Candles in the Darkness: Of the Terrorist Attack on America

By

Johnie H. Scott

Associate Professor of Pan African Studies

California State University, Northridge

September 20, 2001

No one will ever forget this picture of the hijacked airliner being directed into the World Trade Center already reeling from being hit by one plane just moments earlier.

Key Concepts:

1. Reflections
2. Aftermath
3. Daunting
4. Excavating
5. Bodycount
6. Disproportionate
7. Oppressive
8. Gaze
9. Passively
10. Zero Tolerance

Reflections on the American temper in the aftermath of the terrorist attack on the World Trade Center in New York City and the Pentagon in Washington, D.C., delivered at the Performing Arts Center of the University Student Union at CSU Northridge.

We have come together this afternoon to share our thoughts on the present course of action being taken by our nation in the aftermath of the horrible attack on us last week that claimed more than 6,000 innocent lives. At the same time, this is an opportunity to pay our own tribute of respect to those who were murdered and injured in New York City and our nation’s capitol. In being invited to be a part of this gathering, I have been asked to draw some parallels where possible to the Civil Rights Movement, the African American Community, and this country’s involvement in global conflicts from World War II to the present. This would be a daunting task under any circumstance. The very fact that even as I speak to you the efforts at excavating the dead from the Twin Towers continues, and the bodycount continues to rise.

Bodycount: a word from the Sixties, from the Vietnam War where, each night, we were given the casualties of the day for both American troops and the Vietcong. The War where Black America comprise ten percent of the nation’s population, but a highly disproportionate percentage of those killed in action. The War where Muhammad Ali entered the pages of history when he defiantly declared “The Viet Cong ain’t never called me a nigger,” that statement costing that heavyweight title held by the man who up until then had been known as the Louisville Lip, that same statement to follow him throughout his years from the ring as he stood his grounds as a Muslim and a Black man, that same statement to ripple through Black America like a Tsunami in echoing the sentiments of so many hundreds of thousands.

The War where Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. would expand his vision from the injustices of the racist American South and an equally oppressive North, expanding his vision to take in this conflict that had so bitterly divided our nation, doing so because it simply was no longer possible to deny the effects of that War upon America, yes, but even moreso, Black America as it struggled to come to grips with a country that professed freedom, liberty and justice for all while still denying the most basic civil rights to its own citizens. There are those who say and have written it was when this Nobel Peace Prize winner turned his gaze upon Vietnam that the doors opened to his own assassination.

Speaking before you today, I am reminded of another tragic moment in our nation’s history when people from coast to coast came together in morning. It was September 18, 1963 just a few days following the racist bombing of the 16^th Street Baptist Church in Birmingham, Alabama. This was a bombing that took the lives of four little black children, four little girls – Carole Robertson, Addie Mae Collins, Carol Denise McNair, and Cynthia Diane Wesley. The bombing took place the previous Sunday as these girls were in the church basement attending Sunday School. Dr. King officiated at the funeral service for three of those children killed in the bombing – Addie Mae, Carol and Cynthia. A separate service had been held for the fourth victim, Carole Robertson.

Speaking at the funeral service for those little girls, Dr. King make note of what might equally apply to those lives taken on September 11^th: “These children – unoffending, innocent, and beautiful – were the victims of one of the most vicious and tragic crimes ever perpetrated against humanity.” Surely, the same can be said for those who found themselves hijack victims and hostages on those four airplane flights. No doubt, the same can be said for those working in the Pentagon that morning. And without question, we can say of the men, women and children who just happened to be in the World Trade Center that morning that they “…were the victims of the one of the most vicious and tragic crimes ever perpetrated against humanity.”

I have been invited to, in the words of my colleagues and friends, share thoughts that might go beyond the rattling of swords, the jingoism substituting for patriotism, the murderous attacks on innocent people in our own country in the aftermath, people slain because of their dress, their complexion, their supposed religious difference in a country where the Founding Fathers themselves came searching religious freedom.

This one man standing in front of the now-collapsed Twin Towers provides an unknowing contrast in illustrating the destruction of that morning.

I see, all of us see, in my mind’s eyes the Twin Towers crumbling. I see, yes I do, those people making the awful choice between the fire or leaping to their deaths 80 stories below. And I still hear, yes I do, the screams and cries of the people on the streets below fleeing for their own lives and safety as the Towers implode upon them. And I grieve, yes I do, for the dead, for their families, for we are all connected, by country, blood, by a common humanity. So the question becomes, what sense do we make of this? And when do we strike back, in the words of today’s generation, when do we get payback?

I look back to Dr. King’s words at that funeral service for those little girls, words that were weighed very carefully as he spoke not just to television cameras, not just to a curious America and the world, but even moreso, as he spoke to the millions of African Americans who identified with and embraced those children, thinking in their minds, our minds, of how they were in the basement of 16^th Street Baptist Church, going to Sunday School like you and me and so many others.

“And yet they died nobly,” Dr. King said that somber day.

“They (i.e., their deaths) have something to say to a federal government that has compromised with the undemocratic practices of southern Dixiecrats and the blatant hypocrisy of right-wing northern Republicans. They have something to say to every Negro who has passively accepted the evil system of segregation and who has stood on the sidelines in the mighty struggle for justice. They say to each of us, black and white alike, that we must substitute courage for caution. They say to us that we must be concerned not merely about who murdered them, but about the system, the way of life, the philosophy which produced the murderers. Their death says to us that we must work passionately and unrelentingly for the realization of the American dream.”

I think of those words even as I reflect upon the emails shared with me by my own students who lost friends and loved ones in New York, by other students concerned with the mounting backlash and the question where do we go from here, and by one of my students in particular whose letter I want to share with you at this time. I received this on Wednesday, one day following the assault on the World Trade Center.

“Professor Scott,

Due to the tragic events that occurred on Tuesday in New York and Washington, D.C., I am stuck here in Boston. I flew out here on Monday evening to attend a board meeting for my company expecting to come back on Tuesday evening. However, due to the airport closure, I have not been able to catch a flight out yet because the airport is still closed. American Airlines stated that the Logan Airport is expected to open on Saturday morning. I expect to be flying out that day. However, because I thought I would be coming back on Tuesday, I did not bring my film evaluation notes for “Black Is, Black Ain’t” with me. I do, however, have my notes for “Ethnic Notions” here on my laptop.

I understand that there is a “ZERO TOLERANCE policy for “late” submissions.” However I am hoping that you can make an exception because of the unforeseen circumstance…As your syllabus stated I did have access to a PC and I am able to check my mail remotely, but I failed to bring my notes with me. However, I understand if you cannot accept this and I am willing to take a zero for my mistake.

I really didn’t understand how it felt to be discriminated against until the events that took place on Tuesday. Since I am a Muslim from Afghanistan my skin and hair is a bit darker than others. In the past few days that I have been here in Boston, I have received “different” treatment from people. Even the employees at the hotel act cold towards me after the incident. However, the day prior to the events, I was treated with respect. On the way back from my company’s office, I was stopped and searched twice by police. I am not ashamed of being Afghan or Muslim. It’s sad that a small handful of extremists can make a particular nationality and/or religion look bad. I am strongly against terrorism and I feel that anyone who acts or supports such acts should be punished, whether they are Afghan, Muslim, or any other nationality or religion. My family left Afghanistan to flee from the persecution of the Soviets. I remember as a child seeing men, women, and children lined up against the wall in Kabul and gunned down by the Soviet army. I hope that I did not flee one country’s oppression and racism to come into another that does the same…..Thank you”

“…We must work passionately and unrelentingly for the realization of the American dream.”

If there is anything of value and substance I can bring to this meeting from the African American Experience, it has to be the patience, tolerance, and understanding that comes from many hard winters long endured. This is not the time to turn against one another, to further victimize and demonize our neighbors and fellow Americans. I have read where Osama bin Laden is quoted to have said, “If you are a U.S. citizen, then you are a target.” Well, the times are different from the Sixties, that decade when Muhammad Ali could righteously say “The Viet Cong ain’t never called me a nigger.”

Author recounts events from the Transatlantic Slave Trade.

My ancestors were forcibly brought here against their will on the slave ships. They picked cotton til their hands bled. They chopped sugar cane and picked tobacco. They bore the lash and, in fact, were that strange fruit dangling from Southern trees that one of our greatest, Billie Holiday, rendered in song. My grandfather, whose name I bear as my middle name, was one of those. My people gave America its spirituals, and let the world know we meant what we said in singing “We Shall Overcome.” And like one of my own favorite groups from the 1960s, the Impressions with Curtis Mayfield and Jerry Butler sang, “This Is My Country.” So I am African and America, which makes me a U.S. citizen. And the same way I sang “Ain’t gonna let nobody turn me around,” neither I nor the millions of my African Americans brothers and sisters are going to deny or be denied our American birthright.

Understanding this doesn’t mean we are ready to nuke Afghanistan. That doesn’t mean I’m ready to tell a future son-in-law it’s alright to go out and take the life of someone whose religion, or way of dress, or culture is different from mine. When I do that, then I have betrayed that history and blood knot with my ancestors. I have betrayed the birthright that rightfully belongs to all of us. There are dark days ahead of us, serious times. But if I can say this, the darkness shall not be with us always. We, you and I and all of those we know, love and care for, can be those candles in the darkness. The world knows this – but the question is when will we awaken to it?

If not, then those men, women, and children died for nothing. The sacrifices you and your own families have made in coming this far, going to college to get the kind of education which will enable not only to make money but, much more important, make a difference in the world, will have been for nothing.

Thank you for inviting me. Thank you for listening. And God bless us all.

This photo of the World Trade Center gives a surreal, grim testimony to the lives lost that September morning.

Discussion Questions:

1. What would you describe as the tone of this statement? Why? What words serve as keys to determining the tone?

2. What is the thesis of this presentation?

3. What would be the three primary ideas or patterns that the author uses to develop and support that thesis?

4. Which of the following modes or styles of discourse does the author draw upon to develop this statement: description, narration, argumentation, persuasion? Give examples from the presentation to support your choice(s).

5. In reading this statement, what level audience do you think would most benefit from the thoughts expressed? Why? What audience would benefit the least? Why?

6. What new insight(s) did reading this give you in regards to the Terrorist attack on America?