9/11 : Thirteen Years on

There are a few dates in the year that I don’t look forward to. Days when I look a bit more carefully around my shoulder, and don't feel comfortable about being on the Tube. September 11th is one of these days.

Today I’m heading into London, to go to work, and I think about the almost 3,000 people who made their journey into work 13 years ago. They were probably thinking the same thing as many of the rest of the commuters on this train do – what work was due in today, what they were having for dinner that night, whether they left their hair straighteners plugged in. Even dates, anniversaries, birthdays that were being planned. In a horrendous and vicious act of hate, these plans, these futures, were erased forever.

 I’m a lifelong Brighton fan, and the Albion community lost one of our own in one of the Trade Centers. Robert Eaton was on the 105th floor, going about his normal day to day work, probably with one eye on the news coming in about the Johnston’s Paint Trophy (or another completely irrelevant) game that night. Robert never came home. I was at the game that night, and it has to be one of the strangest games I’ve been to. The mood was sombre, most people still in utter disbelief about what had happened that day.

Thirteen years have gone on, and that day still remains fresh in my mind. At 14 years old, I was very naïve to the hatred that simmers underneath in this world. Terrorism was something that I don’t think I even knew about. Trying to understand what was happening when seeing the rolling images of the planes hitting the Towers was unfathomable.

But today, terrorism is a word which is said in the news almost every day. Whether it be in Syria, in the West Bank, in Iraq, Afghanistan, Ukraine or Pakistan, this hatred and violence is being perpetuated day on day.

I read this morning that Obama is doing a speech on the threat of IS today. I think that we are not doing enough to investigate what is driving people to commit these atrocious acts, instead I believe we are taking the perhaps more comfortable position that these people are just “evil”.

No one is born hating people, wanting to take their own lives alongside 3000 others – there must be reasons behind this. The man murdering the two journalists in the last week has a markedly London accent, what led him from the relative cosmopolitan lifestyle of London, where people in suits sit alongside people in fancy dress without an eyebrow being raised, to commit these horrible crimes?  What caused him to join an organisation fuelled by hate? Without more knowledge of this, I don’t think we will see peace in this lifetime. I believe that we are in a World War, without it being country vs country, with no end point. That’s terrifying.


So today, I will be thinking about not only the people who died in 9/11, not just of Robert Eaton, but of everyone who has died due to terrorism since. I will hope for peace, in our lifetime, and in our children’s lifetimes. Let’s hope that it happens. 

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