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It Really Is Time To Move On

I know this will upset many Americans. It’s not my intention to do so, but I can’t keep quiet because, frankly, I just want to scream:

“IT’S BEEN FIVE YEARS. GET OVER IT!”

Five years, and they’re still searching for human remains at the site of the 9/11 attacks in Manhatton.

Tonight, NBC Nightly News reported that human remains are being unearthed, but not the odd arm or leg, or even a finger. It’s tiny fragments – part of a finger nail; a microscopic splinter of bone – that can be tested and identified using DNA technology, but to what purpose?

Why is it so important to Americans that five years on they still wait to be told, “We identified this fragment as being from your husband……..or wife……or Uncle George.”?

Many from other countries died in the tragedy, including 67 British citizens, 23 Japanese, and lesser numbers from 34 other nations. Their loved ones have come to terms with the loss, are beginning to pick up the pieces, not wait around for confirmation of a fact glaringly obvious to them already – that their husband, or wife, or Uncle George died on 9/11/2001.

An argument is presently in progress regarding some battered stone steps on the site, down which some of those attempting to escape may have passed. Relatives want them left intact, presumably because their husband’s, wife’s, or Uncle George’s feet just possibly may have touched them.

It’s turned crazy.

America, five years later, is still clinging to its grief; refusing to let go; wanting to hang on – to nothing. There is nothing tangible left worth finding. If my wife had died on 9/11 I wouldn’t want to be told five years later, “This is a bit of her finger nail.” It would do nothing for me. Empty words, for it wouldn’t even be recognizable as anyone’s fingernail.

The time to move on is now. Fill in the site, erect a suitable memorial, and leave the dead to the ground and the living to get on with their lives.

Perhaps then, as well as the grief, some of the hate may begin to fade also.

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8 Replies to “It Really Is Time To Move On”

  1. I’m reminded of my mom and brother stumbling around the graveyard with dad’s ashes, trying to find ‘a shady place with a view’. I didn’t have the heart to tell them that he was actually dead.

  2. Anan – it took a while for me to respond to this comment – first, I had to stop laughing. Thanks for a brief, but wonderful recollection.

  3. The difference is wealth. No one gives a damn about poor people, but when rich people die it is so special. Remember the big stink when the wrecked Titanic was going to be salvaged. No one cares about the thousands of slaves that died at sea, but let one luxury liner go down and we have to mourn forever more. Hardly hear anything about Oklahoma City anymore – just middle class people died there. Few news story over 1/2 a million + dead Iraq citizens. Equality is such bullshit.

  4. Flimsy – in this instance I think it’s as much political capital as wealth, although in some respects the two are interlinked. The longer Bush & Co can keep the horror of 9/11 alive, the more his war in Iraq can be linked to his war on terror. Bush once likened himself to Winston Churchill. While Churchill had great faults and was not the great hero history has proclaimed him, any comparison to George W Bush is an insult to the British prime minister. During the worst years of the WW2 blitz, Churchill rallied the nation and told them to carry on as usual, to not let the Nazis kill the British spirit. Bush has done exactly the opposite with the American people. His battle cry to the nation is “Be afraid; be very afraid.” Keeping 9/11 ongoing feeds that fear.

  5. My instincts tell me that this is a sad attempt at bolstering propaganda to further justify the “war on terror”. Fear-mongering at its worst. I’m fairly disgusted by it.

  6. Mike – fear is how politicians maintain their power these days. To see how, watch “The Power of Nightmares”, three, one-hour long documentaries made by the BBC in 2005. American TV networks have refused to show the films in America, but you can watch them on Google video.

    Daisy – welcome to Sparrow Chat. Living in Britain, you’ve probably already seen the above docs. I note you’re Welsh – (sigh) – how I miss my old home in mid-Wales.

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