... so eight years after 9/11 I still feel myself cringing at the mention of it, not because it hurts but because it's a reminder to me of the self-inflicted wounds this country is suffering through.
See IM conversation below... (My comments in bold)
thats sad
Maybe so, but it's a lot of what I think about on 9/11
honestly, this is the first 9/11 after the second 9/11 that i've thought about it
This country went absolutely insane after 9/11 and i'm not proud of it, i'm outright disgusted by it, the way we treated our own people, our own arab americans, how we've killed people in two wars because of it,
I remember where I was on 9/11, how it felt, how other people felt, and I remember for about a week feeling proud of how the country came together.
me 2
Then I saw the Bush administration start using it as an excuse to take away our rights, to legalize and enforce race based discrimination (though that didn't last for more than a few months)...
Sorry, I didn't mean to spew vitriol on you,
I just meant to let you know how I felt.
However, this is the first 9/11 that I may actually not be ashamed of my country, so we'll see how the day goes.
really? why, b/c bush isnt president anymore?
No,
because we have a chance at not using 9/11 as a political tool this year,
hmm
and hopefully no one will think it's ok to use the recordings of the people on the hijacked plane as a patriotic tool
Notice i said "chance"
yeah
Really though, we're on the way out of Iraq,
we're addressing civil liberties issues brought up by the bush administration post 9/11,
we're closing guantanamo
... things arne't so bad anymore, and the fact that they're happening on Obama's watch can be credited to Obama.
But the mere fact that Bush isn't in office anymore doesn't make it better... it's the actions
yeah
well the guantanmo closing isnt going as well as we might think
we've said we're closing it
but based of NPR, its going slow
We still got a half year.
Oh I know.
yeah it was sad to listen to
but we're in the middle of fixing the economy, foreign policy, healthcare, immigration,
civil liberties,
true
but does that make it any mroe fair to those we've done an injustice against?
just ... there's so much shit to do I think I'm ok with giving a little leyway, even though it's at the expense of the freedom of a few hundred people. It doesn't make it better, i tjust makes it understandable
We just thought the same things
true
n oyou're really right,
we really should have taken care of the guantanamo thing first,
however the people we're going to be releasing have been moved to areas where they're being taken care of very well
i mean i understand the whole prioritziation thing
and the people we aren't planning on releasing are definitely not being abused, they're being monitored by the red cross and other international agencies now
but he just said what was needed to be said, and then walked away from it to go through bureaucratic slowness.
not being abused anymore
so, again... comparatively, we're not torturing people anymore (wow, who would have thought I'd ever say something like that), we're treating prisoners humanely, and those who we're stuck not releasing are at least being treated well, not just well for prisoners is the key
yeah, at least they get to play basketball and watch tv now
Well, depriving people of their freedom is bad enough which is what we're finally ONLY doing now... (sigh)
can you see why i've been ashamed of our country for so long? I still have to rationalize the current "better" conditions in guantanamo
yeah
definitely not your usual angle
but i do see why you would be ashamed
why we should all be ashamed
just because someone fucks with us doesnt give us a right to go barbarian and nazi style on them
especially when its been proven that it wont drive results.
just because we arent gassing them or testing shit on them doesnt make us any better than what has been done to people in the past
well, it doesn't give us the right to go barbarian and nazi style on everyone including our own people.
right.
b/c honestly, tell that to the folks that are being fucked with
oh hey at least you werent in a concentration camp
well you kind of were
just a different era
basically like the internment of the japanese
we've got just as ugly a past as the rest of the shitty regimes out there, but we just "arent as bad" as them.
right.
and we pin that on our chest and feel great about it
right.
well ... it feels terrible
its good to talk to you
even if it is about this
so yeah, I'm not sure whether i'm going to be proud of my country this year or not.
just not sure how i feel
Right.
You too man, back to work.
yeah, whatever that is :