nmah5542.xml

nmah5542.xml

born-digital

story

yes

no

2003-06-09

"Witness history?" That's rather bold. I didn't "witness history;" I saw things happen. I remember sitting in class, surrounded by hicks (it's a Tennessee high school, go figure). At first, some people thought it was a joke. Must've been some sick joke, if you ask me. Later, once everyone had a chance to see the towers collapse on TV, things went from bad to ugly. People were freaked out, but not in the way you'd expect. In the hallways I heard shouts of "We's goin' to war wit' Palestinia!" and "I can't wait to get 'em back!" (excuse the approximate vernacular). Even then, it was an instant reminder of the absolute stupidity of man, especially of the American teenage male.

Yes, but not in the way most people claim it's changed their lives. If anything, I am far less patriotic than I was before, after seeing my fellow citizens become nearly feral with rage against people they don't know, all the while managing to somehow retain their superiority. It made me realize something I'd never really thought of before - WE ARE NO BETTER THAN ANYONE ELSE. (And that's putting it modestly. On another day, I might have written that we are the scum of this planet. Today, however, I've decided to retain a bit of tact.) Then came the wave of "No other nation can truly understand what we've gone through." Yeah, and George W. Bush was fairly elected the president of the United States... But I digress. Essentially, the events of September 11th, or more specifically the actions of most American citizens after September 11th, have shown to me just how vacuous American patriotism can be.

I think we all need to remember that IT CAN HAPPEN HERE, TOO. Maybe now we can try to sympathize with people in the third world, where this stuff happens all the time, often on a much larger scale. Approximately 3000 people died in the attacks on September 11th (according to howstuffworks.com); 5000 to 7000 people have thus far died in our latest war on the people of Iraq (according to iraqbodycount.net as of June 9, 2003). And now, we've just added more fuel to the anti-American fire. I don't know when the next retaliatory attacks will come, but they probably won't be too long. In short: what goes around, comes around; what comes around, goes around. But maybe, just maybe, we can break the cycle of hate. Maybe we can just stop worrying about who's killing who, and start worrying about who's helping who.

No, I did not fly a flag. Yes, my feelings have changed; when I see the flag now, I am immediately and thoroughly nauseated.