<p>Tetra, from your posts I’m getting a sense that the attacks on that day weren’t a very big deal to you. If that’s the case, then you certainly wouldn’t share the views of others for whom it’s a very big deal. There’s nothing wrong with coming at the same event from a different perspective. I think yours is valuable and informative.</p>
<p>She came downstairs, taking a break from studying and put on the news for us to watch.</p>
<p>My daughters normally abhor violence of any kind, but their reaction was immediate and unequivocal: sheer jubilation. </p>
<p>They were young children, 6 and 9, living in Manhattan when the Twin Towers went down. I actually watched it, or part of it. I went out for a bike ride that morning along the Hudson, and heard & saw an unusually low-flying aircraft heading downriver. I biked on downriver and out to the end of the pier to get a better look at the river and saw one tower in flames; then a short time later it was clear the second tower was also burning, but at a different level so it couldn’t be that the first fire had spread. I watched a few minutes wondering what had caused it, until someone carrying a radio came out and joined me; he told me both towers had been hit by planes and terrorists were suspected. I biked home, told my family, and we watched the whole terrible thing unfold on television, ending in the collapse of first one tower, then the other. We all remember the acrid smoke that reached our neighborhood a few hours later, the people trudging up Broadway walking home to Westchester and New Jersey, the Air Force fighter jets making low pass after low pass just barely above the rooftops, trying to reassure us I suppose, but we didn’t find it reassuring at all; the kids thought any jet noise could be a plane targeting our building, and it left them trembling in fear. We knew several families who lost loved ones, several others who just by happenstance were not at their offices in the World Trade Center that day, and one of the firefighters down at the local firehouse, who the girls used to stop and chat with, was among the heroes who didn’t make it out after going in to save others.</p>
<p>That day is seared in the memories of my daughters, and marks a defining moment in their childhood. Some of the innocence of their childhood was lost; they’ve both said they first realized that day that the adults they had always counted on to keep them safe were powerless against that kind of threat, and it left them feeling deeply vulnerable and alone. From that day they lived in fear, not just the ordinary fear of death, but fear of the randomness and anonymity of senseless, brutal mass death and destruction that they, and we, were powerless to stop. And Osama bin Laden was the personification of that terror. For my daughters, his death at the hands of U.S. operatives felt like a personal triumph over the omnipresent evil that overshadowed their childhood, and they reacted with sheer joy.</p>
<p>I saw that same sense of jubilation in the faces of the young people waving flags, singing patriotic songs, cheering, chanting, and literally dancing in the streets last night. 9-11 affected all of us, but I think sometimes we don’t appreciate how deeply it defined and dominated our children’s lives, especially those who were a young and tender age when it happened—and especially, perhaps, those whose own city was under attack.</p>
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That is so true. I woke up last night several times with flash memories of things that I hadn’t thought of in years. Do you remember the rash of bomb scares in the months after the attacks? Where it seemed like life was disrupted every day in some fashion? The “missing” posters on every telephone pole? The attacks invaded every aspect of our lives for a long, long time and (much as I hate this expression) we all learned to cope in a new normal that included being told regularly that the next attack was only a matter of time. Which certainly seemed (seems) sensible in light of the number of the serious threats against the City that have been ongoing.</p>
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<p>This is misplaced priorities then. Going broke with hundreds of soldiers and thousands of civilians dead to find one evil person when there are plenty of other evil people to take his place? </p>
<p>I feel like I become spiritually poorer from such celebrations. It seems other people disagree and I will witness these outbursts of joy with silence and certainly not cast judgement as to what is a deep and personal reaction on my part.</p>
<p>I was a bit surprised by my D’s first reaction…“whatever…nothing will change”. I disagree with the “whatever” part…but she is probably right about the “nothing will change” part.</p>
<p>I began to remember how happy I was 20 years ago, that my 6 month old baby was too young to understand what was happening on TV during the first Gulf War. Never thinking it could be worse.</p>
<p>And in her brief 21 years, she really only has memories of living in an America with lots of airport screening and security alerts and politicians bickering loudly on TV about what to do about the crisis in the Gulf and OBL who is hiding in a cave while planning our demise.
She has no memories of the pretty happy care-free life that I led for the 35 years previous to 9/11. The joy of being a 1962 baby. Ignorance truly was bliss.
Her eyes are just wide open…</p>
<p>My son said, well I guess when anyone gets killed then we’re supposed to feel sad, but…with OBL…boo hoo…now I’m done.</p>
<p>Neither of my sons at were overjoyed at the news. As an accomplishment of war, they were glad as the successful attack and destruction of the compound was important. They felt strongly that we should not be celebrating the death of Bin Laden as it puts us on the level of people in countries that look terrible and low grade in their rejoicing over the horror of war. It was an important strategic victory and should be celebrated as such,not as the killing of any person. I think it elevates Bin Laden’s importance to make him the focal point of this strike.</p>
<p>I was disappointed that the President made the death of Bin Laden the focus point. I think it would have diminished his importance and made much more of an impact to have announced that we discovered and destroyed the Al Quada Headquarters that housed heads of the terrorism including Bin Laden. Making him just another terrorist gone would have been a class act.</p>
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<p>Personally, I am not happy that he is dead so much as that he cannot kill or harm anyone else. </p>
<p>I was in a RA staff meeting…we were just finishing up and our boss announced it to us. No one really had a reaction, I think because we live on the opposite side of the country from NY so 9/11 was somewhat surreal for them.</p>
<p>But not for me. I grew up in Long Beach, which also has a WTC…I remember a record number of kids absent from school that day because their parents were afraid of sending them to school. I remember going to Disneyland later that year and no one being there because people were still so afraid. I remember flying on an airplane for the first time later that year and being terrified that someone would hijack it (all this at 11 years old). I remember everyone being afraid that the LB WTC would be next.</p>
<p>10 years later, I am glad that the man who caused all of this fear and who has–as someone else has said–been my generation’s real live “bogeyman” for the last 10 years can’t strike fear into anyone else’s heart. I am not naive enough to think that Al Qaeda will crumble, or that terrorism will end. But I am proud of our military, glad that none of our soldiers were harmed, and thankful for the battle they are still fighting on our behalf.</p>
<p>Our freedom is not free.</p>
<p>I spoke with my BU son this morning. He said he and his friend heard shouting and went out to Marsh Plaza to see what was going on. The commotion moved to Kenmore Square and then the police came out, cleared/closed Commonwealth Avenue and led a march of students down to Boston Common. The videos of the rally on Boston Common are pretty amazing with the young people singing the National Anthem and waving the flag. </p>
<p>My other son is working in one of the World Trade Center buildings that has been rebuilt and reopened. He sent me a cell phone picture of the crowds outside his office building and also of a newstand guy wearing an Uncle Sam hat holding a sign that said “We Got Him.”</p>
<p>I texted my D today that I hoped she was not one of the GW students at the White House celebrating last night. She responded that she was not. I watched news coverage when I got home from the airport after a long flight (glad we didn’t know about it before we took off) but I find going out in the streets celebrating distasteful. My 2 kids at home seemed to think it was a big deal, and we talked about it some.</p>
<p>D’s immediate response, when she saw the celebration, was “that’s poor form”.</p>
<p>Well, then I guess I’m a big believer in poor form.</p>
<p>Yes, I do celebrate when a mass murderer is removed from the Earth. Thank you to whoever made it happen. </p>
<p>I truly do not understand this idea that each and every death must be a dignified and holy affair. I’m not speaking of abusing a body or anything like that. I’m speaking of the tone. Maybe it’s because I’m an atheist and so have no ties to belief in the afterlife but I believe when we are dead, that’s it. What is mourned, or celebrated, is what happened during out lives. In other words, we choose how our deaths will be received by our actions during our lifetimes. Bin Laden made his choice, why should I pretend otherwise?</p>
<p>So, yes, I celebrate, in fact I am thankful when someone who purposely kills innocent men, women and children of all races, religions, nationalities and creeds can act no more.</p>
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<p>As someone who was in London on July 7, 2005, it’s hard to feel quite the same way.</p>
<p>My son, who was a second grader on 9/11 and just a few days past 7, posted the followng on FB:</p>
<p>“Now that the world champion at hide and seek is gone, the last question to be answered is ‘Where’s Waldo?’”</p>
<p>He and I also had a very in depth conversation about the impact of bin Laden’s death on world peace. We are NY Jews and very much aware of how we are targeted and despised by Osama (may he rest in torment) and his ilk.</p>
<p>When he came home today, my son said that his history elective class discussed how Hitler died on April 30th with the death announced on May 1st. Interesting coincidence.</p>
<p>Haven’t talked to S1 today. He’s a U.S. Navy Spec.Ops officer so I have to believe there were cheers going up in his unit today. He was in the ninth grade watching the 9/11 coverage on TV when he knew for sure that he wanted to be a part of the U.S. military. Go Navy.</p>
<p>Thank your son for me for his service, PackMom.</p>
<p>“For I have no pleasure in the death of anyone”, says the Eternal God. “Turn, then, and live.” (Ezekiel 18:32)</p>
<p>I am hugely relieved that the man that masterminded the murder of my friend on flight 93 and thousands of others can no longer be a threat.
I cannot feel happy when any human dies. The Canadian embassy response of “silent satisfaction” seems most appropriate</p>
<p>And thank you to all the posters here with family members in the service. We owe so much to all of you.</p>
<p>[Manhunt</a> - An FP Slide Show | Foreign Policy](<a href=“http://www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2011/05/02/manhunt]Manhunt”>Manhunt – Foreign Policy)
A visual slideshow on the hunt for Osama bin Laden.</p>