Remembering the fallen and the world before Sept. 11, 2001

On the morning of Sept. 11, 2001, I was on my way to work when a friend paged me.

Texting by phone wasn’t really a thing, yet (smart phone were still a few years off), but we were lucky enough to have two-way texting pagers as employees of a little company called SkyTel in Jackson.

“A plane flew into a building in New York,” she wrote. “I think it’s an attack.”

“Surely an accident,” I replied.

A short time later, the world knew the truth. It wasn’t an accident. The United States of America had been attacked, not just in New York, but at the Pentagon just across the river from the nation’s capital, and in a foiled hijacking that ended in a crash in a Pennsylvania field.

We watched in horror as the majestic twin towers of the World Trade Center crumbled in the next hour and a half, knowing that we had just seen the fates of thousands end in flames and ash and twisted, melted glass and steel. We watched as thousands trudged through a rain of ash, faces obliterated by the same stuff their feet sank into.

First responders, as always, rushed in the save those they could, many paying the price for their bravery. In Manhattan that day, 2,753 people died. Of that number, 343 were New York City fire fighters, 23 were police officers and 37 served with the Port Authority.

At the Pentagon, another 184 people died when a plane crashed into the building. Near Shanksville, Penn., 40 passengers and crew died when their hijacked plane plowed into a field, probably as a result of the hijackers abandoning their plan for even more destruction when the passengers and crew attempted to retake control.

Of the 2,977 people who died as a direct result of the attacks, 75 to 80 percent were men. Victims were of all ages, from 2 to 85. About 60 percent of their remains have been positively identified to date. Since then, more than 7,400 people have filed death and personal injury claims with the Victim Compensation Fund for illnesses suffered as a result of the attacks.

Many of us will never forget that day and the horrors revealed in the coming weeks and months. On the other hand, many Americans who had yet to be born that day are now looking forward to casting their first ballots in November. Those young people have never known a world before 9/11, before the war in Afghanistan or before the Iraq War, Syria or the thousands of seemingly random terrorist attacks in the Middle East and across the globe. They don’t remember a world where Islam was just another religion.

Young people with little to no memory of 9/11 don’t have memories of a world where families rushed to the gates at airports to greet their loved ones, or where being scanned and taking off your shoes wasn’t part of getting to your departure gate.

They don’t remember a world where the words “homeland” and “security” are inextricably linked, and where the 22 federal agencies contained in that newly created bureaucracy stood apart, from the U.S. Coast Guard to the Federal Emergency Management Agency.

Before 9/11, entering an office building was a matter of walking through the doors. Now, it’s likely that you and your belongings will be scanned. You may have to present ID and sign in. And those concrete posts now lining the sidewalks? Those are meant to prevent vehicles from crashing into buildings.

If you are a Muslim in the United States, chances are high that you have experienced discrimination, some of it violent. Hate crimes and assaults on Muslims and Islamic institutions have increased dramatically.

In truth, it’s much harder to be an immigrant of any kind in America.

We’ve all added words and phrases to our vocabularies, such as the “war on terror,” “terror alert” and “axis of evil.” And we’ve grown accustomed to being watched and listened to as the Patriot Act made it easier for the government to monitor our communications. Your face has likely been captured by cameras, and the image resides in a database somewhere.

News is something that we now get from all corners of the world, especially through the internet and social media. Despite the proliferation of many more options in 24/7 news delivery, we don’t trust the news nearly as much as we did. Newspapers are struggling as never before. American media is less independent and more delivered through the filter of profit motives and special interests. It’s no wonder, then, that few of us trust the news—or our other public institutions—as we did before 9/11. Instead, cynicism is the order of the day.

On this anniversary of the tragic events of Sept. 11, 2001, it’s important to remember and honor the fallen.

It’s also wise to remember that reality was much different before that day. Perhaps, the future will provide a world where fear will be replaced by trust once again. Maybe not. Perhaps that’s a choice each of us must make.