Let me first say that my sympathies are with everyone who lost a loved one in the September 11 World Trade Center Attacks. Only by the grace of the goddess do I not count myself among one the “families of the victims.” My brother was working on the 90th Floor of one of the buildings when they were senselessly attacked. He felt the building shake as the first building was hit and he immediately left his work area and began running down the stairs. When over the loudspeakers came an announcement that every one should return to their workstations, my brother, never really one to listen to authority, once again didn’t listen. He kept running. He ran all the way out of the building and home to his children. And as much as his problems with authority used to get on my nerves when we were younger, I am thankful for it now because I believe it saved his life. So, because my brother doesn’t listen when people tell him what to do, I am not a member of the “families of the victims” group. But I do feel their loss; and my heart goes out to every single one of them.
But that doesn’t mean I won’t give them a piece of my mind when I think it is due. And right about now I think someone should stand up to “them.” I understand their wanting a proper memorial for their loved ones. I really do. But “they” seem to be forgetting that “they” are not the only people in America to have lost their loved ones in a senseless tragedy. And their loss does not give them the right to dictate what is done with that very large piece of real estate in land starved Manhattan. It’s getting ridiculous. Seriously. If you don’t follow the drama of the rebuilding, its long and convoluted, but here’s a quick snippet: the families of the victims have put their two cents in at every step in this process. At this point, nothing has been finalized, because every time it gets close to being finalized, the families find something else wrong. If its not one thing, its another. They got the biggest press though, I think, when they decided that they didn’t want the International Freedom Center on the site. “They” didn’t want it there so it got the boot. (Doesn't any one besides me see how fucked up it is that the International Freedom Center got thrown out of rebuilding a site of a terror attack?) Going back to the beginning, there were some who wanted to leave the site an open wound, to remind everyone of the horror. But what has set me off is their latest bitch – apparently, “they” have now decided that there should not be a PATH train at the site. Don’t ask me why. Probably something to do with honor or some other fucking thing. But come on – no PATH? How the fuck are people supposed to get to work? Walk across the river, you fuckers? Really, their demands are getting out of hand.
So, enough already. It’s time that everyone stopped cow-towing to the families of victims. Yes, they suffered loss. Yes, they suffered tragedy. But they are not the only people to do so. What makes the lives of their loved ones more important that the lives of other people’s loved ones who also died in senseless tragedies? How is it that they get to dictate what happens to a particular piece of land? A piece of land, I might add, that they neither own nor are making any financial contribution towards. They just complain. Complain about the location of the building – its in the footprint. Complain about the Freedom Center -- we don’t want people to think about anything but our families members. Complain about the PATH train – (I got nothing on this one). And while they complain the City is struggling through a financial crisis of epic proportions. A large, and lucrative (for the owner, yes, but also for the City) parcel of land is going unused. Thousands remain out of work; business has fled to Jersey because there isn’t any where else for them to go. At this rate, if people do not stop all this bullshit, nothing will ever get built there. But perhaps that is the point.
Maybe this is brutal. Maybe I’m a total fucking bitch. But you know what, I really don’t give a fuck. There is no rule or law that says anyone has to listen to these people. People are listening because they don’t want to look like assholes. Well, I’m not afraid. I’ve had enough. First, rich bitches complained they were only getting $1 mil from the government and they would have to move out of their mansions. Boo fucking hoo…ever heard of life insurance? Now, they want to decide what happens to the WTC site; they want to decide how everyone else has to commute, and work, and whatever the fuck else they come up with. Well if no one else has the guts to say it, I do. I say no more. People are victims and die senselessly every single day. Their families don’t get to rule over the scene of the accident like kings. And there’s no reason why these families should be treated any different. You don’t hear the police department bitching, or the fire department bitching (other than a few concerns about safety – which makes a lot more sense than not wanting a Freedom Center). If they were, perhaps that I would understand – those men and women were the true heroes of that day and they deserve a fitting and profound memorial. But I don’t get why the lives of “the families” loved ones are so much more important than the life of a child who dies from being shot by a stray bullet during a gang fight, or the father who dies coming home from work when some drunk asshole runs a red light; or the mother who dies when her abusive husband beats the shit out of her. People die senselessly every single day. But for those who are still living, life has to go on. We still have to eat, and sleep and love. We still need to work. And commute. And talk. And think. And argue. And politic. And everything else. And if these “families” can’t understand that nearly four years after the horrors of that day, well then tough shit. Because life goes marching on whether you want it to or not. So, enough already. Let them build.
