This is an article by Leonard Pitts, a
columnist from The Miami Herald. It appeared in
Wednesday's edition, September 12, 2001:
********************************************
We'll go
forward from this moment. It's my job to have
something to say. They pay me to provide words
that help make sense of that which troubles the
American soul. But in this moment of airless
shock when hot tears sting disbelieving eyes,
the only thing I can find to say, the only words
that seem to fit, must be addressed to the
unknown author of this suffering.
You monster!
You beast!
You
unspeakable bastard!
What lesson
did you hope to teach us by your coward's attack
on our World Trade Center, our Pentagon, on us?
What was it
you hoped we would learn?
Whatever it
was, please know that you failed.
Did you want
us to respect your cause? You just damned your
cause.
Did you want
to make us fear? You just steeled our resolve.
Did you want
to tear us apart? You just brought us together.
Let me tell
you about my people. We are a vast and
quarrelsome family. A family rent by racial,
social, political and class division, but a
family nonetheless.
We're
frivolous, yes, capable of expending tremendous
emotional energy on pop cultural minutiae-a
singer's revealing dress, a ball team's
misfortune, a cartoon mouse. We're wealthy too,
spoiled by the ready availability of trinkets
and material goods, and maybe because of that,
we walk through life with a certain sense of
blithe entitlement. We are fundamentally decent,
though-peace-loving and compassionate. We
struggle to know the right thing and to do it.
And we are, the overwhelming majority of us,
people of faith, believers in a just and loving
GOD!
Some
people-you, perhaps-think that any or all of
this makes us weak. You're mistaken. We are not
weak. Indeed, we are strong in ways that cannot
be measured by arsenals.
IN PAIN
Yes, we're in
pain now. We are in mourning and we are in
shock. We're still grappling with the unreality
of the awful thing you did, still working to
make ourselves understand that this isn't a
special effect from some Hollywood block-buster,
isn't the plot development from a new Tom Clancy
Novel.
Both in terms
of the awful scope of their ambition and the
probable final death toll, your attacks are
likely to go down as the worst acts of terrorism
in the history of the United States and,
probably, the history of the world. You've
bloodied us as we have never been bloodied
before. But there's a vast difference between
making us bloody and making us fall. This is the
lesson Japan was taught to its bitter sorrow the
last time anyone hit us this hard, the last time
anyone brought us such abrupt and monumental
pain.
When roused,
we are righteous in our outrage, terrible in our
force. When provoked by this level of barbarism,
we will bear any suffering, pay any cost, and go
to any length, in the pursuit of justice. I tell
you this without fear of contradiction. I know
my people, as you, I think, do not. What I know
reassures me. It also causes me to tremble with
dread of the future.
In the days to
come, there will be recrimination and
accusation; fingers pointing to determine whose
failure allowed this to happen and what can be
done to prevent it from happening again. There
will be heightened security, misguided talk of
revoking basic freedoms. We'll go forward from
this moment sobered, chastened, sad. But
determined, too. Unimaginably determined.
THE STEEL IN
US
You see, the
steel in us is not always readily apparent. That
aspect of our character is seldom understood by
people who don't know us well. On this day, the
family's bickering is put on hold.
As Americans
we will weep, as Americans we will mourn, and as
Americans, we will rise in defense of all that
we cherish. So I ask again: What was it you
hoped to teach us? It occurs to me that maybe
you just wanted us to know the depths of your
hatred. If that's the case, consider the message
received. And take this message in exchange: You
don't know my people. You don't know what we're
capable of. You don't know what you just
started.
BUT YOU ARE
ABOUT TO LEARN!
