I'm sorry about the way I phrased that post — I think I forgot a sentence I meant to include. That attack was also beyond horrible. #ParshaChat

I actually *did* know people in the DC area, but I don't think I even found out about the attack on the Pentagon until later. I was a teenager and I don't think I'd been aware of the existence of the Pentagon before then. #ParshaChat

Never! I have a friend who lost friends in that attack. #ParshaChat

And please don't forget the attack on the Pentagon the same day! #ParshaChat

And I will always be grateful to whichever kids' channel it was in 2001 (I think Nickelodeon?) that made the decision to broadcast normal programming so the kids could have something normal to watch while all the adults were glued to CNN. #ParshaChat

My wife's oldest brother was an electrician who had been working in the World Trade Center, and it was an anxious hour before she could reach him by phone and make surge was okay. #ParshaChat

Oof. Yes, I can imagine. I haven't actually been to that museum yet, but I can imagine *exactly* what those broadcasts are. #ParshaChat

This all makes sense. At the time I had recently moved from Chicago to Michigan. One of the folk lost in 9/11 was from high school. I didn’t know anyone who hadn’t lost someone or knew someone who knew someone. Grief was omnipresent #ParshaChat

Would you be willing to say more about the possibilities you're seeing? It sounds like you've thought of some possibilities I haven't. #ParshaChat

Yeah, I read some kids historical novels and kids nonfiction about 9/11 recently, and it made me realize just how much for kids, it's history. #ParshaChat

And also age and social setting: I was 16 or 17 and in a situation that became rapidly unstable due to the ideological fault lines that were developing. #ParshaChat

I think this is in part geographical — I was living in Oregon at the time and I didn't know anyone living in NYC or Boston or who was flying that day.
#ParshaChat

I think with long hindsight about how disastrous the Iraq war was, people imagine that the anti-war movement at the time was something a lot better than it actually was.

I think it's easy to forgot how hateful and conspiracy laden so much of it was, at the time. #ParshaChat

I actually feel a little distant from both those. I remember they happened, but later. The vivid memories were … who was on a plane to NYC, and how long did we wait to hear how they were? Who showed up for work at the tower that day? Who was left to receive the insurance payout (no one)? #ParshaChat

Progress does depend on refusing to accept the status quo, it does depend on willingness to take risks, and it *also* depends on living in reality and being strategic and engaging in a lot of trial and error. #ParshaChat

Solidarity! Unions! #ParshaChat

And also perhaps because we have a mythos that progress is made by refusing to accept limitations on the possible and just dreaming bigger and fixing everything through sheer force of moral clarity. And that's really not how it actually works! #ParshaChat

I love this whole thread . My son responds with an observation about how this happens because the broader society harasses, nags, criticizes them into doing impossible things #ParshaChat

And also: Treating people as people rather than as characters in a plot. #ParshaChat

I also remember how in my social circles, there was a near-immediate divide into left-wing conspiracy theories and right-wing jingoism, and both parts of that were pretty terrible. #ParshaChat