This is one of the most brilliant things I've read on this whole... god... this whole horrible episode.
Last Tuesday's effect on me personally has caught me completely off guard. I've been a hair's trigger away from completely breaking down in public (and anywhere else) just from the sheer callousness of this violation, the scale of this massacre, the pictures of people accepting their fate and jumping out of the WTC in a last act of defiance, the phone calls home from those on the flights. It is saddening beyond any words I can muster. Horrifying.
Hell... I'm expressing this on a flight sim BBS of all things... Unbelievable. It is just very saddening.
When I got dumped off curbside from La Guardia to the upper East Side Manhattan YMCA via some fierce cab ride, all my belongings packed into 3 boxes, hmm... 6 years ago or so... I was just a Canadian kid who got invited to a very cool school there... and I was full of, erhm... a bit of second guessing (to put it mildly). I busted off a 3 year relationship, sold my car and everything else I had but for 3 boxes worth, and went for it. I was given the standard warnings about life in NYC (you can imagine)... and my 1st few months there surely lived up to those warnings.
I stayed in a hotel on St Marks and came "home" one day to find the place covered in yellow police tape... A murder had taken place in the room next to mine. My room had no sheets on a bed full of cig burns, and there were cockroaches everywhere. Each morning on my way to school I'd pass 55 dollars to the "landlord" through this bank-like Plexiglass turnstile apparatus. It was insane.
But soon enough I got my own place, got an internship while in school then got hired right out of school. Worked there for a few years at great firm and made some fantastic friends.
What quickly became apparent to me is that New Yorkers are unlike any other people. They may seem a bit hostile, initially, but that's not actually the case. They are vital. They don't wake up to meet the day - they wake up to *challenge* it. And within, they are some of the warmest, most caring and passionate people I have ever met.
It is utterly devastating what has happened. On so many levels.
I attended three different lectures given by architects on the WTC... They were amazing buildings. In Canada I used to see them in movies, or in the opening scenes from NYPD Blue. In New York they became the backdrop of my walk to work. And now they are... simply... no more. Is that heinous? Yes... but it pales in comparison to seeing a couple step off one of the ledges, hand in hand, to certain death. I cannot fathom what was going through their minds...
My hurt is only now starting to turn into anger. Inevitable. And I want the !#$##'s to pay for this, and hard. I mean really... if it takes a decade, if it is taxing to the extreme, I don't care... I am prepared to hold up my end of the bargain, for as long as it may take for the folks in the services to hold up theirs. If resolve falters, just one look at a picture of some poor woman falling head first to her death from 80 floors will be enough to keep that in check.
I am by no means yer typical hawk-like person, not eager to war. Yet I am seething... and want revenge *now*...
But gosh... Popeye's idea... It is one of those things where it's so brilliant that it should be easy to spot... yet it rarely is. Look at what's happened... In the wake of this thing, Israel and Palestine seem to have made good on a cease-fire, Pakistan has come out supporting the US and asking that the Taliban give up bin Laden, the United Arab Emirates have now come out cutting ties with Afghanistan and the Taliban, and the overwhelming majority of Middle Eastern countries have expressed condemnation of this attack.
It's kinda funny... but 2 weeks ago the big news was of a ship with Afghanistan people seeking refuge in Australia... after being denied it both there and other countries. Who now would refuse them? We didn't know who the Taliban were two weeks ago... But now we've seen plenty... videos of women getting their heads shot off in soccer stadiums for chrissakes. Christ, I'd put them up in my apartment if it there's no place elsewhere... What they are trying to leave behind erhm... who could blame em?
Today also marked the first time that porn got eclipsed on the search engines. It's amazing how much the world can change in a day.
But here we are.
Aw dammit I'm rambling like mad...
The gist is... what if the 1st strike in this war was purely humanitarian? What if it was not about "infinite justice", but instead offered some hope to Afghans - who may want bin Laden and his goons eradicated as much as you and I? bin Laden's days are numbered, most of his Allies are now shutting him out. Divide an conquer...
An epiphany I had today was when thinking about Dresden, or the bombing of London and Berlin. It was basically policy: hit civilians and crush their will to fight. Well... it finally happened on our side of the pond. Do any of you feel like laying down your weapons? Would you rather surrender now that risk seeing more of this?
Not at all... We all now finally *know* just how flawed this is. So what if... man could you imagine turning on the news and seeing a report on how the armed forces have begun their campaign... camera cuts to massive air drops of food and supplies for the oppressed peoples of Afghanistan who've suffered greatly under the Taliban regime? The look on bin Laden's face when he realizes he has lost...
Totally naive... yeah... but at the very least it's an interesting idea.
