Thoughts About 9/11

Looking back on September 11th, 2001 through the lens of current affairs, I can’t help but wonder what happened. 

What happened to that spirit of national unity we all felt for almost a whole year?

What happened to that outpouring of concern and help for our neighbors that followed the horrible devastation in New York, Pennsylvania, and Washington DC?

What happened to that sense of being one nation – one people – standing strong together against threats from terrorists around the world?

Now, there’s no national unity. 

Now there’s only an outpouring of concern for the family, friends, and neighbors with whom we agree. To hell with all those other people.

Now we’re a fractured nation with factions facing off, almost like people of third world countries. You know. Those places where people are oppressed. Those places where half the population lives in poverty, and the other half lives in splendor. Those places where religion is wielded as a weapon.

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To say we have lost our moral compass is an understatement. Just look at how people talk to, and about others, on social media and sadly, sometimes to their face. People who are on both sides of this terrible divide that is destroying what was once a country we could all be proud to call home.

Just look at how many families are torn apart, with people no longer speaking to each other because of their political or religious beliefs.

Just look at how too many people in authoritative roles still treat people of color.

Just look at how people in positions of power in government are afraid to make a move without the approval of their particular party leaders, so nothing gets done, and the general population pays the price. 

I’m not alone in my feelings of despair right now. While doing research yesterday in preparation for sharing this blogpost, I came across this terrific article, Never Forget That We Were at Our Best as a Nation After 9/11, written by David Leibowitz in the West Valley View in 2017. Already he was feeling the slide away from what we were in 2001 into what we were becoming. Here’s just a short excerpt of his terrific article that follows the paragraph where he mentioned all the places that Monday morning 9-11-2017 where people shared remembrances of where they were on the first 9/11, paid tribute to the fallen, and honored the men and women who worked as first responders:

“There was a lot of jabber, a lot of never forgetting. Still, something felt like it was missing. It took a few days, but finally I put my finger on it – the thing I wish we would all never forget, the quality that would lift those two words out of the realm of marketing and place them back where they belong, as an exhortation not to mere thought, one more social media post, but to action.

You know what we should never forget? What it meant to be an American in the aftermath of 9/11.”

Bears repeating:

Can we stop forgetting what it meant to be an American in the aftermath of 9/11?

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In doing research yesterday, I found another interesting article. This one published by the Pew Research Center in 2021: Two Decades Later, the Enduring Legacy of 9/11, and it’s well worth looking at. It’s a long article, but if you like facts and stats as much as I do, you’ll appreciate the information. One particularly fascinating tidbit of the report was how quickly after September 11, 2001 things started to slide away from that spirit of enduring unity that initially swept the nation.

This lady who is normally a steadfast idealist and patriot is struggling, like many others, to hang on to some scrap of that spirit of enduring unity. It’s hard with what society is throwing at us, but I’m also a survivor and a fighter, so I will continue to use my one voice to call for reform in government. Reform in our judicial system. Reform in how people treat each other.

And if my one voice is joined by another voice, then another, and… Maybe we can become a better nation again.

Every year since 2001, I usually listen to this song “Where Were You When the World Stopped Turning?” by Alan Jackson. It’s a poignant, patriotic song and it always touches me deeply. This year, I thought about skipping, but then decided maybe it would help me find that scrap of spirit I need.

That is all.

Thank you for reading.