I've been overseas alot.
The rest of the world has much of it's opinion about the U.S.A. and the Citizens of the U.S.A. based on (primarily U.S.) media coverage of the U.S.A.
Anyone living in the U.S.A. knows that a vast majority of the Citizens of the U.S.A. couldn't give a rat's bellybutton *who* Michael Jackson was seen with for example.
But the 'media' based in the U.S.A. (now) mainly exists to 'sell copy', which is why you had 10 times as many stories about Princess Diana (I never bore any ill-will towards Princess Diana mind you, she was pretty attractive and seemed to generally 'have her feet on the ground) and her life as there were about Mother Theresa.
9/11/01 was the biggest bloody nose suffered by the U.S. as a Nation recently. It was the biggest bloody nose suffered by the innocent civilians of the U.S. ever. There's alot to mourn about.
But my idea of mourning is the friends and relatives of the victims being recognized for their sacrifice/loss by the U.S. Government. Make a memorial somwhere, have the friends and relatives make the call about what it should be. Have the President, Senate, Congress meet these friends and relatives over an extended period of time (so the President, Senate, and Congress can keep on top of their day to day jobs).
Any media coverage is going to be a joke to say the least. We're going to have a bunch of commentators and media personalities acting somber and shaken but let's all be honest - most of the people you are going to see on TV probably lost 1-3 nights of sleep over the whole affair, mainly worrying if there was going to be a NBC attack in the big city where they work. Any look or demeanor of mourning or sympathy is most of the time going to be really good acting.
And from the point of view of the other Nations in the world, the media coverage is going to be an embarrasment for me.
Because in the world history of the last 20 years, we got off pretty damn light.
People in the U.K. felt bad about the attack, because they had an idea of what it must have been like in NYC on that day. A fair # of people living in London have probably seen the aftermath of an IRA bomb attack. The same goes for many who live in Ireland.
People in Eastern Europe could sympathize and probably did. They've seen *worse* in recent history. I have been in the proximity of several mass graves in Eastern Europe (the result of the recent conflicts in Bosnia and Yugoslavia) and the death toll for those locations tops 9/11/01. And those losses were brutal and personal on a very individual level. One was women and children. They weren't going to kill them at first, just rape them (the women that is, I guess they just left the children outside the buildings to hear their Mothers scream) and demean them. Then they decided to kill them afterwards. Another was Fathers and Sons and other Men of military or potential military age. They started to kill them. Some escaped into a nearby forest, where there were 'military' units waiting for them - they were hunted down...in pairs, in small groups, etc. and executed.
Remember Rwanda? 300,000+ murdered. Mostly with edged weapons. Let the U.S. 'media' say what they will about France, but the French Foreign Legion was the only force to initially intervene - with an armored reconaissance company. That's some pretty big balls in my book.
My point is this - 'our' (U.S.) 'media' is going to paint a picture that the 'Nation' is 'torn with grief'...while 'our' (U.S.) 'media' spent more time covering some dumb bellybutton Hollywood based 'scandal' story or something of like unimportance while an ocean or so away helpless people were being murdered by the types of people we (the U.S.A.) are supposed to stand against because of the very reasons our Nation was founded. Don't get me wrong here - I'm in the military and I understand that we cannot deploy to every atrocity to save the day. My problem here isn't with the U.S.A. at all, or the Citizens of the U.S.A., or the Government of the U.S.A., or U.S. foreign policy. It's with the .00001% of the U.S.A. who determines what our media reports and how they report it - and I think they live in dreamland, don't have a clue, and don't care. Usually it doens't have too much of an impact on Joe the car mechanic in Wisconsin. But in this case I think Joe would be embarrased.
In short, from the picture our 'media' is going to paint for the world 'on our behalf' (i.e. to generate some ratings) it's like we broke one of our legs and we are crying about the pain to people who have been undergoing chemotherapy treatments for 20 or more years.
The contrast that hits me is this - Nazi Germany, Imperial Japan, Communist Russia - all pretty brutal regimes. And the U.S.A. (any many other Nations) all went to war against them. Maybe not 'only' for 'Noble Causes' but alot of the rank and file who volunteered to actually get killed 'bought into' volunteering because they believed in said 'Noble Causes'. And while those conflicts were going on, the 'media' (which consisted of persons you could actually call 'reporters of the news' back then) didn't have Nation-wide 'weep-ins' with sappy dumb-ass music on December 7, 1942. They were busy reporting the current status of the conflict on several different continents.
Ask yourself honestly - would you really miss out or care if there wasn't heavy media coverage of the 11SEP01 'anniversary'?
I think most of the Citizens of the U.S.A. do feel bad. I don't think they don't care about what's happened to women and children and other innocents around the world - I think our piss-poor media coverage never informed them enough that they could care. After all - working 8 a day with 2 kids and a significant other at home probably leaves little time for research on current world events, especially before the internet was widely available and developed.
I'd say fly your flag at half mast for the day. Send a week's pay (or however much you can afford) to the Red Cross or the 9/11 'fund' or the 'dependant's fund' for the NYC policemen and firefighters. And don't turn on your TV - you're generating ratings for a group of people that don't really care and have nothing in common with your 'average' (if such a thing exists) American - i.e. you, me, the bartender, etc.
If we're going to have a big special day do it like the U.S.A. used to do it - when the currently relevant bad guys were all toast and it was time for a short but well-earned vacation.
Mike/wulfie
