September 11th, 2001

I was a senior in high school that year. I had come into the AV Department where I worked part-time during high school to eat lunch and probably leech some anime off XDCC bots on IRC when one of the other guys who had graduated a year earlier but came in from time to time burst in and said a plane hit the World Trade Center tower. Initially I thought some small plane or something hit it by accident, but we flipped on the TV. As more information came in it had turned out to be a passenger jet full of people. Stunned we then watched as the second plane hit the other tower. By then we, as much of the nation realized that both towers were hit intentionally and that extremist Muslim terrorists were behind the hijackings. Then the third plane hit the Pentagon. Then the fourth plane, possibly destined for The White House, went down in Pennsylvania after some brave souls on board retook the plane from the terrorists, only to send it spiraling to the ground. In just 12 hours after the attacks, none of us knew what to say. Several people in our department tried to place calls to fellow friends and family in New York City, finding it impossible after communications were blacked out or overloaded. The school system initially delayed letting the general student body know of the incident until closer to the end of the day, and not even telling the middle and elementary schools at all. In the next few days, everyone had questioned why any man could even do such a thing, could even fathom taking planes filled with innocent lives and slamming them into two of the tallest towers in the world, killing more inside and outside the buildings. Why? For your God, whom has never spoken to you and you’ve never seen? For an ideology that only you and your brothers and sisters of your faith know and understand?

The aftermath of 9/11 simply hasn’t been just remembering those who have fallen and those who reached out to help, but it has reached out into our very daily lives. Politics, economics, media, faith, and social tolerance, a lot of things have changed since 9/11. Some day we were naive and ignorant before the attacks, that it “woke us up” to face the grim world in which we live in, but were we really that complacent? Did we see the rest of the world with rose colored glasses while the rest of the world saw us with contempt and hatred?

“Haters gonna hate” comes to mind, to coin one of the internet’s most recent forced memes.

But the one thing I think people must remember, especially when considering the Muslim mosque in New York City or the Quran incident in Florida, is that people are scared of what they don’t understand. People’s fear converts into verbal and physical violence, and it displaces other people who simply want to live quiet, simple lives. The one thing that has contributed to my dim view of religious faith is how people use religion like they use politics, war, and personal identity, and that is to increase their self-importance over others. Radical Muslim groups claim to be fighting for their fellow men and women, and for their God, but the truth is many of them simply want to feel more important over everyone else, and in the case of the Taliban, rule over everyone else. Religion, and faith, is widely interpreted. I myself would like to believe in a central force in the skies, guiding the human race to the ultimate meaning of life, but realistically, we are a de-centralized group of human beings all over the world who can only fend for ourselves and family, friends, and others. All of the world’s nations and communities exist to provide for each other, in order to raise families and live their lives out.

President Obama spoke of tolerance, a lot of his opponents think our tolerance makes us weak. Both are right, we must be firm and resolute in showing these radical groups that we, and the rest of the world, do not tolerate those who seek to undermine human achievements and human rights by dishonoring themselves and their families by taking the lives of those who aren’t fighting anyone and simply want to live in peace. At the same time, not all Muslims around the world are terrorists, and they should be afforded the benefit of the doubt, and especially in this country where the freedom of religion is what founded this country and our values and beliefs. Should they build a mosque near Ground Zero? Honestly, it’s a bit insensitive to those families who lost loved ones nine years ago. However, at some point we need to rebuild and move on. Ground Zero cannot be a hole in the ground forever, it honestly should have been rebuilt with an even bigger tower eight years ago to show these terrorists that they will never win, they will never break this country or any other country with their cowardly acts. In many respects, that mosque should serve as the starting point for American Muslims to show the world that they are just another religion, another faith that millions practice every day, and like Christians and Catholics, Mormons and Jewish, can co-exist with everyone else in this world, and they don’t need “Freedom Fighters” to show the world for them.

The tagline has always been “Never Forget”. By now, it should just be “Always Remember”