Posted on 09/11/2011 8:59:46 AM PDT by JewishRighter
I don't know about other FReepers, but I am sick and tired of the 9/11 memorials. Maybe you read my headline and thought I am an insensitive jerk, a troll, a liberal or a lunatic who doesn't have the sense to realize the importance of marking this day appropriately. You'd be 180 degrees wrong and that's just my point. I mean I'm sick and tired of the way this day is remembered. I mean the weepy, maudlin preoccupation with the "tragedy" of 9/11. Of course, I don't mean that there should be no solemn observance to pay the proper respect to the victims and to comfort their families. I just mean the obsessive singular focus on the aspects of loss and so-called tragedy to the exclusion of what I believe should be the true American, patriotic form of remembrance.
For reference, I think we should look at the one day in our history that comes closest to the events of 9/11, Pearl Harbor. A study of public reaction from contemporary resources shows a nearly uniform sentiment: dignified rage. Recruiting offices around the country were mobbed with men who shared this dignified rage and knew in their hearts that the correct and proper thing to do is to destroy the vicious and treacherous enemy who dared to commit such wanton acts of murder and destruction on America. Beyond those who were willing and able to bear arms, the entire nation rallied around the flag and their government in full throated support of an unapologetic war to visit annihilation on the perpetrators.
Mind you, the righteous anger of America that blazed on December 7, 1941 and the unity of purpose to destroy our enemies did not wane in 4 weeks or 6 weeks or 6 months as it did after 9/11. Politicians did not tell Americans to just go out and shop or otherwise behave as if nothing had happened. Fierce American resolve from the President down to the private in the foxhole to Rosie the riveter kept burning brightly from the day of the attack until and even after Hiroshima and Nagasaki were smoldering piles of ash. Setbacks along the way did not diminish, but renewed, American determination to see vengeance through to victory.
Of course, there were memorials for the soldiers, airmen and sailors killed at Pearl Harbor. Although I haven't had the privilege to visit, I understand that the Arizona memorial is a most solemn and sobering tribute to the men who died that day. But I find no evidence that Americans reacted to and remembered Pearl Harbor with such intense focus on the victims and their families or that they regarded the attack as a "tragedy". It wasn't a tragedy - it was an outrage, it was the worst kind of villainy, it was evil incarnate and Americans back then knew what to do and how to behave. And, I might add that the American culture of the day was more stoic and more dignified in their sorrow. You didn't have every single surviving family member making tear filled speeches and reading poetry. Again, for those who might misunderstand, I am not taking one iota away from their pain and suffering, but I believe the preoccupation with that part of 9/11 diminishes its significance and the national resolve and sense of purpose that are needed to finish the job of eradicating the barbarians who would visit a thousand 9/11's on us every day if they could.
Separate and apart from the tragedy of the loss of life for the victims and their families, the message of 9/11 and its remembrance on the national level is not one of tragedy at all, but should follow the example of the Greatest Generation: 9/11 should be a solemn, dignified remembrance of loss but it should also be a time to reflect on the vicious, evil atrocity that was done to our country and to renew our united determination to obliterate every last vestige of the people and the ideology that brought death to our shores.
G-d Bless America and Bring Death to Her Enemies!
Forgive me for supporting something that is appropriate.
(Post tome of finger-shaking righteous indignation here)
I agree. Here’s what I wrote on another thread:
In the past decade, key members of al Qaeda were either captured or killed by the U.S. Military, the mastermind of the 9/11 attacks is in Guantanamo and Osama bin Laden was killed.
In my view, THIS is what we should be commemorating today. No disrespect to the victims, but reading off their names in solemn sorrowful rememberance seems masochistic and weak. Maybe if it were just a part of the day. But it seems like a lot of people are using the day to grab a hanky and have a good cry.
We should be reading off the names of all the dead terrorists, not the victims. We should celebrating with fireworks and parades, and recommitting ourselves to defeating and obliterating the enemy. We should be trumpeting to the world what we have accomplished against these animals, and pumping ourselves up to keep the pressure on.
Today should be a pep rally, not a funeral service.
Yep, and it has a whiff of penitence about it, if you ask me. It very subtly accepts the premise that we brought the attacks upon ourselves.
Always the Shabbos/Shabbat before Purim in “honor” of Haman the Amaleki (Amalekite).
In fact, FDR would have been dumped into the Potomac River -- wheelchair and all -- if he had tried that kind of nonsense.
Are you sure you read the essay? I don’t want to stop the memorials, just change the focus.
About the firefighters, do we know of any who didn't go in, who might have said to themselves, "This is stupid"?
About soldiers, most are not heroes. In most wartime cases, at least before the PC era, a soldier who deserted would be shot.
These people might have been brave, but being brave alone does not make one a hero.
ML/NJ
“””The volunteerism thing is the community organizer’s way.
Yep, and it has a whiff of penitence about it, if you ask me. It very subtly accepts the premise that we brought the attacks upon ourselves.””
Well said.
I love your post! Not to get off subject, but I voted for W twice and I can make you a list of the good things he did on the back of my business card, because listing the dumb-ass things he did would take far too long. The ROP crap was just one of them.
Good article. We as a nation tend to commericalize everything, like Christmas and Easter. Those days should be remembered as Holy, not for trying to see if we can outspend or act holier than our neighbors.
9-11 should be solemn. Not long winded speeches, no over drawn TV specials....
I like what Isreal does. I forget what day, but for ten minutes{ I also forget the length of time} everyone stops and stands still. It is a quiet way of remembering what happened and who we lost.
God Bless the USA....may he see us thru the troubles.
Some interesting thoughts there. If someone had been in a coma for the last ten years and woke up to witness all of these 10th anniversary memorial ceremonies, they’d probably think these were remembrances of a tragedy in which nearly 3,000 Americans lost their lives in an earthquake or something.
It does the soul good to grieve a loss such as this, and on a national level.
So you are wrong.
I have to agree. It’s embarrassing to watch a nation come together as “victims”. I can just picture the jihadists sitting back and gloating at such weakness.
You want to strike back at the terrorists and commemorate 9/11? Rebuild the damn Twin Towers! NOW! And forget the weepy memorial crap. Make it a shrine to free enterprise! And rebuild our economy! Nothing says screw you to the terrorists better than good old American success!
Well said.
My own feelings...Since the media is comprised mostly of strongly liberal individuals, watching them memorialize events that they helped create through their various advocacies, and continue to exacerbate to this day, gives me a queasy feeling. I don’t doubt the sincerity of many of the memorial participants, and bless them for it, but the media presenters and most politicians are, to me, highly suspect in their sincerity. Watching a liberal media wax all emotional and patriotic about that terrorist attack makes me feel as I perhaps might have if, in 1945, Hitler had performed a memorial event for Jews.
Excellent post, very well said!
My favorite is what Poles do in Warsaw on August 1st to commemorate "Godzina 'W'", at 5:00 PM the time of the start of the Warsaw Uprising, everybody stops what they are doing for one-minute. Cars stop and continuously honk their horns, also church bells and air-raid sirens ring out for that minute.
I think we spend too much time wallowing in it.
Now before you flame me, hear my side. I had a meeting scheduled at the World Trade Center on that morning. Through slow paperwork, we had to postpone our meeting until later that afternoon. Not more than fifteen minutes after I hung up the phone from rescheduling the meeting, the first plane hit. I never heard from my client again.
My wife and I know 9 people who were killed - a few quite well. My wife has several students whose fathers were killed. We were very closely affected by this event.
But ten years on, I wonder if it might be time to put away the tears (but not the remembrance) and move on.
I heard an interesting comment by Chris Wallace the other day on the Imus show. He said to Imus, that we seem to spend a lot of time morning this event, and mentioned a 9-11 widow who said: “Every year since it’s like I have to have another funeral for my husband.”
9-11 affected us all greatly. It was an incredibly saddening event that deserved tears. But we can’t keep crying every year over it. We can be pissed, we can be resolute, we can be rightfully indignant, but if we continue to mourn so visibly every year - so many years after the event - we play right into the terrorists hands. They got a bargain in the deal. Not only were we emotionally devastated in 2001, but we continue to be emotionally devastated each and every year to follow.
I think it might be time to move on emotionally, and to begin to look at 9-11 with the same emotion we view Pearl Harbor today -
- Don’t forget, and make sure it doesn’t happen again, but put away the misery and stand strong.
Part of the problem here is that if intelligent people really looked at the last 20 years from a historically objective perspective, they'd ask themselves why the hell the U.S. government has been waging these mindless wars for "democracy" in these sh!t-holes in the Middle East . . . while the radical Wahabbist Muslims who have governed in Saudi Arabia for decades are still there, and still have U.S. presidents kiss their @sses.
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