As I sit down to write this post, multiple TV stations airing September 11 documentaries or dramas, I do not fully know where to begin or where to go with this. As an event that has struck the very heart of America there is no way I can begin to encompass it, nor am I eloquent enough to write a moving story of the bravery that surged from men and women involved with the attack. I guess the best thing I can write about is growing up in a post-9/11 world.
I was ten years old when the attacks occurred. The day itself is one of the keenest memories I have of that time in my life. I was attending school at Schaeffer Academy in Mrs. Deedrick's fifth grade class. I forget specifically how the news got to Mrs. Deedrick, but remember her telling us of the attacks and how we would remember this moment for the rest of our lives. She said this day is like the day John F. Kennedy was assassinated. She told us that our children would not understand what it was like to experience the tragic day and know it only from textbooks. She said life would never be the same.
That is the unique part of my story. That is the difference between me and Americans older than me. I was ten at the time of the attacks. The word normal didn't - couldn't - exist for me. I and my peers have grown up, developed our thoughts and opinions, and looked to the future in a world far different than the world of anyone before us for the last century. We did not have an illusion of an America that was perfectly safe. We did not have the utopian view that the whole world got together. That value - our innocence - was robbed from us on that fateful day.
Since then, we have grown up knowing multiple foreign wars. Many of us don't know what an America uninvolved with war would look like. These perpetual wars we have lived have caused many to become disillusioned to the war on terror. We have grown so accustomed to it that we don't really think about it anymore. Sure, when the moments arise where the wars are shoved into our face we will react accordingly, but not in the same way as older generations. We reverence them because we are supposed to, because we know they go through difficulties we cannot imagine, and because they are fighting for our freedom. But it seems so hallow. My peers and I are growing tired of perpetual wars in foreign countries. The Arab Spring has shown many that the people of the Middle East can find their own way to democracy without U.S. intervention. We are sick of seeing our friends and neighbors shipped off to foreign lands coming back scarred either physically or mentally. There is a growing sentiment among us: bring our troops home.
We have lived in a world where government seems to be an all-encompassing power. As we grow into our 20s and seek independence from our parents, we are seeing that a new power is taking their place - the government. Going to the airport and getting fondled by the TSA has become acceptable to many adults, but the youth say "This is my person - my property! No matter the security I am master of my own body." With almost constant access to the Internet, the youth is able to find information the mainstream media does not publish. We read reports of wire-tapping, aerial surveillance, invasion of property, and seizure without warrants and we cry "Where is the America of the Founders?"
This is an interesting point. The older generations are far removed from civics or history classes. They learned years ago about the Constitution and have since then been able to forget what it says. But my generation, we have learned of the Constitution the same way the older generations have. But because we are learning of it, we compare it directly to what America is doing now and we see there is a serious disconnect. The Founders fought against a tyrannical government that claimed to own citizens. They replaced it with a government with clearly limited powers to promote individual freedom. Today I fear we have forgotten about the Founders and their vision for America.
The propaganda machine has not pushed its way into education completely to dismiss these issues and replace it with a nationalistic sentiment that everything the government does is in your best interest. Rather, the youth is left in a sort of limbo where we have to figure it out on our own. Some join the older generations and accept these things as necessary to preserving security. Others, like myself, follow Thomas Jefferson and question the government's actions and are never trusting of it. He said that when people sacrifice their freedom for the sake of security they are deserving of neither. As I grow up I want nothing more than to experience the world in its fullest, not to be fenced in by government agencies and laws that cover the world in bubble wrap and tie my hands so I don't hurt myself.
Let me conclude with this. I love America. I love the freedom she promises and I love the people who cling to that freedom as dear as anything. As we remember 9/11 my hope is we all send a prayer of thanks to God for his grace in founding this country, one of thanks to the men and women who serve our armed forces for their valor and courage, a prayer of comfort to the thousands that lost loved ones in the attack, and a prayer for guidance in the movers of the world, that they will see the best course to be taken in the years ahead.
As we remember 9/11 I wish people to look at it in two ways. I want them to consider the generation of Americans who have known only the post-9/11 world and what they have experienced - how this event has shaped their life. Secondly, I want them to remember the power we experienced when the nation as a whole came together and worked as a whole; to know that when free people unite for a common cause, no power can overcome them.
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