And in the process ignores why such commemorations remain important to us as a nation.

Again it comes, for the sixth time now — 2,191 days after that awful morning — falling for the first time on a Tuesday, the same day of the week.

Again there will be the public tributes, the tightly scripted memorial events, the reflex news coverage, the souvenir peddlers.

Is all of it necessary, at the same decibel level — still?

Each year, murmuring about Sept. 11 fatigue arises, a weariness of reliving a day that everyone wishes had never happened. It began before the first anniversary of the terrorist attack. By now, though, many people feel that the collective commemorations, publicly staged, are excessive and vacant, even annoying.

“I may sound callous, but doesn’t grieving have a shelf life?” said Charlene Correia, 57, a nursing supervisor from Acushnet, Mass. “We’re very sorry and mournful that people died, but there are living people. Let’s wind it down.”

Some people prefer to see things condensed to perhaps a moment of silence that morning and an end to the rituals like the long recitation of the names of the dead at ground zero.

But many others bristle at such talk, especially those who lost relatives on that day.

The article goes on to compare 9/11 to Pearl Harbor, Fort Sumter, and even a maritime fire that killed nearly 1100 people in New York harbor. In doing so, I believe the article mises the point.

The events of September 11 still resonate for three reasons.

First, they are the event that we mark in our minds as the beginning of the current war between the United States and jihadi terrorists. As such, the horrific events of that day serve as a pointed reminder of why we fight -- indeed, of why we must fight -- the Islamist foe. The Confederacy is dead and buried. Imperial Japan and Nazi Germany have been defeated and emerged as valued allies. But this latter day enemy is still at war with us, in Iraq and Afghanistan -- and dozens of cities and town where planned terrorist plots have been thwarted. Commemorations of that day's horror keep us focused on what we are up against, and the price of failing to be vigilant and prepared.

Second, 9/11 is an event different than any other in American history. America has been attacked by foreign enemies in the past -- but never has that attack been so directly aimed at our civilian population using the ordinary elements of our daily lives. Like it or not, Fort Sumter and Pearl Harbor are fundamentally different because they were military attacks upon military forces at military installations -- and I've often argued that the reason the attack upon the Pentagon resonates differently with Americans is not merely a question of numbers, but also of our recognition that our military personnel have signed up to face America's enemies while office workers and janitors in a skyscraper have not.

Lastly, we lived those events with an immediacy that we did not, indeed could not, live any other event in American history. Television, radio, and the internet placed every single one of us at Ground Zero immediately We remained there for days There is a psychic connection nationwide that no other event in American history to this point can match. While some are ready to move on, a great many of us still feel an attachment to the events of September 11 and those who died that day.

Is it time to scale things back? I don't think so, and I don't know when it will be.

MORE AT Captain's Quarters & Right Wing Nut House

Posted by: Greg at 02:16 AM | No Comments | Add Comment
Post contains 631 words, total size 4 kb.