It Changed Everything

With the 7th anniversery of 9/11 in a couple of days, I thought I would say a few words about what was essentially the event of the century, and without a doubt changed my life forever along with the course of history. It is now somewhat of a cliche that September 11, 2001 "changed everything" but it is definitly true with regard to my life.

First off, the events themselves affected me at the deepest level of my soul. I knew nobody that died in the attacks, but I felt (and still do to a degree) each and every death deeply that day. Before 9/11, I only understood the nature of evil in the abstract. That completely changed that day, as did I.

I will never forget people jumping from the windows of the Twin Towers and realizing with horror that that was the most rational choice that they could make at that time. To quote Ayn Rand from The Fountainhead, "When I see the city from my window--no I don't feel how small I am--but I feel that if a war came to threaten this, I would like to throw myself into space, over the city, and protect these buildings with my body." I wonder how many silent heros did just that on that horrible day?

We know of the hero's of Flight 93 who fought to their deaths to stop the hijackers from carrying out there mission that day when they discovered their intent. This is but another example of the heroism that lies within even an "average" free man when his life and freedom are endangered.

And as I now understand it is because we are free men that we were attacked by this enemy. It is because of our virtues that we are hated. It is because we are a country of men who are in general free to use their minds, and to make money that we were attacked. The World Trade Center wasn't choosen by accident. Our enemies attacked the symbol of our society's greatest virtue--the ability of free men and women to make money and persue their own happiness as they see fit.

While in general I understood the greatness of America and the virtues of Capitalism and persuing my own self-interest prior to 9/11 it was that event that lead to my explicit understanding of these issues and specifically why they are issues of morality.

At the time I was attending a university and within weeks the Left was already out protesting our "imperial invasion" of Afganistan which was actually a direct response to 9/11. This is when I first explicity saw evil here in the United States trying to destroy the good by the use of unearned guilt. To say the least this also rattled me at a deep level, because these people were essentially blaming us for the deaths and defending Islam as the "religion of peace".

So I first turned to the Conservatives at my school because at least they supported justice and retribution against the enemy. However I quickly learned that I wasn't a Conservative. For one, I've always been an atheist and that of course doesn't jive with them to well. LOL. Second I have always been much more of a Capitalist even though I had no idea what laissez faire was at that time they kept telling me I supported it (which I did without knowing) and must be a Libertarian. (Yeah right! ) Finally one of them brought of that I sounded a lot like Ayn Rand. I was like who, went to the internet and the rest is history. ;)

Since then not only have I learned that I was right about how evil the enemy and it's worldwide Leftist supporters are, I have learned why. At the root they all hold an anti-mind philosophy which requires sacrifice. It requires the sacrifice of the good to the evil, the producers to the worthless, the mind to God or others, sacrifice for the sake of sacrifice. It is this code of sacrifice that must be rejected. 9/11 lead me to understand completely that men are NOT sacrificial animals but that everyman is an end in himself and not the means to the ends of others.

9/11 lead me to learn about the morality of life--egoism. It taught me that evil exists but that it can be defeated--by force. It taught me that this force--retaliatory force against the initiators or force is not only proper logically--but is the moral action that free men and proper governments MUST take if they want to live and have the ability to persue happiness.

Yes, 9/11 changed everything for me, and much of the world. But it is now the time to share this change with the world. All lovers of freedom, Capitalism, and the good should take this time to decide how best they can further this goal, whether it be intellecual activism, blogs like these, letters to the editor, or just living your life to its fullest potential. Now is the time to take action to defeat this enemy which took it's ugly form on 9/11 in the form of Islamofascism but which is really the morality of death in all its form, the morality of self-sacrifice--altruism. This is what must be defeated if the world we want is to be ours.

We live in a time where ideas can move around the world at nearly the speed of light via the internet. If there is one main thing that should be understood in light of the events of 9/11, it is that when an idea's time has come it's nearly impossible to stop. Use this technology to help spread our ideas and maybe we can stop the next 9/11 before it has to happen again. The future's now in our hands.