Personal Essays
The 21st Century
By Michael Pajon
Countless angles of destruction and a hope for the future shattered in a moment's time. We have all experienced this tragedy on some level together, whether it be a relative living in New York or D.C. proper, a friend who was scheduled to depart on one of the flights, or the 4th-degree friend who lost their life in the chaotic ruin. Mixed feelings of sorrow and anger are recorded and regurgitated by the media. Endless loops as planes collide. Planes collide. Towers collapse. Towers collapse. People die. People die.
These faceless attackers must be brought to justice, but by what means? The youth of today have never had to deal with a catastrophe of this proportion before, nothing besides: the suicides of rock stars, sexual preferences of celebrities, televised scuffles with the Middle East over soaring oil prices, and foolish personal romances. For the generation whose most radio friendly lyric was "I want to fuck you like an animal," for the generation brought up by divorced parents and crashing waves of peer pressure, our home soil has become a battlefield and nothing could have prepared us for the shock wave.
Over a week's time has passed and the anxious public demands answers to sate their vengeful tongues. Now our government, the people of the U.S., and the media are demanding retribution and instant gratification for this heinous act. They are all jumping to conclusions and pointing fingers, calling this "Their holy war that we have been caught in the middle of." Meanwhile these same people are saying "Prayer is our weapon," "In God we trust," and "Thank God," making ours as much a holy war as those accused. They have perverted patriotism, thrusting the flag into the spotlight and whoring our symbol of freedom as a weapon for the media to instigate and enrage the public to act irrationally, but based solely on
this "suspect" and "enemy" of our great and mighty nation.
Our society is being blinded by these symbols of mass destruction and the magnifying of the Middle East as a nesting ground for terrorism. They have castoff reason and sound methods of resolve and resplaced them with counter attacks of mass violence to some how balance out the enormous loss of life. The "Media God" is feeding its own dogmatic verse and completely drowning out the important coverage of our world leaders' careful discussions on how to handle our situation - how to react without becoming hypocritical of life, liberty and happiness.
The media juggernaut is distorting the flag's design and purpose - that symbol of our country, the flag, that bathed in blood for the freedom of its fathers and their children. It is supposed to be a reminder of our freedom not a partisan to "One nation under God." As children raised by television and mass media we must filter this barrage. Take no sides until the facts have been drawn out and not cater to the fast-food mentality of the 20th century. This is still the inception of the 21st century, so let us make it one in which the decision we make does not abort and obliterate all possibility of peace and prosperity.
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