WARNING! POTENTIALLY OFFENDING RANT BEGINS HERE!
Once every year, on the anniversary of the falling of the Twin Towers, we 'come together' and feel pity for those who were left behind when some really clever terrorists killed a whole bunch of people.
Let's start on that fact. These were some unusually clever terrorists that were still on the news. Now, usually terrorists on the news are really stupid failures. If you're really good, you're either not on the news at all. That, or you're on the news because what you did was huge, successful, and very hard to ignore. These particular terrorists fall into the second category of 'clever'. So yes, this was huge, successful, and very hard to ignore. In fact, nobody ignored it.
So we sent aid, counted up the numbers of our dead, and somebody actually counted the number of the people affected. (How could you count the number of the still living people affected? It's a chain reaction, 'we are one' and all that, it would be everyone.) Granted, I don't know much about this. Sorry, I'm a little bit of a hypocrite. However, hypocrisy is nearly impossible to avoid.
So people mourned. There were services. There were speeches. That year, maybe even the next. We remembered the people who had died exactly one year later. 365 days. Okay, take a deep breath. Is everybody okay now? We've had around 12 months to get through this, mull it over.
No. They are not okay.
Still people are not okay. Still people must be reminded what somebody else did ten years ago. Whatever happened to forgive and forget? Obviously whoever said that first was not an American. We hold grudges. Remember Bin Laden? Now he lives in a pineapple under the sea. Okay, now are we okay? We got revenge, so that wipes out the 'forgive' part. But no. Killing someone responsible will not do. We will never forget. And they refer to themselves in the royal we! Are we not to have individual opinions on this? Never.
Think of it from the perspective of someone 'directly affected'. Think of it from the point of view of one of the around 1,600 people they estimated had been affected. How might it feel that one day a year when you're forced to remember what happened to your husband? Your wife? Your son, your daughter? Aunt, uncle, brother-in-law, sister, lover? That day must tear you apart every single year.
People will give you pitying glances the whole day, and every pair of eyes that laid upon you that day would weigh so heavily. It would feel like they were inside your head. Because that one day of the year, they are. They know who and what you're thinking about. Because they don't want you to forget the ones you loved, and they feel personally responsible for making you feel better. But they aren't bad people, they just want to to the right thing.
Remember them every single day if you don't want to forget them. Don't reserve one day of the year to remember the laughs, the kisses, the smiles, and all the good times.
WARNING: POTENTIALLY OFFENSIVE COMMENT BEGINS HERE
ReplyDeleteI think the "not forgetting" part is less about the people who were killed and more about realizing we'd been caught with our pants down, and suddenly becoming aware of a growing problem.
Imagine you live on a nice quiet street with your like-minded neighbors. And one day you wake up and the house three blocks over was on fire, burning to the ground with people still in it. You don't know them, but maybe you know some of their neighbors, and they're showing the fire on t.v. You find out that the people who did it live in Glen Carbon, people who went to one particular elementary school. You never spent much time thinking about them even though you sort of know that they aren't like most of the people who live in Glen Carbon; and really not like the people in Edwardsville. You didn't worry about them much because hey, live and let live, right?
But it turns out the whole time you've been living your life, ignoring them, they've been hating you. Not because of anything you specifically did, not even you personally, but because they don't like people who live in Edwardsville. They really don't like _girls_ who live in Edwardsville, especially not the ones who like to write stories, dress how they want and think for themselves. And imagine that those people in Glen Carbon not only hate you, but they're raising their kids to hate you too, and they were taught in their elementary school that the Great Pumpkin told them that they have to kill you because you don't go to their school.
Now, keep in mind that not everyone in Glen Carbon hates you, but just one small elementary school. There are a lot of people in Glen Carbon who don't go to that school, or any school. A lot of people don't believe in the Great Pumpkin, or if they do, they think he is a nice pumpkin who brings candy on Halloween and doesn't care what kind of pants you wear or who you like to kiss on Halloween.
But all your life, you never realized that not only are those crazy Glen Carbon Pumpkin Patch-ers hating you but they were actively planning, raising money to buy matches and gas, and trying to burn down as many houses of people in Edwardsville that they could. They're hoping to burn so many houses that Edwardsville descends into chaos, and no one will move there and work there or buy a house there. And if burning houses down doesn't work, they're going try going to your school and argue in court that the school can't keep them from wearing pumpkins on their heads, and that furthermore, in order to show respect for the Great Pumpkin, EVERYONE has to start wearing pumpkins on their heads, too.
And they're recruiting, so now there are people in Troy and Hamel and Glen Carbon who didn't go to that school but who agree with their beliefs. So you can't really tell anymore who might be a Pumpkin. You value your freedom to not wear pumpkins on your head, and to write your stories and wear your clothes and kiss who you want to on Halloween but you're worried about the growing influence of the Pumpkin People, and their irrationality. And the economy in Glen Carbon isn't great, so there are a lot of young people without jobs who don't have anything else to do besides burn down houses in the Pumpkin's name.
Your life would change a little bit and every year, on the anniversary of the house fire, you'd think about it and remember the flames. You'd remember the awful video of the people trying to jump off their roof to escape the fires - innocent people who never did anything wrong, except live in Edwardsville and write stories and kiss their date on Halloween night. Because that fire wasn't a private event that just impacted the people who lost their loved ones that morning - it was something that changed how people live in your town, and it changed how you look at the world and the people in it.
I see, that is a very good way to put it.
ReplyDeleteI'm just going to mention that Gerard Way witnessed it on his way to work, and wrote a song about it and is now in a band that I am in love with.
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