Ghosts
by wjw on September 11, 2011
I think it was when ABC News started broadcasting messages from the 9/11 dead that I made up my mind. I won’t be watching the news on the tenth anniversary, or watching or listening to any of the ten-year commemorations.
ABC is, after all, one of the country’s premiere news organizations, but apparently they can’t tell the difference between a tribute to the martyred dead and an episode of Syfy’s Ghost Hunters.
The fall of the Towers was a tragedy that radically changed this country and the world. The survivors of those killed on that day will be marked for life, and they have my deepest sympathy and respect. And though no one I knew personally perished on that day, I still get a chill whenever I see a photo of the New York skyline.
But still I won’t be able to face the tasteless media orgy that this anniversary is sure to become. I won’t be watching Animal Planet’s Hero Dogs special, nor will I be watching the O Network’s special on twins who lost their siblings in the towers, nor will I watch Paul McCartney as he wanders around Ground Zero for the cameras. I have no inclination to watch pampered newsmen stare solemnly into the camera and intone whatever it is they’re going to intone.
Nor can I quite shake the feeling that what’s happening on TV is a huge advertisement for Al Qaeda. They can count on us to boost their recruitment at this time every year.
So I won’t be watching TV tomorrow. I won’t need to.
The ghosts of 9/11 are there. And they’re speaking. And you don’t need ABC News in order to hear them.
Amen. It’s crap like you noted above, why I don’t have cable, satellite, direct TV or dish. I have 12 channels on a good day (when the reception is working) and I don’t even watch those anymore.
Just pisses me off the way everything has become so dramatized. Honor the dead, don’t sensationalize them.
Walter,
I wonder if you’ve ever seen the documentary “9/11”? CBS usually airs it every few years and I think it’s excellent. No sensationalism, just courage and love under harrowing, withering fire. Two French brothers were doing a documentary on “probies,” new firefighters, at one of the stations closest to the Towers. They were there filming on 9/11/01 and followed the firefighters into, and eventually out of, the Towers. It’s amazing stuff and I make sure to watch whenever its on.
I couldn’t agree with you more Walter. Have respect for the dead, be strong in their memory but don’t wallow in the Slough of Despond for that which can’t be changed. I canned tomatoes, listened to CDs and thought about my friends who are gone instead of spewing memories all over the media.
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