Comments on: Evacuation

By: Matthew

Matthew — Mon, 30 May 2005 10:54:45 +0000

It’s no longer strange to experience an evacuation. It’s like the fire drills we used to have in school. And since I taught in public school for three years after college, I kept on experiencing drills like this beyond the point most people settled into ordinary jobs without evacuations. What was strange for me was receiving the “escape hood respirator” shortly after beginning work here. The “escape hood”is basically a baggie you put over your head to keep you safe during a biological or chemical attack (nevermind that some chemicals affect exposed skin and don’t need to be breathed; never mind that!). We also recieved a small satchel of emergency supplies–a few foil packages of water, dehydrated fod, basic medical supplies–which we are supposed to keep at our desk. These items are more unnerving to contemplate than the evacuations. As much as I try to convince myself that it’s all pointless, that the government has overreacted to the threat, there is the inescapable fact that there are people out there who would like to detonate a nuclear weapon in Washington, D.C. I don’t care if we did bring this threat on ourselves with our actions around the world; it seems pretty pointless to assign blame to ourselves right now. What I care about is whether my government is doing everything possible to prevent another 9/11, or to save my life in the event of another 9/11. I don’t feel that is true. In the end, maybe there is nothing we can do to prevent another 9/11. Total withdrawal from the Middle East would nt satisfy these fanatics (hence my comment that blaming ourselves is pointless). In its more honest moments (which are rare), the Bush administration seems to admit that it cannot truly protect us. But the Bush Administration is really all we’ve got right now. I still don’t trust them, but the Democrats aren’t exactly giving us any alternative in terms of national security.

By: shel

shel — Sun, 29 May 2005 21:13:32 +0000

It must be so strange to have such evacuations be a normalcy around you. It obviously affects you somewhat…hence, your terrorist attack dream.

Sometimes I think of 9/11 as our generation’s tragedy. We all remember that day so well. Our parents’ generation’s prime question was “Where were you when Kennedy was shot?” Ours is “Where were you when the first plane hit?”

I don’t know about you, but I remember perfectly.

By: wadulisi

wadulisi — Fri, 27 May 2005 05:03:55 +0000

While I’m sickened by any kind of violence, such as happening day-in-and-out in Palestine and Iraq (not to mention in US communities), what “terrorists” show is how imperialists–even the Superpower U.S.A.–cannot achieve “complete” domination, or control the outcome of the imperial endeavor. What has effectively brought “terror” to the US public is the aftermath of its imperialist policies.

Certainly, though, the BushAdmin has done an effective job of using 9/11 to heighten the profile of the terrorist genre and to manipulate the public with fear by using this genre.

Mel B., I hope that an abstract notion of terrorist doesn’t get fixed in any of our minds, though we are saturated daily with such stereotypes; then the terrorist becomes the boogeyman and scapegoat. This, of course, is nothing new. After the OK bombing, the assumption promoted by gov’t officials and the media were ‘those terrorists’–a generic type of the ’swarthy’ male (adjective compliments of Ann Coulter in recent years). How horrifying for the US public to find ‘an enemy within!’ (As if the US is an unified public–contemporarily or historically!)

Maybe one day school e-textbooks will account for the post-9/11 wave of terror as stemming from the terror that the US has wreaked on the world. I expect, though, that in parts of the world, this lesson is already being taught.

By: Mel B.

Mel B. — Thu, 26 May 2005 21:56:14 +0000

Part of what I find interesting is that for people in your city, terror is a bit more real and closer to home. After the initial shock of 9/11, I had a hard time connecting to an abstract thought of terrorists. And I still have hard time giving credence to some of the measures being taken against liberty in the name of protecting us from terrorism.
But 9/11 had a profound effect on all of us, I’m sure, regardless of where we lived. I had a plane crash dream about a month after, and I don’t consider myself susceptible to that. But then, someone pointed out that I had a tsunami dream…

It’s also hard, too, to take evacuations seriously, when there are so many. Or the infamous color alert system…
The way I see it… the terrorists won, even as we’ve spent close to the last four years hunting them down, imprisoning them, and tightening security.
Because we’re all scared on some level, either consciously, crafting new security measures or holding evacuations for forgotten pacakages, or even subconsciously, in our dreams.
Terrorism is about terror. And that’s been pretty effective.

By: Matthew

Matthew — Wed, 25 May 2005 09:14:11 +0000

Yes, it was the conversation with D. that had the greater impact on me. Even when we realized that this was a for-real evac, and not just another “someone left their bag unattended” drill, we weren’t too concerned. After all, nothing had blown up (yet), so it couldn’t be too serious. I interviewed for my job here in early spring 2002, and I came to work here in August 2002, thus I missed the excitement of 9/11 and the anthrax scare. People who were here have some good stories to tell, though. All of the people I’ve talked to recall the fear that settled in not because of what they knew had happened (they didn’t know much), but the fear of what they did not know.