Which of course obscures the fact that, essentially, “we” did 9/11 to ourselves as well, going all the way back to Kermit Roosevelt and Operation Ajax in Iran in the early fifties. All our endless warplane diplomacy in the ME led up to 9/11, as evidenced by the choice of the targets. (Note that most of us were never directly involved in US enterprises and adventurism in the ME, but most of us just let it happen.)
This is ridiculous. Please tell me how the Spanish brought this attack on themselves? Or the Belgians? That is victim blaming at its worst. Terrorists are the only ones to blame for terror attacks.
You must be joking? If what you say is true, then how do you explain the fact that no one has ever heard of the Battle of Gettysburg? Not only does it not have a remembrance day of its own, it has been eclipsed since before it actually happened by Independence Day celebrations! All those fireworks going off to celebrate the revolution, it’s like people had never even heard of the Civil War, let alone the Battle of Gettysburg.
I get your point, but what do most people associate with December 7th? That the United State was the victim of a devious attack by Japan – which is certainly true, but it only tells part of the story, and it’s the part that fits in with the narrative that the United States is the nation of freedom fighters. I’m sure you know it’s a lot more complex than that. I’m far from an apologist for imperial Japan, but there’s enough hypocrisy to go around there.
Remembering history is really as useful as understanding the entirety of it. The defenders of the Confederate monuments often use the same rationale to keep them standing, that we’re ‘forgetting history’ by taking them down, completely ignoring the very reason they went up in the first place. That’s not remembering history; that’s being manipulated by those who want us to remember their version of history
September 11, 1973. Never forget.
Spaniards brought this attack on “themselves” because our President José María Aznar (together with Tony Bliar) sided with the US (the US? OK, George Bush Jr., Dick Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld, Condoleeza Rice etc. etc. etc.) in the summit in the Azores and sent troops to Irak though it was not justified at all to do so (to accept that it was known that it was not justified see what the German Foreign Minister Joschka Fischer said in public during the annual Security Conference in Munich to Donald Rumsfeld about the need to go to Irak)
The Belgians, … that is long story. Would be worth a separate thread. There were reasons for the attack in the Brussels Airport and Metro. There was no justification, but there is an explanation why then, why there.*
Of course the victims, the people who died or were wounded and suffer to this day in NY, Madrid or Brussels did not “bring it on themselves”. But that is politics: you pay for bad leaders. This is not victim blaming: I blame the hypocrite liars in power.
And talking about victims: We are vicitms too, because our society is worse off because of Irak and Afghanistan. And because all of the surveillance we endure with the excuse of security and war on terror.
* Among other things, one reason was blatant incompetence. Guess it sounds familiar. 
Sorry, was I talking about terrorism in general? This thread is about 9/11 observances specifically.
I wonder how many people here know what you are refering to. Read about Australia’s involvement?
You did say this. The 9/11 attackers were not affiliated with any government that we were involved with and their sole purpose was to kill to promote their version of Islam.
Yeah that just came out recently
Well, that depends. One could argue that our government’s relationship with the House of Saud is complicated, and the Saudis’ relationship with 9/11 is also complicated. There’s also the inconvenient truth that the U.S. a role to play in the radicalization of Pakistan and Afghanistan.
I mean, I get it – we had skin in the game and we were picking race horses to back. But those choices have had consequences.
All true but also common for all regional not to mention super powers. Blaming the US for 9/11 is like blaming the victim of a crime for the crime because he or she didnt take appropriate precautions.
Yup. “They” did it to us. That’s why we’re so hung up on it.
No, it is not like that. It is like we view Hurtloin as the victim because Dilrod burned down his house, until we learn that Dilrod killed Hurtloin’s plow horse (without which Hurtloin cannot make a living). Which leads us to investigate why Dilrod killed the horse and so forth. As asahi notes, it is a very complicated formula that goes way beyond the scope of any analogies.
The people who died on 9/11 we’re, yes, victims. No one is blaming them. But some of us also lay blame on the US for creating Da’esh (as a result of adventurism). It is not a matter of victims protecting themselves, it is a matter of the US proactively fucking up other countries, which the US does not actually need to do. For example,
Proactively, you say? Saddam Hussein invaded Kuwait and Iran Iran–Iraq War - Wikipedia in which Iraq openly committed war crimes The Whole Range of Saddam Hussein's War Crimes - MERIP. He used nerve gas against the Kurds Halabja massacre - Wikipedia . Yeah, it was the USA fucking up Iraq instead of Saddam Hussein acting like a mini Hitler. You seem to have forgotten the history in Iraq.
“My buddies”? Grow up.
You do know that the US worked with Saddam during his war with Iran and we were aware that he was using nerve gas during the conflict?
How does that change the fact that we did not proactively engage Iraq? And how does that change the fact that he invaded Kuwait and committed a genocidal act and maybe acts against the Kurds?
The issue here is that people are trying to use complex geopolitical events to score political points. There are dirty hands all over the place but that in no way justifies acts of terror.
The “blame America first crowd,” making moral equivocation.
We can make a distinction between Hanna Arendt’s and Ward Churchill’s definitions of a “little Eichmann,” of course. But some of us make no distinction between deliberately targeting civilians and “sucks to be you Haji, wrong place, wrong time. Pink mist now. USA! USA!”
I’m referring to the home front chicken hawks, not the US and coalition troops. When the Seattle police were specifically attacking first responders wearing scrubs who were giving aid to the injured Capitol Hill protesters, how I wish the rules of engagement our troops overseas were in the vast majority honoring been on display.
Then you must make no distinction between Hitlers genocide in the East and the Allied bombings of Germany and Japan that killed more than a million civilians. The differences are in degree and motivation.