The memory is still vivid in my mind, we had just recently moved to Doha in Qatar, and we were living in a guest house with various other people from my dads work. I came home from I think school and walked into the room, the first thing I noticed was the absolute silence, it was the TV room, with the TV on my right and all the adults were sitting on the couch. As I turned to the TV in question, I saw a burning building and did not at first realize its full significance.
I was a confused young lad, but a quick explanation from my dad cleared things up. I remember shock, disbelief, excitement and lots of confusion. I asked my self why any one would want to kill them selves in such a scary way. I admit though, I think I was a little bit excited about the concept of America being under attack, alas I was a young lad and young lads are easily excitable by war and the such that doesn't involve them. What really bothered me at the time, was that they attacked the tallest building in the world, so now it wasn't the tallest any more. My young mind failed to realize the innocent lives that were lost in the incident.
But as I grow older, I continue to realize the complete significance of this event. 9/11 was the turning point of the millennium, it was like an omen for this new millennium; a bad start. It is what set the foundations for everything that has happened in the 9 years since the incident. Just imagine, if all that money spent hunting terrorists had been invested in AIDS research or world hunger? Imagine if all those millions effected by the after shock of the event; being the whole population of Afghanistan and every Muslim on the planet as well as the families of those lost in the tragedy, were not effected? Imagine all the dreams that were broken. the dreams for a better world which could have been fulfilled. Imagine all the great people who were prevented from obtaining their rightful jobs or positions due to the event, imagine what they could have done. Of course I'm actually seeking some of the smaller less obvious points here but as we all know how significant this event really is. I can really go on about this, but I don't see any point in doing so.
There were a few positive things that came out of the event, we are now safer than ever from terrorism and I'm pretty sure they added safety features in skyscrapers amongst other things.
That being said, we cannot undermine the killing of ~3'000 innocent people. Today, it does not matter who did it, or why they did it or even how. Today, it is these lives that we remember, lives that were simply going off on an ordinary day of work to never return again. Normally I would say that we all die at some point in life, and it is fates decision to choose when. However, just imagine what a cruel and horrible way to die that really is.
Without undermining all this however, let's talk about what has become of the world. I find the way that the Americans have started to justify this has really come out of hand. A prime example would be the Community center that a group of Muslims were trying to build close to "ground zero" Which actually wasn't really that close. Now obviously I know that this was over hyped by the media who obviously wanted to hide some other important thing. However, it is really the reaction that gets to me.
Relatives of those who perished in the event I think for the most part don't mind it so much. They understand that their loved ones did not die to be used as an excuse to limit others from their religion or culture. It is those Americans who live far, mainly not even in the city who are creating the uproar. It really is more of a psychological reasonings, were the media presents a single point in a specific way to make it more of a fact than an opinion.
I supported the building of the community center, not as a Muslim but as a human being. I know that to the Muslim community of New York, this center would serve a grim reminder of events passed, of events that they are then thought to never allow to happen again. I realize that I don't actually live in New York, but neither do most of the critics. This is where they say to me, "But you don't live in America, you don't understand the pride we have in our nation"
But then I ask you my friends, how can you have such a large amount of pride in your nation, but have no faith in your fellow Americans? Americans that are no different than you in the pride of their nation, but only different in the religion they follow.
What I believe 9/11 really did to destroy this decade, and the next few, was dash all hopes of peace. Things were finally looking up, sure, there were many civil wars around the world, and sure there was still USA in Iraq, but it all seemed like it could be ended. And then terrorism struck and it succeeded in its true goal; to strike terror into the hearts of people. Doing so, it ensured a never ending war, because my friends, terrorism can never be ended unless you get over the fear of it. It is only when a terrorist sees that his plan would not have the desired impact, or a suicide bomber realizes that his life will be lost in vain that it will stop.
Another interesting thing I would like to note, is the worlds reaction to this event. I realize it was a tragedy, but I honestly doubt the reaction would be so big if it wasn't the United States that were attacked. I guess some sort of an example would be the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
A marginally larger number of innocent people perished in those bombings, and to me, they were terrorism at its worst. The whole purpose of the bombings was to display a new weapon, to strike fear into the hearts of the enemy, to force them to surrender by scaring their people. The bombs were used on completely innocent cities, cities that were not directly involved in the war, but rather were simply a location for the population to live their lives. Now I can go on, but the point is that while the world reacted to this in one way, it was not nearly as decade changing as the relatively speaking, smaller attacks on the World Trade Center.
Why is that? Is it because this was the year 2001 and that was 1945? Is it because "alls fair in love and war?" Or is it because it was the powerhouse of the world; the United States of America that no one dares stand against that was attacked?
(p.s. this post was mainly written on 9/11/10, but I wasn't able to publish it until the 12th)
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