Nine Years Removed
I hope beyond hope that I won't ever run out of things to say pertaining to the anniversary of September 11, 2001. Saying where I was seems trite. Saying that because I've been to both the top of the towers and to Ground Zero fills up column inches, but it doesn't bestow upon me any greater sense of loss or understanding. In looking through various posts on Facebook, there were two words that are worth mentioning: history and burning.
We're now nine years away from the worst terrorist attack on the shores of the United States. I was still in school, never thinking in a million years that I would own a home, or be working at the family business for a career. My biggest concern was passing the drivers test that I had failed several times. Think about what in your life has changed in the past nine years. My guess is that it is "a whole bunch." Think about what is different in our lives because of what happened that day. It takes two more hours to get somewhere on a plane. I need a passport to get into Canada. And so on.
The other word is "burning," and it pertains to a totally loathsome guy who intended to burn a Koran today. It is any American's right to do so, and I have two options: sit here and lump it. I can tell you how awful I think such an act is, and how disrespectful an act it is, but that's what the First Amendment allows. Right there, that is what America is about. A group of people is really unhappy with that right, and that's why they're pointing missiles at our soldiers overseas. It is quite literally the manifestation of "my way or the highway".
Insofar as we need to get along with everyone, I am no longer interested in hearing about how I'm supposed to understand Islam, and how I'm supposed to respect their ways when they don't get that fundamental point. My understanding of the "religion of peace" was etched when nineteen guys piloted planes into buildings. Instead of hearing about hundreds of Kabul residents burning the flag (and what a metaphor that is) I want to hear Muslims saying "Wow, we really would prefer that Whatshisname not burn the Koran, but we understand why he's allowed to do that." And to have them denounce the flag burnings and other sectarian violence in that area.
We can be attacked: to have our buildings knocked down by fundamentalist nutjobs, but as a country we're able to dust ourselves off and get back to being an exceptional nation, to the point where people want to come here to enjoy the freedoms that can't be had elsewhere. When we start to pshaw away the First Amendment, part of what makes us exceptional is taken away, and we have to work much harder to get that back; much harder than to rebuild buildings.
We're now nine years away from the worst terrorist attack on the shores of the United States. I was still in school, never thinking in a million years that I would own a home, or be working at the family business for a career. My biggest concern was passing the drivers test that I had failed several times. Think about what in your life has changed in the past nine years. My guess is that it is "a whole bunch." Think about what is different in our lives because of what happened that day. It takes two more hours to get somewhere on a plane. I need a passport to get into Canada. And so on.
The other word is "burning," and it pertains to a totally loathsome guy who intended to burn a Koran today. It is any American's right to do so, and I have two options: sit here and lump it. I can tell you how awful I think such an act is, and how disrespectful an act it is, but that's what the First Amendment allows. Right there, that is what America is about. A group of people is really unhappy with that right, and that's why they're pointing missiles at our soldiers overseas. It is quite literally the manifestation of "my way or the highway".
Insofar as we need to get along with everyone, I am no longer interested in hearing about how I'm supposed to understand Islam, and how I'm supposed to respect their ways when they don't get that fundamental point. My understanding of the "religion of peace" was etched when nineteen guys piloted planes into buildings. Instead of hearing about hundreds of Kabul residents burning the flag (and what a metaphor that is) I want to hear Muslims saying "Wow, we really would prefer that Whatshisname not burn the Koran, but we understand why he's allowed to do that." And to have them denounce the flag burnings and other sectarian violence in that area.
We can be attacked: to have our buildings knocked down by fundamentalist nutjobs, but as a country we're able to dust ourselves off and get back to being an exceptional nation, to the point where people want to come here to enjoy the freedoms that can't be had elsewhere. When we start to pshaw away the First Amendment, part of what makes us exceptional is taken away, and we have to work much harder to get that back; much harder than to rebuild buildings.