Last Updated 04/15/02
Every few weeks, moxiemag.com is updated with new online-only feature articles. Click here to sign up to be notified when new stories are posted.
Join the discussion - What are your thoughts on these 9-11 pieces?
9-11
 |
|
Peace |
In the wake of the devastation of September 11, Moxie brings you raw and real first-person accounts in a special section in our Perspectives Department called simply 9-11.
We urge our readers to turn to independent media to get beyond the media-speak that the mainstream press is now feeding the public by seeking out these sources:
AlterNet.org
utne.com
motherjones.com
southernstudies.org
hopedance.org
www.counterpunch.com
www.commondreams.org
www.zmag.org
and these articles:
http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/la-110401ehrenreich.story
http://www.workingforchange.com/article.cfm?ItemId=12060
http://rawa.fancymarketing.net/index.html
http://www.nytimes.com/2001/10/19/opinion/19GOOD.html?
ex=1004587552&ei=1&en=76242998a2a70ff4)
http://www.alternet.org/story.html?StoryID=11765
and this inspirational photography exhibit:
And remember, the terrorists missed their real target when they attacked America, for "We don't live in America; America lives in us."
- end of a poem composed by a young woman at the Union Square Peace Vigil, recited on the Sally Jessie Rafael show a week after the attacks.
Back to
Normal?
Within minutes, the
surreal image of the WTC crumbling transformed our legendary New York
state of mind, exposing the city of lights and our nation to its
humanity and mortality. Depression and anger now overrule many of our
lives. Even as a "new kind of war" begins, we try hard to
adjust, complying with the suggestions of...(more)
Bosnia,
New York
The World Trade
Center collapsed outside my window.
It's now 11:00 at night, and from my apartment in Brooklyn you can
see clear across the water to the smoke that still billows gray
against the black of the night sky. It would be all too easy to...(more)
Canning Tomatoes
I picked the tomatoes on Saturday
and now it was early Tuesday morning. I filled the canning pot with water and turned
the flame up high. The Joy of Cooking said not to set the timer until the water reached
a rolling boil; it could take nearly an hour for this much water to get to that point.
My mother never canned - all I knew was what I read in a book. Without the benefit of
experience, the text set me on edge...
(more)
Delta
15
If you
wondered about all those flights that were in the middle of the
great blue Atlantic Ocean on the morning of September 11th, here is
an up-close-and-personal story written by a Delta Airlines flight
attendant en route from Frankfurt to Atlanta.
We were about 5 hours out of Frankfurt flying over the North
Atlantic and I was in my crew rest seat taking my scheduled rest
break. All of a sudden the curtains parted violently and I was told
to...(more)
The Dig
4:30 am Sat.
Sophie et al,
I went back to the remains of the World Trade Center and dug for
bodies.
There is a staging area at Chelsea Piers where city staff determines
if one has useful knowledge or experience to help with the rescue.
If...(more)
Downtown
New York, 9/15/01
My dear family and
friends,
I have just returned from walking around downtown New York. It is so
grim here; an exquisite fall day at odds with the sorrow that is
everywhere. The unreal drama of the events we witnessed on Tuesday
have given way to the reality of the horror and helplessness we feel
now.
Smoke continues to...(more)
Ethos &
Elan
When you think the United States isn't well thought of all
over the world, read this editorial from a Romanian Newspaper...(more)
Faith and
Martyrdom
Like many, I was calling around to friends on Tuesday in the aftermath of
the disaster and a friend who is a therapist told me that one of her clients
had called to ask, "What should I be feeling?" I laughed and then
I realized that hers was perhaps the most sensible question of the day. What
should we be feeling?...(more)
Fighting Fear
by Learning About Taxes
During most of the day since 9-11, my life is the same as it used to be. I
notice the smell of pumpkins in the morning air, I work hard on my teaching
routine, and I make plans for the future. However, for at least a few
moments each day, my fears and imagination take over...(more)
Fighting
the Forces of Invisibility
In January 2000 I wrote in a newspaper column that "the
defining struggle of the new age would be between Terrorism and
Security,” and fretted that to live by the security experts'
worst-case scenarios might be to surrender too many of our liberties to
the invisible shadow-warriors of the secret world. Democracy requires
visibility, I argued, and in the struggle between security and freedom
we must always err on the side of freedom. On Tuesday, Sept. 11,
however, the worst-case scenario came true...(more)
Goosed
If my own household hadn't been
in such chaos on September 11, I might have thought better than to use Fred Flintstone
to ease us through the aftermath of national terrorism. Little did I know that children's
films were themselves a recipe for disaster...
(more)
It's Simple.
It's Not So Simple.
Now is the time to be talking to people. Communicating, sharing information,
listening — they are the core of social change, of changing minds, of
exchanging rationalizations and cynicism for vision and empowerment...(more)
Life
I am twenty-two. I have found people my age to be generally cynical
and disenchanted with the "Spirit of America." From
college classes to bar stools, I have sat and listened to my peers
bashing the Constitution, capitalism, the media, and the corrupt
elements of our system. Don't get me wrong — I think skepticism
and youth go hand-in-hand. As an environmentalist, I've
participated. While traveling in Europe, a good friend of mine and I
observed...(more)
Martin
Luther King, Jr. Speaking on Violence
The ultimate weakness of violence is that it is a descending spiral,
begetting the very thing it seeks to destroy. Instead of diminishing
evil, it multiplies it. Through violence you may murder the liar,
but you cannot murder the lie, nor establish the truth. Through
violence you...(more)
A New York
State of Mind
I've been talking to people recently, and while it might seem unpatriotic
just now, or subversive even, we're all turning over the possibility of
leaving New York city, especially those of us with children, those of us who
can't find jobs, those of us falling through the cracks in this city's
mighty façade. Neither victims nor heroes, just ordinary New Yorkers
struggling to adjust to a changed world, unable to "get back to
normal" because the norm has so drastically changed. Our children draw
pictures...(more)
The Open Door
"Girl, you know you don't have to check those bags if you don't want
to," said the young African American girl from behind an x-ray screen
to her co-worker, who was checking passenger baggage at Logan Airport. Maybe
it was the way she said it that caused chills to shoot up my spine as I
grabbed my bags from the conveyer belt. Her tone made it sound as if...(more)
Pearl
2001
Within one hour of
the second tower falling, James Croak, a sculptor living in New
York, sent this email via DSL to a girlfriend in France to let her
know that he was alive...(more)
Pollyanna’s
Choice
The advice keeps coming on how to talk to children about current events.
While there are some good guidelines, I'm beginning to think "What
should I tell the kids?" is a bit of a disingenuous question. The truth
is we don't know how to cope and we may be...(more)
September
1, 1939
I sit in one of
the dives
On Fifty-second Street
Uncertain and afraid
As the clever hopes expire
Of a low dishonest decade:
Waves of anger and fear...(more)
Towering
Eternal
I have had a very long ritual relationship with the World Trade
Center. For more than two decades it has served as my own
personal/public shrine, an urban Stonehenge for an urban shaman...(more)
Urban Shaman's Prayer
More than a week after the blasts
there are still immense clouds of smoke coming from lower Manhattan. I
keep looking for the towers which I used to be able to see from my
window. I cannot...(more)
"We will never be the same." Perhaps there is hope, a deep opportunity in that statement, heard many times in the last few days. As the desire to get back to normal comes up, I find that in some ways, I don't want to get back to business as usual. I want to...(more)
What We Were
Spared
Certainly no one in their right mind would say that the attacks of September
11 have a positive side, but when it comes to sheer numbers, comparing the
number of those who died to the number who could have died is amazing to
consider...(more)
Words
from the Dalai Lama, 9/11/01
The events of this
day cause every thinking person to stop their daily lives, whatever
is going on in them, and to ponder deeply the larger questions of
life. We search again for not only the meaning of life, but the
purpose of our individual and collective experience as we have
created it--and we look earnestly for ways in which we might
recreate ourselves as a human species, so that we will never...(more)
|