Talk of the Town

“We knew we had just witnessed thousands of deaths; we clung to each other as if we ourselves were falling.” John Updike’s words in his article Talk of the Town perfectly describe the thoughts of everyone who witnessed the horrific events of September 11^th, 2001. Heroic firemen rushed in to save the thousands of people in the towers; people fled the building in terror. All of America watched as the inevitable collapse of the towers played out on live television right in front of our eyes, leaving every witness with a haunting sense of helplessness as they watched the towers fall.

I have witnessed the events the events that took place on 9/11/01 multiple times. I remember the day it happened. I was five years old. We were driving home when the radio broadcast cut to the scene playing out in New York. I did not understand it, only that something was not right. My mom did her best to explain it in terms that I could understand until we arrived home and turned on the news. I remember seeing the north tower burning, and the second plane hitting the south tower. Luckily I left the room before the towers fell down. I thought my experience with the events of that day was a thing of the past, until I visited a museum in Washington D.C. six years later.

The museum had the remnants of part of one of the towers on display, and a small anteroom played the news clips from the infamous day. People covered in dust and rubble were interviewed, crying as they talked, describing their experience. Many had worked in the towers and had watched their colleagues throw themselves out of windows eighty stories above the ground to escape the heat of the fires. I cried as I watched the clips. It was more powerful than watching it live, because this time I could understand what was going on. It was like rewinding the clock six years and reliving it.

John Updike offers an opinion very similar to my own regarding the action that should be taken following this terrible day. He argues that American freedom is something that shouldn’t be limited just to diminish the chances of something like this happening again. I believe that increased airport security measures are a good thing, but that should be the extent of the measures that should be taken. Updike offered some very insightful words on freedom. “It is mankind’s elixir, even if a few turn it to poison.” Additional rights should not be sacrificed so that an incident as rare as this has a slightly smaller chance of happening.

Susan Sontag takes a very interesting perspective on the events of 9/11/01. She has brought into the spotlight both some holes in the American response to this event, and some American hypocrisy. American journalists and the government have denounced this deed as “cowardly.” Sontag denounced them as hypocrites for doing this. “And if the word “cowardly” is to be used, it might be more aptly applied to those who kill from beyond range of retaliation, high in the sky, than to those willing to die themselves in order to kill others.”

Sontag has a point. America has attacked from beyond the point of retaliation in the past. The atomic bombs were dropped on both Hiroshima and Nagasaki during World War II from airplanes. Napalm strikes as well as Agent Orange were used during the Vietnam War in order to minimize American casualties. I do not believe that Sontag wishes for American soldiers to rush blindly into their deaths on the front lines. She merely is pointing out that America cannot call the terrorist attacks on 9/11/01 cowardly. The terrorists did a heinous and awful thing, but they were not cowards.

I believe that Sontag has higher aspirations for America. She wishes for peace in the Middle East and for America to be able to back up its judgment of the rest of the world. I believe that the only way to tackle this problem is through peaceful manners. We will never be able to defeat al-Qaeda through violence. We instead must turn to diplomatic and educational methods. Six years ago, I read a book called Three Cups of Tea. In the non-fiction book, a man named Greg Mortenson built over fifty schools in Middle Eastern countries. Mortenson believes that the only way to defeat the warring terrorists based in that area of the world is through education. Many children do not receive education in those nations, and they turn to terrorist organizations looking for work. In order for them to be able to analyze their options and make a better humanitarian decision, they need to be educated. Securing these children peaceful jobs will eventually dry out the terrorist organizations and will bring peace to an area that has not seen peace for centuries.