Thoughts on 9/11.
You ever just feel completely fugging ignorant? After reading some of the things about 9/11 people have posted in thier LJ's, I thought about writing something of my own in mine...and then realized that I don't know enough to say anything even remotely appropriate.
I've pushed that tragedy away from myself, just as so many Americans have, tried not to think about it...because it's a nasty terrifying thing, a depressing thing. It is something that just further destroys what little faith I still manage to scrape together for the human race.
It's not just how the terrorists could kill thousands of people in a few minutes, but the aftermath. A year of squabbling, infighting, as the goverment fights to 'strengthen the country's defenses', while simultaniously eroding the civil liberties that make this county so great, so free. Watching ambitious politicians make plays for power based off the fear and uncertainty, the anger, that 9/11 presented. Being forcibly reminded by so many, over and over, that we aren't as innocent and shiningly noble as a country as some would have us believe.
I'll admit, I hold very few patriotic feelings within me anymore about this country. It's getting to the point where it's even hard for me to feel proud of the good old U.S. of A. when standing on a grassy field on the fourth of July, with Fireworks blasting overhead, and Patriotic band music playing in the background. It's hard to feel proud. Yes, we have more general freedoms than most other countries even dream of. Yes, we have basic rights that no man should be able to breach, through our forefather's wisdom in creating a great Constitution.
And yet, the essence of the dream of America, of a country devoted to liberty, to equality, to justice....that pretty ideology fades to muted shades when faced with the corruption, the greed, the base nature of humanity's dark side, in people who would take those basic rights from us to better serve themselves, or thier causes. Our country has real potential. I just wish we could find the way to live up to that potential...to all fight for those fading ideals that have made this country great. Maybe that's what it really is to be a patriot.
I've pushed that tragedy away from myself, just as so many Americans have, tried not to think about it...because it's a nasty terrifying thing, a depressing thing. It is something that just further destroys what little faith I still manage to scrape together for the human race.
It's not just how the terrorists could kill thousands of people in a few minutes, but the aftermath. A year of squabbling, infighting, as the goverment fights to 'strengthen the country's defenses', while simultaniously eroding the civil liberties that make this county so great, so free. Watching ambitious politicians make plays for power based off the fear and uncertainty, the anger, that 9/11 presented. Being forcibly reminded by so many, over and over, that we aren't as innocent and shiningly noble as a country as some would have us believe.
I'll admit, I hold very few patriotic feelings within me anymore about this country. It's getting to the point where it's even hard for me to feel proud of the good old U.S. of A. when standing on a grassy field on the fourth of July, with Fireworks blasting overhead, and Patriotic band music playing in the background. It's hard to feel proud. Yes, we have more general freedoms than most other countries even dream of. Yes, we have basic rights that no man should be able to breach, through our forefather's wisdom in creating a great Constitution.
And yet, the essence of the dream of America, of a country devoted to liberty, to equality, to justice....that pretty ideology fades to muted shades when faced with the corruption, the greed, the base nature of humanity's dark side, in people who would take those basic rights from us to better serve themselves, or thier causes. Our country has real potential. I just wish we could find the way to live up to that potential...to all fight for those fading ideals that have made this country great. Maybe that's what it really is to be a patriot.