anniversary time

[lobelia321]

So 9/11 is all over the news. Or 11/9, as it should be rightly called by UK standards. *tries to resist American running dogs' take-over of world Anglophonisms*

I am ambivalent about the exploitation of this day. On the one hand, I appreciate the need for concrete memorialisation on particular occasions as opposed to a general memory that goes on all the time. Monuments, rituals, these are necessary things.

On the other hand, I'm not sure about the commercial exploitation going on right now. Made for TV dramatisations starring Harvey Keitel, Hollywood feature films starring Nicholas Cage -- I don't like it. T'h watched one of these last night; I purposely did not. I was traumatised by 11/9 and I continue to be appalled by the aftermath. The aftermath (Iraq) now colours for me my view of 11/9/2001 and makes me wary of any representations that might sentimentalise that event, and de-politicise it.

Also, I don't like the notion that producers and companies are making money from people's deaths. It was only a matter of time but the time seems to have zoomed by amazingly quickly for business ventures to lose their inhibitions.

Maybe I should see the arty documentaries made about the topic which, according to the blurbs, are critical and so forth. But then I'm afraid they might totally depress me.

*is frog and sticks head in bucket and watches frivolous sci-fi shows made in Canada instead*

Comments

[improperlydone.livejournal.com]

I am ambivalent about the exploitation of this day. I live in the US and remember exactly what I was doing at the moment it began...but I agree with you.

When I get home from work tonight, I am not going to watch anything but my Supernatural DVDs.

And it's weird that they're having a 5-year anniversary -- since they haven't stopped talking about it for five years. I'm not saying that they shouldn't be talking about it. I'm just saying it's been mentioned on the news in some way, shape or form more than twice a week. It's never left anyone's mind. And the movies? I think they're disgusting. All of them. Won't drop a single penny for them.

[lobelia321.livejournal.com]

since they haven't stopped talking about it for five years
This is interesting. Thank you for this.

i can't put this rant in my own journal, so you get it in comments to yours...

[rahaeli.livejournal.com]

This isn't directed at you or at anything you said; I just have to get it off my chest. Apologies.

About four years ago, my girlfriend-at-the-time had her family visiting from South Texas, and her stepfather had never been to New York. I lived in NYC for a year, know the whole area pretty well, so she asked me to help her take them in and show them around. I was awkward and uncomfortable around them, because they didn't like me and made no bones about it, but I said okay. And her stepfather spent the entire day asking random people -- the cab driver, the waiter, various people we interacted with -- "so, were you here on 9/11?" And he's a decent enough guy, and his offense arose from ignorance not malice, and he genuinely wanted to understand what it had been like, not out of sensationalism but out of a sort of frustrated empathy for the universe, and every time he opened his mouth I died a little, because you don't do that. Not in Manhattan. Not to the people who were there, and will live with that for the rest of their lives.

The thing that pissed me off most about America post-9/11 -- at the time, there have been many things since then that have pissed me off more -- was how immediately the rest of America started adopting it as their own personal tragedy. And on the one hand, that kind of support and pulling-together can make a big difference, and it's understandable how people who weren't actually there can be just as touched by something like this as someone who was, but on the other hand, nothing in the world pisses me off more than someone who just gets off on the emotional equivalent of masturbating to misery.

I spent an hour, on a morning five years ago, thinking my mother was dead, and it was only the barest of coincidences and a fortuitously-timed migraine that meant she wasn't. I didn't lose anyone, but I know people who did, and I used to walk through all the places that aren't there anymore, and I used to kill time in the Borders in Tower One between trains, and I know people who can't ever step foot in a subway or underground public transport ever again, and I'm not going to say that if you weren't there or didn't know anyone who was that you don't have a right to grieve because the death of any one person diminishes us all, but god damn it, it is not All About You (generic you, not you) or All About Me, even, because I'm not trying to dictate how much pain one person can have but dammit, it pisses me off when people who spent years talking about how New York was the hotbed of sin and iniquity suddenly started hanging prints of the skyline that will never be the same again.

I can't look at the city skyline anymore. It's not right, and it'll never be right again. And people coming in and trying to commercialize that, trying to co-opt that and use it to justify the agenda of imperialism and propaganda, make me want to spit nails.

Re: i can't put this rant in my own journal, so you get it in comments to yours...

[lobelia321.livejournal.com]

I don't know why you can't put this rant in your own LJ (self-censorship saddens me) but feel free to rant here anytime you want, hon! Especially when what you say is so interesting. And here I was not even knowing you lived in New York.

Re: i can't put this rant in my own journal, so you get it in comments to yours...

[rahaeli.livejournal.com]

The self-censorship is because the ex still reads, and is still friends with a bunch of people for whom the subject of my opinions on 9/11 is an extremely sore one, and I don't want to hear the backlash. :P

Yeah, I lived in NYC from 1995-1996 (went to NYU for a year, in their theatre program, before dropping out). And I lived about an hour out of NYC in northern NJ, in one location or another, for my entire life up until I moved to Baltimore last year. :)

[karneol-vision.livejournal.com]

The aftermath (Iraq) now colours for me my view of 11/9/2001 and makes me wary of any representations that might sentimentalise that event, and de-politicise it.

It's what I have thought for quite some time, I just wasn't sure how to put it or whatever it was exactly. I agree.

[lobelia321.livejournal.com]

What to say, eh? I sigh.

[sheldrake.livejournal.com]

*is frog and sticks head in bucket and watches frivolous sci-fi shows made in Canada instead*

I also think this is the way to go.

[lobelia321.livejournal.com]

The day is over. We can now commemorate 12/9! Well, something is sure to have happened on that day.

[betsyli.livejournal.com]

*is frog and sticks head in bucket and watches frivolous sci-fi shows made in Canada instead*

LOL. What do you think us Canadians watch all the time? And wait till you fall upon the frivolous francophone sci-fi shows. Crack with a hefty dose of syrup and hockey, I tell you.

And while most "projects" about 9/11 are mostly money-makers for producers and companies, there are some heartfelt documentaries. But whatever the critics say, if you don't want to watch them and be depressed, then you're perfectly entitled to it. *nods* Bah, what do I know? Our media is basically a diluted version of American news and between the Bush-hate and the Francophone debate, MaldiniGod knows where we stand.

[lobelia321.livejournal.com]

Who is Maldini?? Ah, you Canadians.

[betsyli.livejournal.com]

LOL. Maldini is for Paolo Maldini, a.k.a. God. Us Italy fangirls from forzazzurri call him so, but we try to limit the blasphemy by striking it out.

[sonicbookmark.livejournal.com]

I don't like the notion that producers and companies are making money from people's deaths.
Yes, I feel the same exact way about this. It's just disgusting.

[lobelia321.livejournal.com]

It is the world we live in but sometimes I just feel that I don't need my nose rubbed in it.