It is Monday September 11th 2006 and while you are reading this, I’m in a plane on my way to Londen Luton Airport. And no, it wasn’t my choice to fly on this day: I’m going over to the UK for business as my company is working on a rather big Internet project for a UK based company. As I mentioned many times over in my blog: I hate flying. So flying on a September 11th, exactly 5 years after the infamous attacks that changed the world we live in for the worse, isn’t exactly my idea of fun. Off all news events in my life (so far) the September 11 attacks are the one thing I will definately remember the rest of my life, just like the fall of the Berlin Wall, Tsjernobyl, the release of Nelson Mandela, the first and second Gulf War, the bombings in Spain, Londen, the 2004 Tsunami and Hurricane Katrina to mention a few.
For one, the September 11th attacks had a direct impact on my personal life: about three months later it resulted in a big round of lay-offs at my work (Lost Boys) and I was one of the 30-something people that were fired. Second, it triggered a whole strain of related events that still have an impact on our lives today. In Holland, for instance, would-be politician Pim Fortuyn got assassinated on May 6th 2002 because of his views on the Islam religion and immigration. Two years later, on November 2nd 2004, film director and columnist Theo van Gogh got murdered because of his critical views and columns on the Islam.
Besides the above mentioned influences we can also see how much else has changed since 9/11. The whole airline industry has gone haywire with all the security measures. Travel by air used to be a fairly simple way to get from A to B, but that is all changed. The US government has turned into a bunch of psychotics that think that anything goes when it comes to prevent terrorism from happening. Spying on their own citizens has become normal. Having illegal prisons in other coutries has become a normal thing.
Iraq is just on big chaos. Iran is using the vacuum of power to develop their own nuclear weapons. Israel and Lebanon are the focus of huge problems. As for my own country I can state that the relation between the Dutch and immigrants has become a major problem. People are afraid of each other and it shows. Tolerance has been replaced by scepticism and mistrust. And the same goes for other European countries.
Indeed, the world has changed afer 9/11 and it isn’t for the better.
Remembering 9/11