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The fetishization of September 11 is overwhelming and needs to end.
This morning we are confronted with news anchors dressed in funereal clothing, a day-long replay of the live coverage of that morning five years ago, dozens upon dozens of commemorative services, a president who could not be found during the actual event gadabouting around from place to place to bask in the afterglow of his most shining moment, and, what is possibly the longest-lasting legacy, a day that promises more worthless partisan bickering and personal division over "what this day means".
Even my five-year-old, who was not yet four months old on September 11, 2001, is being forced to "remember" an event that she will never have a personal memory of, as her school indulges in this particular and unseemly obsession. She and her classmates will always live with the consequences of that day and the shameful choices we the people have made since then, but at the very least they should be allowed to face that life afresh and not with the constant perverse infatuation their parents insist on clinging to.
We are cursed with the ability to conjure up not just our imperfect human memories but our intricately detailed recordings of daily events; personal memories fade and reshape themselves over time, but we can be re-assaulted with the exact moments through our technology, and the people responsible for using that technology have no compunction about doing so again and again as long as it seems to suit their less-than-altruistic purposes. And so the memorable becomes unforgettable, and the process of recovering from the emotional trauma is subverted repeatedly until no one is allowed the chance to move on. The families and friends of those who were killed have their own cycle of grief to bear, but now every person in this country is forced to re-tread that cycle for themselves, seemingly ad infinitum.
Thus has the magnitude of the day been rendered out of proportion for most people. We are treated to the news of disaster and tragedy every single day -- a quarter of a million people killed in the South Asia tsunami, tens of thousands dead in earthquakes in India and Pakistan, nearly as many people dead from Hurricane Katrina as from 9/11, and the ongoing and escalating death toll of Iraqis and Americans alike in the sham war perpetrated in the memory of those killed in New York, Washington and Pennsylvania. Somehow we are able to soldier on in the wake of all of these tragedies, and in fairly short order. That is the natural progression of life -- we stop for a bit to reflect on what was lost, and then we move on. But we are not allowed that basic provision with regard to this anniversary.
Before the smoke could even clear from the skies of New York, it was crystal clear that there were those who saw in the tragedy an opportunity to make bold initiatives impossible to achieve when calmer heads prevailed, and it has been to their advantage to keep these wounds and divisions as fresh as possible. And though the news media have proven irrefutably that they are shameless hucksters and opportunistic parasites of the worst kind, in their parasitism they are not essentially guilty for exacerbating the situation that the politicians foster. We, the people of this country, need to acknowledge our unseemly obsession, to recover our sensibility with regard to the progression of human life, to reassert our natural ability to overcome obstacles and setbacks. Wallowing in self-indulgent and self-absorbed maudlin sentiment, fueled by the the hypocritical machinations of politics and media is disgraceful and ultimately the poorest possible way to honor the innocents victimized five years ago and the innocents just beginning their lives now.
In 2019, Charlotte and the entering freshman class at Beloit College will have no first-hand knowledge of what happened on 9/11....but I suspect they will consider it some sort of genetic memory....much like some kids born in 1964 and later "remember" the JFK assassination.
Posted by Karan [URL] at 09/11/06
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