nmah6247.xml

nmah6247.xml

born-digital

story

yes

no

2003-09-12

I began my day with an 8am class. It was Critical Reasoning at the Art Institute of Dallas. We were scheduled for a break in the class (which was four hours long), but instead of a break, we finished up early and left at 10 or 10:30. When we left class, the entire break area/lobby was crowded with students who had all been there for at least an hour chattering about it all. There were two televisions in opposing corners of the room, and half of us were glued to them, watching the ongoing coverage.
I remember coming downstairs and not knowing what was going on. Someone explained it to me, as I rarely pay attention to those televisions. As I watched, and listened to the news, I began to get upset. They were talking about mobilizing units. My dad is high on the list of mobilization when it comes to security. He's in the Air Force, a Senior Master Sergeant in Explosive Disposal.
He and my family were stationed at Holloman AFB, in New Mexico.
The school closed for the day after reports of the possility of one of the missing planes may be heading to the downtown Dallas area.
Most of the students left immediately, some stayed and watched, waiting for rides. I made arrangements to ride with a friend, who also volunteered to give another classmate a ride home. So, as I awaited his return (he had a Honda motorcycle), I attempted to contact my family.
Unfortunately, and unknown to me at the time, they were on-base doing some shopping that morning. The base was locked down, and no-one was allowed on or off without clearance. I was unable to reach them for most of that day.
When I finally made it home that morning, it was probably 11 o'clock. We turned on the television, and my friend sat there watching the coverage all day.
I was unable to watch, I just couldn't. I'm a very peaceful person, and it just shocked me too much. I ended up in bed and slept almost the entire day away.

Since then, I have lost some hope for the human race. I know that, deep down, everyone is capable of great things. I know that we can all find a non-violent solution to every problem. But, I also know that it is easier for humans to resort to primitive, violent, activities to get their message across.
I just wish they wouldn't.

I even created a website dedicated to discussions about ways to obtain a world peace, although its traffic has not been as high as I had hoped. I think I only had fifteen people even visit it in the past year.

I have always thought of myself as an optimist, but the way it was handled, not only by these 'terrorists', but also by our own government, media and even the people, just doesn't seem right.
The media played it every way they could. You couldn't walk ten steps without seeing a sign commemorating it, or using it in an advertisement. You couldn't watch television without some coverage at least every 15 minutes. They even took the twin towers out of some movies due to release that year.
The government used it to push forth a 'war on terrorism'. Just a reason to attack an already dessemated country. It has even gone on far enough that it was used as an excuse to attack Iraq, which is now more recently being thought as unrelated to 9/11 in the first place.
And the people. We the people, who took all that our media told them, and judged these terrorists with one side of the truth. These terrorists had a reason, but we didn't want to see that. We just wanted them to pay, of course, we didn't think that the terrorists that did this died doing it...we wanted the rest of their families and friends.

We should remember that yes, it was a shock and tragedy. However, instead of attacking back, and further perpetuating the cycle of destruction, we could have found a more reasonable way to resolve it.
Violence begets violence, they say.

No, I didn't fly a flag after 9/11.
My feelings concerning the flag have not changed. To me, it has no real meaning. The flag is just a piece of cloth to me. I may be American, but before that, I'm human, and all of humanity, whether they be American, Armenian, Afghani, Iraqi, or any other nationality, holds a higher priority to me.