9/11/01 in memoriam

Anyone who has any appreciation of the power of symbols would realize that the orchestrated event of Sept. 11, 2001, was not just about targeting expensive real estate. Nor was it simply an arbitrary occasion for misguided suicidal acts of 20 deranged or ideological fanatics to mercilessly take along some 3,000 innocent bystanders in their perceived supreme act of self-sacrifice. No. It was a deliberate act to cripple the soul of a nation. To be sure, the assault on important sites (World Trade Center, White House, Congress and the Pentagon) had been compared to the Japanese surprise attack on Pearl Harbor in 1941. 9/11 has been described as a great wake-up call to the benchwarmers in American politics who refuse to take responsibility for the consequences of American actions in global politics. The comparison is misplaced. The Pearl Harbor attack was a great military strategy that failed. 9/11, emergency #01, was an assault on the American psyche that has succeeded. Symbol has triumphed over the practical reality of casualties.

Terror aims to instill excessive fear that results in quivering anxiety. For all the hoopla about how we have successfully combated terrorism, we seem to have demonstrated nothing but paroxysms of panic. The recent explosion of a flashlight battery crippled one of our premier airport hubs in Southern California for more than three hours. This is the response of a harassed and harried community that has surrendered its self-confidence to the purveyors of fright. Now, we even refuse to board into a commercial flight well-known Sen. Ted Kennedy just because his name appears in someone’s watch list.

Already, we seem to have surrendered the protection of the Bill of Rights just so some sectors get the certitude that measures are being undertaken to keep the burglars out of the house way after the valuables had already been spirited away. Our actions with the Guantanamo captives and the Abu Ghraib prisoners appear more vengeful than calculated acts of accountability. Pursuit of our treasured legal due process heritage has taken a back seat to expediency. Paying the cost of fear has been high.

Numerous deaths later in Iraq, I am reminded of the little war America waged against Filipinos more than a century ago, with the propensity toward genocidal tactics conducted under the guise of developing the institutions that will save the unschooled into the practices of democracy. 9/11 Fahrenheit, or Centigrade, amounts to the same thing. We have come to meet the violators of our own cherished principles. It is US, although we arrogantly put up a face as we quietly try to confine everyone to quarters while we internally quake in our boots. Our sense of security measured against our expenditures on defensive measures at the expense of programs of offense against innumerable ills and maladies is currently perceived as an even split, if the presidential contest is any indication. This November will show which view prevails.

In a choral reading, students at San Vicente Elementary School, during its first general assembly for the school year last Friday commemorating the victims and heroes of 9/11, recited excerpts from the speech of U.S. President George Bush about the War in the Gulf delivered on Aug. 15, 1990. In part, the speech said: “Our job, our way of life, our own freedom and the freedom of friendly countries around the world will all suffer if control of the world’s trade of oil reserve falls into the hands of one man, Saddam Hussein.” President George Bush the Second a decade later would finish his father’s goal in the Gulf to get Saddam and secure the oil. For that, it has cost us a thousand lives more since George II declared that hostilities were over. This does not include the local casualties. In another dramatic choral speaking, members of the Student Council would ask: “Is there still a way out?” An answer echoes: “Yes, Peace. There is nothing so queer about this, nothing so elusive. But only, this is the most abused word. It’s meaning drowned with the successive bang, bang of guns.” Minds, so young, trying to get their minds around the complexities of their war-ravaged and fear-obsessed world.

Sixth grader Clifford Tergeyo capped the recitations with this prayer:

Dear God,

We sadly remember today as a day of terror.
Three years ago, some three thousand men,
women and children
became victims to acts of hate.

Ours is a time of horror.
We realize that as human beings,
we can both create and destroy.

We pray today
that we shall be children who decide to create.
We pray this day
that we shall be people who celebrate.
We pray that we shall treasure
the gift of life
that is given to all of us,
and value this precious gift
that is also given to others.

If today,
we sing the songs of joy,
we laugh the screams of hope,
we dream the promises of peace, and
we dance the steps of gracious celebration,
we shall have won over the forces of hate,
and those who died three years ago today,
shall not have died in vain.

Allow this to us, of us, and for all of us.
This is our solemn and fervent prayer.

9/11 defines a profound crisis of our time. It invites of everyone fundamental decisions of faith, hope and love. No less than our individual souls, along with that of the nation, are at stake. Let us pause for a moment of silence.