What to tell children about 9/11

[duskyjewel]

America’s gulag? How many people have we shot in the skull? How many people have we imprisoned for merely disagreeing with the government, or posing a threat to it by knowing how to think?

People like you, John Augustine, are not worth the breath to argue with, when you make ridiculous statements like that. Do some research and find out what a gulag actually WAS before you use loaded words like that! Disgusting…

 

[rpp]

My oldest remembers the planes flying into the buildings and them falling down. The others are too young.

Here is what I told them: Evil people called terrorists decided they wanted to kill as many Americans as they could. So they hijacked a bunch of planes (had to explain hijacking) and flew them into buildings. They destroyed the World Trade Center in New York and killed and hurt a lot of our military men and women at the Pentagon. The people on the fourth plane knew they were in danger from the hijackers, and called family on their cellphones to say I love you and goodbye. When their families told them what happened, they summoned up all their courage and decided to fight back. They knew they were going to die, but they decided to fight and save other people’s lives if they could. That was the plane that crashed in Pennsylvania, and those people saved the White House or the Capitol from attack, because those were the assigned targets. They might have saved the President or lots of Congressmen from being hurt or killed that day.

My kids wanted to know why the terrorists wanted to kill Americans. So I told them that they hate everything about our country. Our freedom, our prosperity, the fact that we have influence around the world, and the fact that our nation is mostly Christian. And they decided that since they didn’t like us and we were not members of their religion (radical Islamofascism, which I also had to explain), that it was not only OK for them to kill us, but they felt obligated to kill us.

In other words… I told them the truth. If your kids ask, just tell them the truth. Be age appropriate, but don’t sugar coat it and don’t assume they can’t handle it. People don’t give kids enough credit. But also, they need to know that evil is real, it lives in our world, and we are not immune from its effects.

Nice summary. Especially the part of what motivated these terrorists and who they were.

 

[rpp]

I didn’t find out about Abu Ghraib until months after it happened… and neither did you. And as the perpetrators were prosecuted and convicted or subjected to non-judiciary military punishments, there was no institutional approval going on, and therefore, no approval for me to be deemed to have participated in.

Guantanamo… you mean that place where terrorists are taken after they are captured in battle, given medical care and plentiful, clean food prepared in accordance with their religious dietary restrictions? Where they are given access to religious texts and spiritual ministry by imams who visit them regularly? Oh, yeah, we are treating those people terribly… especially when we release them so they can go back to killing our troops!

That said, the privations of Iran-funded, Syria-armed al-Quaeda terrorists do not keep me up at night, when and if they have any.

The only sleep I lose sleep with regard to Gitmo is when I hear someone has been released.

 

[bcuster]

A 5 or 6 year old don’t need to be frightened by the dangers of the world. That is why we have parents to protect them. If your children ask you questions about 9/11 answer them simply. Please do not burden them with the scary details.

 

[thomfra]

Guantanamo… you mean that place where terrorists are taken after they are captured in battle, given medical care and plentiful, clean food prepared in accordance with their religious dietary restrictions? Where they are given access to religious texts and spiritual ministry by imams who visit them regularly? Oh, yeah, we are treating those people terribly… especially when we release them so they can go back to killing our troops!

Are you living in an alternate reality? Did you ever ask yourself why those suspects were sitting in Guantanamo instead of under the Juristriction of the American justice system?

news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/4602874.stm.

I find this (seemingly self-imposed) igornance absolutely astounding.

 

[thomfra]

America’s gulag? How many people have we shot in the skull? How many people have we imprisoned for merely disagreeing with the government, or posing a threat to it by knowing how to think?

People like you, John Augustine, are not worth the breath to argue with, when you make ridiculous statements like that. Do some research and find out what a gulag actually WAS before you use loaded words like that! Disgusting…

ok… gulag was a bit over the top. BUT…perhaps you could respond to the rest of the post?

 

[thomfra]

A 5 or 6 year old don’t need to be frightened by the dangers of the world. That is why we have parents to protect them. If your children ask you questions about 9/11 answer them simply. Please do not burden them with the scary details.

Agree. Telling a 6 year old that evil people that hate americans and are out to get them is not a great idea.

 

[JKS]

Thomfra,
Your post sounds like those we find on the Daily Kos and the other blogs that are dominated by people with BDS, so even if you don’t have BDS*, it looks like you might; and I for one don’t want to waste time arguing about whether toilets facing Mecca are considered torture. It’s hard to debate these things when the facts are in dispute, and we end up arguing past each other.

Many Europeans actually believe that 9/11 was a plot by the Jews! A Polish friend and a friend of his, told me this in my dining room. I didn’t believe it at first and laughed, but it appears this is true. It’s difficult to have an intelligent debate with people who have lots of strange ideas and a different take on what the reality is. I’ve seen from your previous posts in other threads, that you don’t seem to grasp what America is all about, and I can’t really explain it to you in this venue.

The fact is, though, that we were attacked by extremist Muslims many times over the past few decades: Beirut, WTC I, USS Cole, and two of our embassies in Africa (don’t remember offhand which ones: Tanzania?). After 9/11, we struck back. I remember clearly the smoke in the distance marring the otherwise beautiful cloudless blue sky, and sirens running all day, sitting with my best friend all afternoon until her husband finally came home, telling us who wouldn’t come home. War was declared on us, and we’re fighting back.

Despite the “imperialist American” epithets, we aren’t really into that whole empire thing; check your history and try to find a previous world superpower that was this laid-back about her power. Seriously, dude. Ask our territories, and our former territories. (If Puerto Rico ever votes for independence, does anyone here think they wouldn’t get it?) Prison is rather unpleasant for enemies, but it’s kind of supposed to be; one wants the prisoners to not want to return. If we had been attacked by extremist Irish Catholics or Basque separatists, we would have an entirely different group of people in Gitmo, and we would be making it unpleasant for them so that they might tell us who else is trying to kill us, and when, and where.

There are bad people everywhere, including some in the US military. When we find out about it, we make them stop, and then we punish them. I can’t help you get over Abu Ghraib, and other than the people who were unjustly treated, I don’t see where I need to. I think it’s important that we’ve discussed what the definition of “torture” is; we take for granted, perhaps, that the American people had a heated debate about whether our ENEMIES WHO WERE TRYING TO KILL US, should be subject to waterboarding, for example. Mind you, this would only be used to try to find out who else is trying to kill our innocent noncombatant citizens, and where, and when. We’re also having a heated debate about when we get to stop being at war. We don’t like it; despite the terms used, there really are no “pro-war” factions here. God bless.

 

[Della]

Are you living in an alternate reality? Did you ever ask yourself why those suspects were sitting in Guantanamo instead of under the Juristriction of the American justice system?

news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/4602874.stm.

I find this (seemingly self-imposed) igornance absolutely astounding.

I addressed this in post #19.

 

[JKS]

BDS= Bush Derangement Syndrome

 

[Della]

to JKS’ post #27!

Our children have the right to know who their enemies are so they can understand that there are values worth fighting for and truths worth dying for. If there aren’t, we all might as well give up and declare ourselves fair game for any tyrant or extremist out there.

 

[sanctamaria17]

My brother was five the day it happened. My family lives outside NYC. Our town lost a few people that day. He didn’t know it was terrorism, just that planes had crashed into the buildings and killed a lot of people. The TV was on all day, everyone was at our house, my parents’ best friend (who is like a second father to me and my siblings) ended up being sent to Iraq in the months that followed, our whole town was in a tizzy.

I was twelve. I will never forget that day as long as I live. Especially now that I live in DC and NYC and DC are both very dear to me.

 

[duskyjewel]

ok… gulag was a bit over the top. BUT…perhaps you could respond to the rest of the post?

I already told you… people who think like John Augustine are not worth the breath, or keystrokes, to argue with. I abstain.

Did you ever ask yourself why those suspects were sitting in Guantanamo instead of under the Juristriction of the American justice system?

No, because I already know the answer. They are not representatives of a state, wearing a uniform, fighting in an officially declared war. Therefore, they do not get Geneva Convention protections. The reason they have been kept at Guantanamo and not the U.S. mainland, in military detention instead of civilian was purposefully to keep them from accessing the U.S. civilian court system, to which they have no right. They do not deserve habeus corpus, nor the 5th Amendment protection against self-incrimination. (I was appalled at the recent SCOTUS ruling, and strongly disagree with it, considering it further proof of why we need more justices like Scalia, Roberts, Alito, and Thomas.) I have absolutely no problem with forceful or psychologically uncomfortable interrogation techniques against these soulless, amoral scum, because it yields information that saves innocent lives. (I do not think torture is appropriate, but I have a very different definition of torture from the ACLU lawyers who seem to gravitate toward the worst the planet has to offer like iron filings to a magnet.) Part of the reason we still have all the bridges and tunnels in New York, and the Sears Tower in Chicago, is because of information gotten out of terrorists at Guantanamo. I am perfectly comfortable with Guantanamo, I understand the reasons it was done that way, and it is not because of ignorance, self-imposed or otherwise.

 

[rpp]

Agree. Telling a 6 year old that evil people that hate americans and are out to get them is not a great idea.

I lost a couple of friends at WTC seven years ago. You defecate on their memory by your innuendo, ridiculous and treasonous claims.

 

[sanctamaria17]

Honestly, I’ve been learning a lot about human rights and let me just say one thing.

Conservatives and liberals can agree that Guatanamo is not torturing prisoners. What happened in Iraq, the perps got punished for it as that was unfitting conduct for soldiers. But you know something? A) the prisoners at Guatanamo are actually treated fairly (halal food only, practice of religion, medical care) B) Yes, they’re interrogated but if it protects this nation? I’m OK with that (and I’m huge about human rights things).

You want to know unfairness? Go to Burma and see what it’s like to live under their dictatorship. Talk to a woman in the Congo who’s survived brutality. Talk to a victim from Darfur. A Christian in Iraq. A woman marked for a vendetta to save the family’s “honor”. Talk to them and then tell me that interrogation for a terrorist is somehow unfair.

 

[duskyjewel]

Sancta… every time you post, I like you more.

You may be young, but you sound wise.

 

[Litcrit]

Praying for all the victims of 9/11 and their relatives and friends…

Children all around the world do tend to know war, death and horror from firsthand experience only too often. There is no reason to conceal anything.

In fact, in my part of the world (the Balkans) we’ve known wars and death and your house getting burnt down and your friends and relatives getting killed only too well, for years - which incidentally resulted in more people becoming really religious because they realized we lived in an unstable world, where nothing is secure but God

 

[rpp]

Honestly, I’ve been learning a lot about human rights and let me just say one thing.

Conservatives and liberals can agree that Guatanamo is not torturing prisoners. What happened in Iraq, the perps got punished for it as that was unfitting conduct for soldiers. But you know something? A) the prisoners at Guatanamo are actually treated fairly (halal food only, practice of religion, medical care) B) Yes, they’re interrogated but if it protects this nation? I’m OK with that (and I’m huge about human rights things).

You want to know unfairness? Go to Burma and see what it’s like to live under their dictatorship. Talk to a woman in the Congo who’s survived brutality. Talk to a victim from Darfur. A Christian in Iraq. A woman marked for a vendetta to save the family’s “honor”. Talk to them and then tell me that interrogation for a terrorist is somehow unfair.

Very well put. Thank you very much for sharing your feelings here. I think I agree with duskyjewel here.

 

[thomfra]

Honestly, I’ve been learning a lot about human rights and let me just say one thing.

Conservatives and liberals can agree that Guatanamo is not torturing prisoners. What happened in Iraq, the perps got punished for it as that was unfitting conduct for soldiers. But you know something? A) the prisoners at Guatanamo are actually treated fairly (halal food only, practice of religion, medical care) B) Yes, they’re interrogated but if it protects this nation? I’m OK with that (and I’m huge about human rights things)…

It’s not about “conservatives” and “liberals”. Either you are a society that values the concept of Justice and a fair trail, or not. Can’t you see this?

You want to know unfairness? Go to Burma and see what it’s like to live under their dictatorship. Talk to a woman in the Congo who’s survived brutality. Talk to a victim from Darfur. A Christian in Iraq. A woman marked for a vendetta to save the family’s “honor”. Talk to them and then tell me that interrogation for a terrorist is somehow unfair.

Yes. All terrible things. We are talking about the way in which the US behaves.

 

[thomfra]

I already told you… people who think like John Augustine are not worth the breath, or keystrokes, to argue with. I abstain…

Ok. then respond to me then. What do **you **say to Amnesty international?

The reason they have been kept at Guantanamo and not the U.S. mainland, in military detention instead of civilian was purposefully to keep them from accessing the U.S. civilian court system, to which they have no right.

Ok. So what you are saying is that they “have no right” to a fair trial.

can you see a problem with the army being the accuser, judge, jury and executioner at all???