story96.xml

story96.xml

born-digital

story

yes

no

2002-02-28

I had a 9 O'Clock class that day in Intro
American Government. I had not seen the news
before entering class and heard about the airline crash
as I came out of class. I immediately tried to find out more info on
online, but the lines were jammed. Finally, I went out and
bought a radio so everyone in the dept. could hear what was
happening.

Like everyone else, I was stunned and the rest of the day
was spent watching the events on tv ond talking through
the events with friends. The deliberate, single-mindedness
of the act struck us all as hard as the number of deaths.
There was no goal to the destruction-no hostages to release,
no policy to change, no specific act to protest. People
died because they were in a building which was a symbol of
America to fanatics.

The university held multi-faith candle-light vigils and a
series of symposiums on Islam, Terrorism, and American
policies to help people deal with the event. The aftershocks
are still occuring, but the initial question remains
unanswered: What kind of mind plans and condones such an
unprovoked attack on innocent people because they are
different.