FOR WHOM THE
TERRORISM BELLS TOLL...
ALWAYS FOR VIGILANCE
5th Anniversary of 9/11
GROUND
ZERO PLUS 1825 DAYS,--New York, NY, Monday, September
11, 2006--The
bells toll. For whom do they toll? They toll for the Beast Within
and the Beast Without.
It is five
years later.
Terrorism
is still knocking on America's doorstep, lurking in the shadows
of children's playgrounds where mothers want the horrors of
threat to their offspring to vanish.
The Beast
of Terror, however, is still plotting, planning, taking deep,
long breaths as he bides his time, counting on the fact that
Vigilance will bend and break, and that the ultimate sigh of
relief will be exhaled by those who want to believe the Beast
Within and Without has slithered into the bushes, out of sight,
out of mind.
For the
past year and more, I have stepped away from the plate of Terrorism,
and fought the daily urge to carve out its guts as best I can
with the scalpel of Vigilance, trying, as desperately as one
man can, to eviscerate its threat and implant upon readers the
true message Terrorism brings to all.
That lesson
is that Terrorism is not new. It is not hallmarked by September
11, 2001, or, for that matter, any other infamous date in modern
or ancient history.
Terrorism
is as fundamental as breathing in or out, for it exists as night
does to day, or right to wrong, or black to white.
Its core
is not vested in the chest of Osama Bin Laden, or Genghis Khan,
or Adolph Hitler, and, therefore, upon the brutality of any
of these men's deaths, or the elimination of their children,
or their children's children, can society or civilization relax
its vigil against its next uprising.
Terrorism
is a state of being, exhibited by the fear in a child's eyes
that its mother or father might smack them if they look at them
the wrong way, or the rigid, horrid tension in a young girl
as she hears the creaking of the steps signaling her father's
approach to molest her one more time before she goes to sleep
in what the uniformed might consider the safety and comfort
of her home.
Terrorism
is the choice one makes to suck down the contents of a gin or
vodka bottle and to cry and whimper over being fired, or laid
off, or not being respected by others, or wearing the cloak
of feeling one is a failure in life, a "sinner," a
loser, a lout, a no-good-for-nothing piece of fecal material.
When two
planes smashed into the World Trade Center on September 11,
2001 and nearly 3,000 lives were lost to the hands of "terrorists"
claiming a victory against America's false sense of security,
it was only a small, unnoticeable burp in a long train of Terrorism
that has been traveling its course since the first caveman picked
up a club and smashed the skull of another because he was standing
too close to the dinosaur meat.
There are
two types of Terrorism. One is physical. The other emotional.
Physical
Terrorism is that sense of fear and despair we feel when someone
shoves a gun to our head, or takes our children hostage and
threatens to kill them if we don't respond to their demands.
Emotional
Terrorism is about our persistent fears, apprehensions, anxiety
and overall depreciation of our selves and others that casts
darkness on our world, and turns us into insects, seeking to
hide under rocks and in crevices waiting for the next heel to
smash down upon our heads.
We, who
suffer from the "victimization" of others, we, who
consider ourselves a nail and all others a hammer pounding us
into constant submission, we, are the true victims of Emotional
Terrorism.
Today,
as we pay respects to the horrible memory of Physical Terrorism
exhibited by 9/11 ceremonies and countless, endless tributes
to all the "heroes" of that day, must be wary of thinking
that Terrorism is about some enemy afar plotting and planning
our demise with a dirty bomb, or a fleet of airplanes smashing
into more buildings.
Nine Eleven
was a wake-up call at the best to the need for Internal Vigilance.
It was
Nature's way of reminding us all that we must protect ourselves
against the forces of Terrorism from within, not simply without.
Despite
all the efforts of any government, there is no defense against
true terrorism. If mad people seek to destroy icons and symbols
of freedom and individuality, they will. No one can stop them,
just as a group of people holding hands on a sea shore cannot
stop the tide from coming in.
But, we
must not forget, the great weapon of Terrorism is not the destruction
it creates, or the lives it takes in its aftermath. It is, has
been, and will always be Fear, Intimidation and Complacency.
These three
elements are the triads of Terrorism.
A true
terrorist seeks not to destroy, but to threaten. He or she seeks
to poison the individuals in a society into feeling a sense
of helplessness so that an attack's true impact is its ripple
effect that causes Fear, Intimidation and Complacency to rot
the bones of Vigilance.
In the
Korean War, Americans fell prey to Terrorism. The Chinese applied
"mental torture" and broke countless Americans into
believing they were evil and corrupt. Brainwashing was the chant
of the day, and, it worked because Fear, Intimidation and Complacency
were the tools used to ravage the will of the warriors.
However,
one group refused all attempts to break them.
They were
the Turkish warriors.
All threats
to an individual were taken by that individual. The group refused
to assume the sub threat to them. Individuals were tortured
in hopes of being broken, but none did. One by one, the Turks
stood up, unafraid of their captor's obvious attempts to use
the power of force to make their knees bend.
Finally,
the Chinese stopped trying and left the Turks alone.
If Americans
stand up to Terrorism as boldly as the Turkish prisoners of
war did in Korea, the odds are that Terrorism would die a quick
death.
If one
believes that Terrorism's ultimate goal is Fear, Intimidation
and Complacency, then only a stalwart stance of Vigilance can
counter it.
But that
force of Vigilance cannot come from without.
It must
be from within.
That is
the conundrum.
To instill
Vigilance into a society, we must teach individualism as a function
of collectivism.
That is,
a child must be taught to be Vigilant for himself and others.
He or she must learn to protect against the forces of Terrorism--Fear,
Intimidation and Complacency.
This is
a skill, an art.
It isn't
learned easily.
That's
why each of us needs to become Parents of Vigilance and Citizens
of Vigilance.
If we do
not understand the impact of Nine Eleven, we will chalk it up
to a Pearl Harbor or holocaust event--something to be celebrated
on certain dates and to forget as those anniversary points pass.
If we understand
Nine Eleven, we see it as a demarcation point reminding us how
desperately we need to teach our children Vigilance, and to
practice it in our daily lives.
That means
we must learn to recognize, face and overpower Fear, Intimidation
and Complacency at every crossroad. To achieve this requires
a dedication and purpose far beyond our own lives. We must think
solely in terms of the children's children's children--some
three to five generations ahead.
If we don't
have a purpose of grand proportion in learning how to be Vigilant
in our own lives, we will fall victim to the Beast of Terror's
ultimate wrath. We will embrace Fear, Intimidation and Complacency
and feel we are being "victimized" by life itself
because we "don't have" or "should have had"
a better break.
Reading
this web site will be a start.
It is full
of years of beliefs about one way to fight Terrorism.
There are
many others.
But, if
one does not accept the fact we all have a Beast Within and
a Beast Without, there is little impetus to nullify this Beast.
Thus, it roams free.
By learning
how to manage Fear, Intimidation and Complacency, we learn to
live life with Vigilance, and it is this role modeling that
will have its greatest impact on our children, and their children's
children.
For whom
does the bell of Vigilance toll?
For us
all! And, that includes our children's children's children.
Cliff McKenzie
September
11, 2006
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