On Thursday, our country observed the 13th anniversary of the 9/11 terrorist attacks. Most of us reading this can remember where we were the first time we saw a plane fly into the Twin Towers on the television screen.
Leann remembers walking into the kitchen after getting ready for another day of third grade to see what she thought was a scene from a movie. Nicole remembers watching the second plane hit as her teacher watched in horror. Kevin vaguely remembers sitting in a giant beanbag in the first grade when his teacher broke the news to him and assuming it was normal for planes to fly and sometimes hit tall buildings.
The members of this editorial board are from the tail end of the generation that can remember that day. Most of DePauw’s first-year class was in kindergarten when 9/11 happened. Anyone younger than them is unlikely to remember anything from that day. Not many of us have solid memories from before kindergarten. This means that high school seniors and younger are old enough to remember the effects of 9/11, but young enough not to remember the tragedy itself.
This editorial board wonders what that means for the future of the tragedy. Years from now, when those of us old enough to remember that day are in our 80s and 90s, will people still post “Never Forget” photos on social media on the anniversary, or will such posts be reserved for pages specifically devoted to American history and 9/11, much like posts about Pearl Harbor or D-Day are now?
High school teachers are already battling these questions. On September 11, 2014, the Ridgefield Press, a Connecticut paper, published an article titled, “For today’s students, there’s no ‘before 9/11.” The article outlines how current students have a difficult time understanding the effects of 9/11 because they have no personal memories with which they can compare the aftermath. The article also talks about how these students’ teachers must change the way they teach about Sept. 11, shifting from a current event angle to a more historical angle, with 9/11 being the spark to current events.
This editorial board finds this shift in angle troubling. For us, 9/11 is very much a current event, one that we still treat with reverence and solemnity, just as the country did in the years immediately following 2001. For us, 9/11 casts a shadow over what is happening in the Middle East now. Last week’s editorial about ISIS and the comparisons we drew between the situation in the Middle East today and the situation in the same area 13 years ago are evidence of that view. We think there is something worth preserving in that solemnity, and we are not alone in our opinions.
On September 10, 2014, the San Bernadino Sun, a California paper, ran an article titled “Remember 9/11: Teachers adapt lessons to adapt to growing history.” The article quotes one teacher, Aaron Bishop, saying that in the future he hopes to bring people into his classes that experienced 9/11 to preserve the human element in his lessons when he has students who were born before 9/11. “You get real history from stories, not just from textbooks,” the article quotes. “I would like someone’s grandpa to come in to say I was at the Pentagon or I was at that field in Pennsylvania.” We think that’s a good idea.
This editorial board thinks that in years to come, it will fall on those of us who remember 9/11 to make sure younger generations understand the events of that day and what those events did to our country. It will require those of us who lived that day to post more than a picture or a short status on social media each anniversary. It will require us to share our stories.