Twelve years ago today, at approximately the time that I am writing this, a plane was crashed into the Twin Towers. A defining event of a generation, the catalyst for the sweeping changes that would overtake the next decade.
I do not remember where I was when I first heard about the Twin Towers. I hear about many people reminiscing about where they were when they first heard the news, how they stopped and watched as the towers came crumbling down. The horror, the shock, the sudden change in worldview. But I do not remember, and I do not care. The towers fell that day, and stood nevermore.
What I do remember is the aftermath. I have pictures of meeting pilots in the cockpits of flights from before the eleventh, instead of the impersonal windowless doors. I have gifts. I have memories of airport security before they threw you into pornoscanners, violated your privacy, confiscated your property and held you for interrogation for nine hours without a lawyer. I remember.
I remember the Patriot Act being passed, rushed through in the aftermath. I remember the criticisms that it was too hasty; a knee-jerk reaction to the terrorist attacks. I didn't read it then, but perusing it now, I realize how much we actually lost that day.
I remember the justification for invading Iraq, for invading Afghanistan. I remember the laughable rhetoric of "weapons of mass destruction" in possession of Osama Bin Laden. I remember the rejected offer of complete transparency, to cooperate with all inspectors for the search for such weapons.
I remember when weapons of mass destruction referred to actual weapons, rather than a pressure cooker stuffed with nails.
I remember the thousands dead in the war that followed, the videos of marines shooting civilians and the wounded, the torture, the disappeared persons. I remember the outbreak of drones, the tracking of noncombatants, the double tap of first responders, the assassination of relatives without trial.
I remember the no-fly lists, the profiling, the discrimination.
I remember the rapes, the murders. The so called "rebuilding" of Iraq. The contractors all the way down. The guns and caviar index.
I remember Guantanamo Bay.
I remember Occupy, the protests, the kettling. I remember the agent provocateurs, the sabotage, the attempts to discredit. The training of local police departments by the Department of Homeland Security. The anti-terrorist techniques. The militarization of police.
I remember the NSA leaks, the tracking of everyone at all times, the information stored and abused, the astonishing lack of oversight. I remember.
There are children who have grown up in this world, who have known nothing else. Who know of no reason why we are in the world we are in, who know of nothing but the status quo.
Would the world have been any different without 9/11? I'm doubtful; 9/11 was merely a rhetoric, an argument to aggressively push for agendas that were already there. We would have seen the same progression, only more slowly, with less public acceptance. But the world has changed; our privacy, our bodies, our homes invaded. All for the sake of a security that doesn't exist, against a foe that doesn't exist, either. They no longer protect us from the other; they merely protect themselves from us.
I remember a time when we were not the terrorists. And I wish for that time to come again.