9/11 : 18

New York City, New York

The last attack on America in NYC and Washington D.C has reached eighteen years. While not a rounded out number, this makes the anniversary of the terrorist attack the legal age to vote. The picture above is the annual light tribute that gets lit up on this day at the location where the twin towers once stood.

Ever since this was started seventeen years ago, the lights would usually go on a few days before and a few days after 9/11. Recently this was pointed out by two local journalists a few days ago on in a brief discussion on social media by the NY Post’s Nicole Genaris and the Wall St. Journal’s Katie Honan. Which got me to thinking especially since this day doesn’t seem to be garnering much remembrance anymore in my opinion. Especially with the way corporate news is covering it now, which is coming off in an obligatory fashion (speaking of fashion, the fashion industry holds it annual galas and designer shows on the week of this tragic day).

So I propose that maybe these lights could be lit for other tragic anniversaries that made the attack on 9/11 possible. Like lighting the tribute on August 6. The day when George W. Bush received his Presidential Daily Brief about Bin Laden’s determination to attack America.

June 2001, a few months before President Bush was warned about the attacks

And also lighting it up for the horrendous decisions and policies of the national tragedy’s aftermath that continue to kill civil service workers. Like on September 13 2001, when George W. Bush’s EPA commissioner Christie Todd Whitman announced that the air quality was safe to breathe in Ground Zero, even though the air downtown was still thick and acrid with visible residue. This lethal falsehood has led to the slow deaths of hundreds of firefighters and police men and women. Which still continues to this day.

 

The light tribute should also commemorate the date October 26, 2001 with the ratification of the Patriot Act; written by frightened and calculating congress members under the rubric to protect the nation from terrorism but wound up eviscerating the first and fourth amendment rights of American citizens, which is what also what Osama Bin Laden set out to do. This abominable legislation has led to crackdowns and clampdowns of protests and the assembling of them by citizens. And also to wanton abuse of needle in the haystack searches of everyone’s personal phone and internet data records by federal agencies, notably the NSA which Edward Snowden exposed only a few years ago.Thanks to the Patriot act, which the majority of congressional officials didn’t even get a chance to finish reading but still voted for it except for Barbara Lee of California, unpermitted personal data usurpation has become normalized and is the business model of the notorious tech corporations Google, Amazon, Facebook and Twitter.

That’s what this day means now. And thousands of Americans and millions of lives in the Middle East and Africa through regime change and proxy wars to prevent terror have been sacrificed in the name of homeland security. While the lights are a solemn reminder to everyone whose relatives unnecessarily died that day, the lessons of 9/11 still have not been learned, as we are told we are still under threat almost 2 decades on.

 

And in another awful post 9/11 consequence, turns out the tribute of light is also a problem:

ABC News:

The illuminating installation on display for seven days leading up the anniversary of the hijacked airliner attacks that brought down the two World Trade Center towers, killing nearly 3,000 people, may serve as solemn beacons of remembrance for most people. The illuminating installation on display for seven days leading up the anniversary of the hijacked airliner attacks that brought down the two World Trade Center towers, killing nearly 3,000 people, may serve as solemn beacons of remembrance for most people.

But the exhibit also coincides with the annual migration of tens of thousands of birds crisscrossing the New York region — including songbirds, Canada and yellow warblers, American redstarts, sparrows and other avian species — that get confused and fly into the towers of light, circling and expending energy and threatening their lives, according to officials at New York City Audubon. But the exhibit also coincides with the annual migration of tens of thousands of birds crisscrossing the New York region — including songbirds, Canada and yellow warblers, American redstarts, sparrows and other avian species — that get confused and fly into the towers of light, circling and expending energy and threatening their lives, according to officials at New York City Audubon.

Andrew Maas, a spokesman for NYC Audubon, told ABC News on Tuesday that the artificial light interferes with the birds’ natural cues to navigate. Circling within the lights can exhaust the birds and potentially lead to their demise, he noted.

“We know it’s a sensitive issue,” he said, adding that NYC Audubon has worked for years with the 9/11 Memorial & Museum and the Municipal Art Society of New York, which created the exhibit, to balance protecting the birds while providing the temporary memorial.

 

We will never forget 9/11. But it’s interesting how much we, meaning our appointed leaders and corporations, will fuck it all up trying to get everybody not to forget.