Universities Did Not Protest for 9/11
Students in American universities remember September 11, 2001, the terrorist attack on America. They do, if they have History or Aviation classes, but how many of them have visited the 9/11 Memorial and Museum in New York City?
On that day, terrorists hijacked planes on American soil and bombed the World Trade Center Twin Towers in New York, another plane attacked the Pentagon and one crashed in Pennsylvania. Hijackers were suicide bombers so dead men tell no tales, but American intelligence attribute that unprecedented, coordinated aviation attack on what it calls Al-Qaeda, an extremist Islamic group.
Forgotten Firefighters
According to History books, 2,977 people died, including 343 firefighters. Students in American universities are there to study facts and figures therefore, they will remember those fire fighters. The world doesn’t, because we don’t remember what happened yesterday. We live for today’s headlines, for today’s cameras. That’s why we don’t remember the 343 men trained to save lives, but perished on 9/11.
Fire fighters are ordinary people. Save lives, that is foremost in their minds, but not all Americans are like that. The 343 died because of suicide bombers who never forgot why they were born in America or grew up there or got citizenship after all immigration requirements were met. Intelligence can call them Al-Qaeda as much as they want, but the hijackers were Americans and perpetrated the crime on American soil. It took many years to incubate and fine-tune that military operation: vetting religious commitment and studying planes. They hit the Pentagon, the famed Pentagon. It's still hard to believe it.
Champlain Towers, Surfside Florida
Students are not like the rest of the world. They have all the time in the world so they remember condo owners who died in their sleep, on 24 June 2021, when part of Champlain Towers, the condominium building crumpled, killing more than 100 people. Why and how? Reports say it was structural problems. However, it’s highly unlikely students will remember Surfside. Why not? Their current actions indicate they don’t remember September 11, 2001, the attack on America, from American soil, by Americans with other allegiances, and not the U.S. They will never die and will net fresh recruits, because students are too busy to remember and analyze.
Nonqaba waka Msimang
Blogger Without Borders
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