I'm Sick of 9/11 Memorials (Vanity)

Self | 9/11/11 | JewishRighter

[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!

[dragnet2]

I'm Sick of 9/11 Memorials

I agree.

I am sick and tired of every time Americans get their asses kicked, the crying and weeping start lighting candles and holding hands, as they all pose for the cameras..

It's just become disgusting..I refuse to watch any of it.

[sonic109]

I watch the memorial for awhile on line ( no tv here for years ) listened to the radio , ,went down to the river and looked for awhile ( I live in NJ and saw it all happen from a rooftop right across the river ) I cried a bit and felt for the families..
THAT BEING SAID ..Where is the sense of anger and retribution ?
If you were in a coma for 10 years and woke up today you’d thing 9/11 commemorated a hurricane or earthquake. You’d never know these people were MURDERED BY ISLAM. Only ONE person at the reading of names had the BALLS to say ISLAM did this..He was an Italian immigrant..Good man ...
The rest of the media has be de balled and neutered and they hope to make us all wimps....

[dragnet2]

By the way "neocon" is a code word for Jew, which also makes me think you're with Ron Paul.

zipper is code word for paranoid idiot...

[sonic109]

Krugman , that Marxist bastard , needs a serious beating , I hope some NYC Firefighter happens to spot him on the streets . The punk will not allow comments on his article. He calls others frauds but he is the all time biggest punk. He wants to throw rocks then run and hide under the dress of the NY Times. Bastard ..Pussy

[sonic109]

Krugman , that Marxist bastard , needs a serious beating , I hope some NYC Firefighter happens to spot him on the streets . The punk will not allow comments on his article. He calls others frauds but he is the all time biggest punk. He wants to throw rocks then run and hide under the dress of the NY Times. Bastard ..Pussy

[bvw]

Supporting _death is in taking away from ^LIFE in order to memorialize DEATH.

It's like this ... each of the three thousand dead on 9/11 had a LIFE.

Yet what are the families, the friends, the survivors asked to remember about them? NOT THEIR LIVES!

Instead they are dragged by the force of a mass mob, politicians and associated publicity seekers all turned to overdone ever-lamentation, to the very site LEAST representative of the beloved one's LIFE. The site of the last horrible few moments of life. Not to recall the honors and goods of a life, but rather to soak soak soak and drown in the bitterness of the last moments of death.

That's sickness. Death.

[donna]

Leave NY to do NY, none of your business then.

You all let the powers-that-be remove Christianity from your public observance . . . 9/11 isn't over for you yet.

[afraidfortherepublic]

I agree 100% with all you say. 10 years ago I was sure that the US would finally solve its border problems. It’s worse than ever, now. Now, we have illegals and liberals and clergy openly arguing that we should have no borders. I could go on and on. but, you get the picture.

[JewishRighter]

Thanks for your post. You know, you are pointing out a very good example of how the wrong mentality infects how the country sees itself and how it wages war and safeguards security. The border illustrates this very well: its just too politically incorrect to actually insist that aliens do not illegally invade our country. That wouldn’t be nice. Its just too politically incorrect to enforce immigration law. Can you imagine the DOJ suing the State of Arizona on September 12 if Arizona had its anti-immigration law in effect?

[FreeReign]

Yet what are the families, the friends, the survivors asked to remember about them? NOT THEIR LIVES! Instead they are dragged by the force of a mass mob, politicians and associated publicity seekers all turned to overdone ever-lamentation, to the very site LEAST representative of the beloved one's LIFE. The site of the last horrible few moments of life. Not to recall the honors and goods of a life, but rather to soak soak soak and drown in the bitterness of the last moments of death.

Families weren't dragged by force. Mobs, politicians and publicity seekers can't make families show up where they don't want to show up.

I heard family members talking about the lives of their loved ones. I didn't hear family members talking about the last moments and death.

"Soak, soak, soak and drown in the bitterness of the last moments" are your words. I certainly wouldn't attribute that to the family members who showed up.

[The Duke]

...there was only one group of heroes that day. Their leader was Todd Beamer. The rest of us, living and dead, were victims.

I couldn't agree more. We Americans have forgotten what the word "hero" means.

[bvw]

The force of the mob is at the top rank of motivating forces.

And yes indeed the mob did command their appearances.

[danielmryan]

“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!”

Bravo! I have been saying this since 9/12/01.

So did Jonah Goldberg in his first column after 9/11. There's a lot to be said for it, as it gets across the message that the U.S. is too strong to be dragged down by terror. It's like taking a blow with a smirk before letting loose with a haymaker.

[patriot08]

The Obama White House is behind a cynical, coldly calculated political effort to erase the meaning of the Sept. 11, 2001 terrorist attacks from the American psyche and convert Sept. 11 into a day of leftist celebration and statist idolatry.

Our voices need to be heard not only at Town Hall sessions or Tea Party demonstrations but in the very halls of Congress. We have to speak out to stop the desecration of September 11th.

NEVER FORGET

"Every 'moderate' Muslim is a potential terrorist. The belief in Islam is like a tank of gasoline. It looks innocuous, until it meets the fire. For a 'moderate' Muslim to become a murderous jihadist, all it takes is a spark of faith.

It is time to put an end to the charade of “moderate Islam.” There is no such thing as moderate Muslim. Muslims are either jihadists or dormant jihadists – moderate, they are not."

Ali Sini

Ali Sini is head of Faith Freedom International. FFI is a grassroots worldwide movement of ex-Muslims and all those who are concerned about the rise of the Islamic threat.

Faith Freedom International Forums ______________________________________________

NEVER FORGET

<"Islam has a proud tradition of tolerance."
Barack Hussein Obama

"It is important for Western countries to avoid impeding Muslim citizens from practicing religion as they see fit"
Barack Hussein Obama

"We will convey our deep appreciation for the Islamic faith, which has done so much over so many centuries to shape the world for the better, including my own country."
Barack Hussein Obama

"The contribution of Muslims to the United States are too long to catalog because Muslims are so interwoven into the fabric of our communities and our country"
Barack Hussein Obama

"I have lived in a Muslim-majority country... I know, because I am one of them."
Barack Hussein Obama

"As a student of history, I also know civilization's debt to Islam."
Barack Hussein Obama

"Islam has demonstrated through words and deeds the possibilities of religious tolerance and racial equality."
Barack Hussein Obama

"And since our founding, American Muslims have enriched the United States."
Barack Hussein Obama

"And I consider it part of my responsibility as President of the United States to fight against negative stereotypes of Islam wherever they appear."
Barack Hussein Obama

"Moreover, freedom in America is indivisible from the freedom to practice one's religion. That is why there is a mosque in every state of our union, and over 1,200 mosques within our borders. That is why the U.S. government has gone to court to protect the right of women and girls to wear the hijab, and to punish those who would deny it."
Barack Hussein Obama.

"I will stand with the Muslims should the political winds shift in an ugly direction." Barack Hussein Obama- 'Dreams From My Father'

America under Obama

Obama has toured the world, apologizing for America and bowing down to Muslim kings and dictators.

Obama has put out an order to stop using the “War On Terror” Label and to use “Overseas Contingency Operation” instead.

Christianity has been banned in our public schools while special allowances have been made for Islamic students.

A Victory Mosque is to be built at Ground Zero with the mayor and the President’s blessing and those that oppose it are called un-American.

Leftists continually fight for terrorist’s rights while trampling all over the rights of Americans

Obama is at the forefront of UN efforts to create Islamic blasphemy laws in the West disregarding free speech.

The U.S. government refuses to call the radical Islamic enemy by name but Democrat party leaders smear average America citizens in the peaceful TEA Party by calling them terrorists simply because they want our leaders to respect the Consitution.

Obama stated in 'Dreams From My Father' long ago: "I will stand with the Muslims should the political winds shift in an ugly direction."

______________

_______________

Watch this moving video. It is the most viewed of any of the 9/11 videos and is now in the Smithsonian.

Be sure to read (at the site) Anatomy Of The Attack and the moving essay,’That Day’ by Steve Golding, a New Yorker who lived through it.

[Gene Eric]

10 years after the bombing of Pearl Harbor, there were no threats of additional bombings. That’s not true today; the threat of terrorism is as real as it was 10 years ago this day.

We are still battling the forces that wish to destroy us, still battling the Political Correctness that’s repressing Christian prayer. This is no ordinary memorial, this is an active war memorial.

[danielmryan]

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.

What you call the "ROP crap" was actually a war aim. The idea behind it was to minimize the number of enemy combatants. I'm surprised that the Sun-Tzu junkies here haven't picked up on it.

Granted that, like all strategies, it made for a bad fit in some circumstances. The Rules of Engagement are unprecedentedly restrictive, and have gotten soldiers killed. [Not just American ones, either: some of my fellow Canadians have been brought back from Afghanistan in coffins.] The overall idea, though, was to convince as many Muslims as possible to not fight - to look the other way when the Coalition troops came in. "I'm not an extremist Islamist, so they are not here to avenge America by killing me. Hence, they are not my enemy. It's not my fight."

If you're interested, one of the reasons why that strategy was decided upon was because Muslims have a track record of fighting each other - something that the Israeli govenment has wisely taken advantage of.

I should also add that, although the deaths of soldiers prosecuting in the War of Terror have been tragic and in some cases arguably unnecessary, the total number of deaths has been far, far lower than in World War 2.

I know there's a lot of criticism of W here over his supposed effeteness. But, as a matter of brute fact, making Islam the enemy makes for over a billion enemy combatants. One billion, over all of the world. The country with the largest Muslim population is Indonesia.

One of my "9/11 mysteries" is why President Bush has been criticized so heavily on both sides when he and his Administration did a solidly good job in the War on Terror. Remember: Pearl Harbor was an attack launched by the military of a country. Everyone knew who was responsible for it. Any soldier of Imperial Japan was ipso facto an enemy combatant, because the attack was undertook by the Japanese government through the Japanese military. The terrorists flew no flags and were not acting as official representatives of an enemy nation. Had they done so, I can assure you that President Bush would have acted a lot more like President Roosevelt.

Granted that nation-building further muddied things, but nation-building is the unquestioned nostrum of the foreign-policy branch of the permanent political class. W can be faulted for not putting his foot down in this area, but he might have decided to go along with it because they were the only experts he had to rely upon. Some things we have to learn the hard way.

Thankfully, the criticism of W here has been more substantive than those inane liberal snarks about him not stopping his reading of "My Pet Goat." (In the real world, we sometimes need time to gather our thoughts when we're hit with something devastating.) I still think he did the best with what he had. Inarguably, his speech on 9/11 was what America needed.

There you go: I'm now a "Bush apologist." I've never met the man, and likely won't, but I still think his strategy has been underrated and he himself is underappreciated.

[balls]

Your two posts on this thread took the words out of my mouth. I’m sick and tired of hearing about the 300 or so “hero” police and firemen They were just doing their jobs - that is the kind of work they signed up for. We rarely hear tributes to the thousands of innocent people from all walks of life who worked in those buildings. I was especially sickened by a firemans comment on the radio yesterday when he said he was angered by the lack of recognition for two firement who were killed by falling bodies while walking away from the toweers.

[Revolting cat!]

All memorials, anniversaries are by and for those who value posturing and cheap symbolism, and for the media to fill time and pages with inexpensive content.

I agree with you what is should be, as long as it is short dignified and to the point.

Save your sentimentality for Jerry Springer and Okrah.

[JewishRighter]

I appreciate your post. Here’s where I think we see things differently: I respect the “hearts and minds” doctrine behind counterinsurgency. However, it has limited application. I would argue that, in the long haul, it is doomed to succeed in the Muslim world in most cases. This is because you NEVER win over the heart or the mind of Muslims. Underneath any veneer of friendship or cooperation, they ultimately are loyal only to their religious ideology and tribalism.

Does this mean there is no place to try to maintain good relations with an indigenous population while targeting the armed insurgents? No. It is a valid policy, but we should never become complacent in the belief that the populace is now loyal to us and won’t turn into enemies at the drop of a hat.

What I was really criticizing Bush for was two-fold: one, in many speeches to and about Muslims in America, he kept up this drivel about Islam being a religion of peace. He could just as well have left the issue alone or said some nice things about Muslims generally without resorting to an out-right poisonous lie which has not befriended the Muslims but emboldened them to exploit this perceived naivete. Now, every time someone wants to suggest that maybe Islam is not so peaceful (such as the Peter King hearings) they are relentlessly savaged as racists bigots and Islamophobes. Bush greatly contributed to that. Debate is squelched and our people are hampered in rooting out the terrorist cells that are forming right now in American mosques.

Let me make it perfectly clear that I liked George Bush as a person and I appreciated the good things that he did; while they were few, they were important and good. I agree with you that he deserves a lot of credit for waging the war on terror vigorously and successfully for the most part (Only “for the most part” because his success in preventing attacks here is not matched by the failure to capture or kill Bin Laden, obliterate the Taliban and confront Iran and its proxies). I also think he hit grand slams with his nominations of Roberts and Alito. His tax cuts were good as was his generally solid support for Israel against the Palis.

Let me just give you a few top examples of why I think W booted things in general:

1. No child left behind;
2. Prescription drug benefit;
3. Amnesty;
4. Lost his veto pen for 7 years;
5. Dubai ports;
6. Harriet Myers;
7. Failure to fight back against the vicious campaign of lies and distortion about Iraq war;
8. Failure to fight vigorously for his federal judicial appointments;
9. Failure to pardon Scooter Libby the day after he was convicted;
10. Failure to call out the Republican Congress he had from 2002 for their drunken spending and earmark binge.

One last point: despite my criticism, no one should think for a moment that I would even mention him in the same sentence with the present occupant of the Oval Office. George Bush is a decent person who loves his country, but simply turned out to be a misguided mushy RINO. Hussein is an arrogant jerk who hates America and is not screwing things up accidentally, but because of a very deliberate life long ideology. He is not just a bad president, but a truly bad person.

[JewishRighter]

ooops. Doomed to fail in the Muslim world in most cases.

“Doomed to succeed”. Ha, ha. Sorry.