Why are stampedes regular occurrences?

This story from CNN tells of a temple stampede in India that killed 157 people.

I thought some context was missing in this piece that the network thought was important enough to put on its home page tonight.

"Temple stampedes are not uncommon in India during religious festivals," the brief article states, before going on to list other recent deaths at temples. But missing is the cause. Is it simply a large population drawn to the same place at the same time, or is there a religious element that needs to be explained?

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