Do you remember 9/11? or would you rather not?

[Littlefingers In The Air]

I think 9/11 is what started me down the path of hatred for the United States government. Of course, I feel the sorrow and sympathy for the victims of the attack. But the American propoganda machine portraying it as unprovoked and completely unexpected was something I considered an insult to my intelligence, even at the ripe old age of 10.

We let 9/11 make us hate brown Americans who freely practice their faith, simply because they looked like those we were told did it. Americans turned against Americans for no good reason, and I blame the government for stirring up that sentiment. The 3,000 people killed that day, the people who have died as a result of that day, and the families affected by this will always be in my heart. But, as a result of 9/11, I will never have any love for the United States government again.

[Altherion]

It pretty much [i]was[/i] completely unexpected though. The security agencies might have known something of the sort was up, but most people (including myself) did not think that anyone would do something so monstrous. You have to remember that there were many, many airplane hijackings in various countries prior to this one. Practically all of them went the same way: the hijackers would divert the plane somewhere and then make demands. In fact, the official policy was not to resists them because the situation was much more likely to be resolved peacefully once the airplane had landed. 9/11 changed all of that.

[Lord Flashheart]

Jet fuel can't melt steel beams..

[RenlyIsNotRight]

I grew up/still live in the NYC area, though fairly out in the suburbs, but my family is originally from New York and at the time of 9/11, my dad was working in Manhattan not far from the towers - I still remember looking at them through the windows of his building as a kid. When 9/11 happened I was only 9 years old, and I remember it originally being phrased by my teacher as "some people got hurt in New York today", which might literally have been the understatement of the century. We got some sort of slip about it, and I came home and saw the towers coming down on the news and freaked out asked my mom if my dad was okay, which fortunately he was, along with everyone else in my family who was in the area at the time.

 

It definitely affected my father my profoundly than it affected anyone else - he watched the Towers go down knew people who were in them. It definitely impacted me but not in a way I can really verbalize probably because I was so young when it happened.

 

 

Jet fuel can't melt steel beams..

 

[Insert "Bush Did 9/11" Meme Here]

[A True Kaniggit]

I actually completely missed 9/11. I was 10 at the time and my school didn't tell the students what was going on, they just finished the day like normal. After school I went to my piano lessons, and then my parents didn't tell me anything. I can't remember when I actually found out what happened, but it was at least a day afterwards.

[NoneofYourBiz]

At the risk of "overdramatizing", 9/11 impacted me in many ways, although I was neither in New York nor Washington DC.

My 9/11 began the way most of my days at the time began. I took the train into my office in Chicago, and sat down at my desk. A few moments later a coworker came by and asked if I had heard about the plane that hit the WTC. At the time my immediate thought was that it had been a small plane and certainly an accident. The idea that anyone would fly a commercial aircraft intentionally into a building was certainly not a thought that occurred to any of us.

As the morning unfolded it became clear what was happening, unbelievable as it was. We all gathered in our break room to watch the news coverage on the small TV there. Many people left the office and headed home. We had a group of our employees who were in NYC or enroute to a meeting scheduled for later that afternoon with one of the firms at the WTC. My boss asked me to call all of our employees to make sure everyone was safe. It was difficult to get through on the phone lines but we tracked down a few that were enroute or on flights that had been grounded. A few we knew were already in the WTC and we would not know where they were until the next day. Fortunately they were in the south tower and had decided to leave the building before the second plane hit, though many people were not evacuating. We lost no one from our company but our clients at Aon were not so fortunate. We worked closely with many of them so their loss hit our company rather hard.

My few coworkers left in the office and I spent most of the day watching the news coverage and watched the first tower fall as it happened. It was so shocking. I remember putting my hands over my face and crying. We went to lunch at a sports bar close to the office and I remember how utterly silent it was, although it was packed with people, with New York's smoking skyline on every big screen tv in the place. As we walked back to the office we heard the distinct sounds of an aircraft flying overhead, and since flights were grounded at the time the few people on the street stopped in their tracks and immediately looked up. We were located very close to the Sears Tower and there certainly was a moment of "please tell me there's not a plane headed for us" and then relief as a military aircraft came into view. They were circling the city.

My husband at the time had recently graduated West Point and we had only been married a few months. He was at OBC at Ft. Knox and I hopped in my car that evening to drive there. Here and there along the way, people had hung American flags from overpasses and such. I remember feeling like the world had changed and everything feeling a bit surreal. As a former flight attendant I remember reflecting on the fact that our training had always been to cooperate with highjackers and I kept thinking about what must have been unfolding on those flights and how that training would now change. My ex husband eventually did a couple tours In the sandbox. We lost a couple people there too.

In the aftermath of 9/11 we learned we had lost a close friend at the Pentagon. We attended his funeral. Another close friend worked for American Airlines out of Boston and he told me that for a month he did nothing but work and attend funerals and memorial services. He lost several friends on that ill fated flight out of BOS. For months he would call me in the middle of the night to just talk because he couldn't sleep. He developed PTSD and ended up leaving American because of it. He has always been a sensitive soul. Airline employees tend to be somewhat affected by any aircraft accident anywhere because it always hits a little close to home. I lost a friend on the United flight that crashed in Iowa years ago and that was hard on me so I could understand many of his feelings. I remember him saying that it bothered him that some of the highjackers walked "his halls" at Boston Logan. Mostly he would just cry.

Those are my 9/11 memories. I think it is important to remember.

[Arkhangel]

I think Americans tend to personalize things. See:the TV show "Mad Men" on when Marilyn Montoe died...or how many people remember even now, with exact clarity, what they were doing when JFK was shot.

It's because we are a nation of individualists.

 

I see the point you're making, but I'd argue that a) many other cultures also hold individualistic (rather than collectivist) values and yet don't put themselves at the centre of the memorialisation of tragedy in the way Americans do with 9/11, and b ) there is a clear distinction between remembering and memorialising. For example, I remember where I was when a firestorm hit my town, burned down hundreds of people's homes and killed four people, but when asked to commemorate it I talk about the damage it did to the victims; I don't unhesitatingly launch into a story of how I personally experienced it from the safety of my un-burned home, and the emotional impact it had on me as someone who directly lost nothing. That would generally be considered inappropriate at best, and self-aggrandising and weird at worst (and that was something which I was at least physically present for). And yet when asked to commemorate 9/11, Americans do exactly that as a matter of course, and it's totally accepted and fine.

 

It'd be really interesting from a sociolinguistic perspective to ask Americans to talk about something like Hurricane Katrina and 9/11, and just compare even something as simple as the number of self-referential pronouns they use.
 

[NoneofYourBiz]

And yet when asked to commemorate 9/11, Americans do exactly that as a matter of course, and it's totally accepted and fine.
 
It'd be really interesting from a sociolinguistic perspective to ask Americans to talk about something like Hurricane Katrina and 9/11, and just compare even something as simple as the number of self-referential pronouns they use.

I honestly do not understand what offends you.

[Arch-MaesterPhilip]

I am from Staten Island and I had taken the semester off from school so I was home. I slept until noon more often than not and it was no different than any other day. Until my father came and woke me up and asked if I knew why he was home. My sister was supposed to go to Madison Square Garden that night to see a boy band, O-Town I think. He told me that the Towers and the Pentagon were hit. And that the Towers were gone. I didn't think he was serions at first. But once the cloudy feeling wore off I understood the gravity of the situation. I was able to see the smoke billowing from the Towers from my house. Getting information was difficult because the networks signals were broadcast from the Towers.

My thoughts quickly shifted to my mother who worked downtown in the Federal Courthouse. Once I found out she was ok I was a little less upset.

I didn't know anyone personally who was killed but a good chunk of the fireman who were killed were from Staten Island. And seeing the bunting hanging from the fire houses was difficult.

A young woman who worked in the bagel store that I would stop in after reliving my newspapers was working for Cantor Fitzgerald and was killed, she was always very kind to me. I still see her father in the neighborhood.

And there was a young woman who used to work at the neighborhood pharmacy. She had a head of black curly hair and a kind smile. I remember having something of a crush on her.

A fireman from my paper route was gone for weeks on end. I was friends with his son. I was relieved to see him when I finally did.

I avoid ground zero usually but this year I was a block away and I was a really uneasy feeling.

[MinDonner]

From what I gather*, for the Sikh community in the US, 9/11 is a day go to "I hope no-one mistakes us for A-rabs and beats us to death in a fit of patriotic xenophobia". And this is where I can see a good argument for NOT remembering this date, if it's being turned into the We Hate Brown People Day by some quarters. The UK certainly has an ugly history of seeing these divisive events "commemorated" in a way that keeps sectarian tensions boiling up for centuries after the fact; while November 5th has largely shed its anti-Catholic origins, we still have the Marching Season in N Ireland. If the result of marking this date is more violence and more innocent deaths, wouldn't it be more appropriate/respectful to just try and forget it and move on?


*disclaimer = this comes from a post I read on Facebook a day or so ago, no actual article to link to

[Arch-MaesterPhilip]

From what I gather*, for the Sikh community in the US, 9/11 is a day go to "I hope no-one mistakes us for A-rabs and beats us to death in a fit of patriotic xenophobia". And this is where I can see a good argument for NOT remembering this date, if it's being turned into the We Hate Brown People Day by some quarters. The UK certainly has an ugly history of seeing these divisive events "commemorated" in a way that keeps sectarian tensions boiling up for centuries after the fact; while November 5th has largely shed its anti-Catholic origins, we still have the Marching Season in N Ireland. If the result of marking this date is more violence and more innocent deaths, wouldn't it be more appropriate/respectful to just try and forget it and move on?


*disclaimer = this comes from a post I read on Facebook a day or so ago, no actual article to link to

I don't think asking people to forget spouses, sons/daughters and neighbors and friends to forget is appropriate or respectful.

I understand why Sikhs and Muslims might feel uneasy but it isn't as if people are turning into We Hate Brown People Day. People are remembering the dead.

[MinDonner]

Of course not. But the country as a whole, most of whom didn't lose anyone directly? Do they also need to mourn every year?

[Arch-MaesterPhilip]

Of course not. But the country as a whole, most of whom didn't lose anyone directly? Do they also need to mourn every year?

I can't speak for the rest of the country honestly, it even for me to say. I don't know how they do it in other places or if they do it at all. Shit I don't even think about it a lot and it happened in my city. Even the commemoration at Ground Zero gets smaller every year. If people elsewhere stopped I wouldn't be offended but that's up to them.

[James Arryn]

I agree that the tragedies which were purported in 9-11's name were much worse than the tragedy of 9-11.

It was a terrible day...we were actually watching as the 2nd plane hit, thinking until then that the first was an accident...but I think the Pearl Harbor example used earlier was apt. Like PH, it was more significant because it happened to Amercans on America than for itself, (and the fact that it was essentially televised).

I'll never forget seeing it, or how scared and horrified I felt, but if all the deaths that came about in 9-11's name since were televised, I'm sure I'd feel even worse. And I agree with the linked blog; I fully expect to see Freedom Fries and 'let's turn the Middle East into a parking lot' again the next time it happens.

[Arkhangel]

I honestly do not understand what offends you.

 

I'm not offended, I'm interested from a sociological perspective about how and why it happens, and from a political perspective on whether and how it impacts public policy-making.

[Arkhangel]

Like, does the reified perception of having been personally affected make people more likely to support policies conducted in the name of preventing terrorism than they are likely to support policies in the name of preventing climate change as a result of something like Hurricane Katrina where there is not such a prevailing personalisation in the way it is (or isn't) memorialised?

[IamMe90]

On the whole I feel like the emphasis on memorial is a little strange and exaggerated to me. Sure, I was in elementary school in Washington, DC when it happened and I remember being somewhat confused/scared - but I didn't know anyone that got injured or died in the attack. So, for me, I haven't felt any more saddened or horrified by the event than any other historical tragedy or mass loss of human life. This is probably because I don't have a strong sense of national identity or patriotism. On the other hand, when it comes to people who were personally connected to the attacks, I don't know why we, as a community, need to tell them to take a moment to remember their dead. That's something personal that they'd do on their own, regardless of these little moments of silence. 

 

There's a bit of a jingoistic whiff to the entire thing, and I don't like to what end that's been used in the past couple decades since the attacks. 

[TrackerNeil]

I understand why Sikhs and Muslims might feel uneasy but it isn't as if people are turning into We Hate Brown People Day. People are remembering the dead.

 

And some people are not. I remember well hearing talking heads and shock jocks speaking openly about attacking nations perceived to be Muslim and indiscriminately killing people. Howard Stern said flat-out we'd be justified in killing old people, babies, whoever. If I'd been of Arab descent, or looked like I was, this anniversary would make me most uncomfortable.

[NoneofYourBiz]

 
I'm not offended, I'm interested from a sociological perspective about how and why it happens, and from a political perspective on whether and how it impacts public policy-making.

I guess I don't understand why you think Americans grieve, memorialize, or remember a national tragedy any differently than any other country does. Can you explain?

[Arkhangel]

I already did. I don't think there's anything unusual in how Americans memorialise tragedies in general, but I think there is an unusually high degree of personalisation of 9/11 in particular.