What Have We Learned?

Today is 9/12 which means it has been 11 years since the terrorist attacks of September 11. I like the rest of the people who will read this has not forgotten that day and will probably always remember what I was doing when I saw the news that day. The deaths of thousands of people are always tragic and when done for such a terrible reason just makes it that much worse. However it has occurred to me over the last eleven years that we tend to forget a few things when it comes to big tragedies, the most important of these being the “what did we learn?” aspect of the events.

As a man who has a great love of history, and it is always important for me to put events into perspective. Just think of every tragedy we have ever had, or better yet let us just look at the tragedies that have happened in this country.

No words for this picture

 I’ll start in chronological order:

1898- Sinking of the Maine

More fun then living in Maine

The Maine was a battleship commissioned by the US navy, after being sent out to protect US interest in Cuba during the Cuban revolution from Spanish control. Sadly the ship met tragic end when it was blown up (most likely this was done to create the outrage to go to war with Spain). In the end what we learned here is that the United States was ready to be a major player on the worlds stage and also that certain people in this case journalist had the power to sway popular opinion to war.

  

1915- Lusitania 

All the fun money can buy

I swear every major early tragedy took place at sea, but as it happened the Germans warned the people that if a ship entered British water where they had U-boats stationed they would get sunk. I don’t know if there was a major lesson here but it was the event that helped take us into another war in this case World War One.

1941- Pearl Harbor

Pearl Harbor

I don’t need to explain Pearl Harbor I just need to point out that once again we are being taken into war. Also maybe we learned the consequences of not only blocking out Japan from resources but also moving in on their territory. Also I tend to think about in this time I think about when people tell us about all the rights we tend to have in America. This event lead to us seeing the US government taking the rights of the Japanese-American citizens taken away. Which is another sad reaction to tragedy, our rights being taken away.

You know the funny thing about Pearl Harbor is that it was the biggest tragedy for our country until 9/11 and it seems that it has long since been forgotten by some people. Also a strange pattern I have seen is that these tragedies tend to put us into a state of war. I bring up these three historical events because it shows how often history repeats itself. Also I have to point out that it seems we just never learn do we.

However I did not create this blog for the sake of a history lesson I want to now turn my attention to 9/11. I sit here before you and ask you what have we learned? I can tell you up to this point is seems that we haven’t learned anything. We never stopped and learned why the people attacked us on 9/11 (maybe over 50 years of western occupation of Middle East land), we never asked the questions of what to do next. We never how we should handle this situation, we already had the answer WAR. The only thing we have at the end of the day is what came about due to the events of 9/11. Two pointless wars that sucked out trillions of dollars, and I think most importantly the continuing loss of rights.

Carlin

The death of thousands will always be tragic, but I think in these situations we need to look at the whole picture and see that in the shadows of 9/11 what ended up being more damaging is the loss of rights. The Patriot Act, the Bush presidency using 9/11 to defend warrantless wiretappings, drone strikes without warning. We now live in a world where we have people to fear that the government is always watching them. Sadly though it might be true, we lost life on 9/11 we have lost lives in the two wars and for this struggle to gain revenge what we got in return wasn’t even the oil we were promised. No instead what we were given in return is a big fuck you the American people and the furthering of power for wealthy and the loss of rights for the rest of us.    

For a little more fun of a read please read my Review of Aladdin 

Also try David Zafra's blog on commonly misunderstood movies 

David Hollingsworth and his post about "Nice Guys" 

Finally two episodes of Daves of our Lives with me as the guest again

First, Kids these Days:

Finally Relationships part 2