The Daily Show with Jon Stewart
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One of my heroes, Jon Stewart, as the Daily Show returned to air after the attacks on 9/11/2001. He captures the pain and confusion of that moment in his uncharacteristic earnestness and tears.

Favorite Class/Moment in After 9/11

I figured that since we have come to out last class of the semester it would be interesting to have a review of the class and share some of the highlights some people have had over the semester.

I know for me, besides my special project, I enjoyed reading the poems and listening to the songs about 9/11. They provide for great reflection to one of the most prominent events in American history. I remember being moved by some of the poems we read, especially "Messages from the Sky". Even if someone young does not know about 9/11 they can still come to know the truth that the poem reveals to us. That humans and truly and intimately bound by love. It is the most universal human saying, "I love you." Despite all the terrible things that 9/11 brought to the world it did unify us as a people and on 9/11 our hearts went out to those who were suffering. I think that these poems and songs were great because they conveyed the truth about 9/11 that the facts cannot get at. Reading them gave me very interesting insight to 9/11 that I had not thought before.

Outside of that I really enjoyed doing my special project. As I said in my presentation, I knew very little about drones and I learned a lot in my research. I also found it interesting framing it in the context of 9/11. Ethics is a very important part of life and I had never thought about the moral implications of something that had been a after effect of 9/11. My project was definitely the summit of the class for me.

Cyber-Terrorism

Since Jon's presentation about cyber-terrorism, I have been quite interested in looking up this new kind of "warfare". I have come to think that it could totally change our world in the next few years. Hacking groups, such as LulzSec, Anonymous, Masters Of Deception (MOD), and Milw0rm have potential to do many things that could cause much destruction. For example the group Milw0rm hacked into the systems of Bhabha Atomic Research Center (BARC) which is the main nuclear center in India. What would happen if someone in the group just wanted something at that reactor site to go wrong. It could potentially kill millions of people. There is a lot of power and responsibility on the internet. As some have said. It could even be the next form of terrorism. In my opinion, it is even scarier than people who run planes into buildings because a terrorist/hacker does not even have to leave the comfort of his or her home to do things of potentially very destructive nature. These people are also good enough that it is very hard to track and find them. Just as we had to look for terrorists in the mountains of Afghanistan, we will have to look for them in the streaming and endless world of digital information. It might just be easier to find them in the mountains.
 Now to go to somewhat of a tangent. Recently, the government has attempted to cut down on internet crime such as this with acts such as SOPA (Stop Online Piracy Act) and PIPA (Protect IP Act). This was however not well received by the American people. The acts could very easily lead to violation of personal information and privacy laws. This would give some people complete authority to go where ever they needed to go to find information and it would also give them the authority to take a website completely offline without any red tape. Those acts thus failed, but the government will not stop trying. They now are trying to pass CISPA, or the Cyber Intelligence Sharing and Protection Act. I will attach an article from a few days ago for reference. We just have to keep in mind that our rights are at stake when the government gets involved with the internet. Is it worth the cost just so the gov. can stop some online piracy? What do people think? Do you think that it will solve cyber-terrorism of will we ever be able to stop it?

 http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2012/apr/23/ron-paul-cispa-cyberterrorism-bill?newsfeed=true

Point of View

Bethany's recent presentation on the terrorist stereotype throughout literature brought me back to Hayan Charara's visit to our class and his reading the same night in Rodman, both of which were extremely thought provoking. His words and readings tied in extremely well with the overall goal of the class. I found the most interesting aspect of Charara's work to be his decision to focus on his personal aspect of the post 9/11 world. Being an Arab American, Charara has had to experience a completely different aspect of the attacks on 9/11 than most Americans would have to experience. Because he is of similar ethnicity as the terrorists on 9/11, Charara has gone through a number of different trying times associated with the hatred and racism towards the Middle Eastern community.

After hearing his readings I was struck by his decision to focus on the perceived "attackers" rather than most of the other material that we have read which focused on the victims of 9/11. In one of my classes this semester we read and discussed Truman Capote's In Cold Blood in which Capote focuses the majority of the story on the two murderers of the Clutter family.

I was curious as to what impact this has on a reader? Is there a major difference between focusing on the victims or focusing on the guilty party? Do you think that one is better than the other? Or if this raised any other points of interest or questions.

A Must-Watch Video On How Military Drones Are Changing War

Hey guys,
Here is a video on drones and there affect on warfare that I watched while writing my special project. You may find it interesting and informative. Hopefully it can spark some dialogue.

http://gizmodo.com/5878417/a-must+watch-video-on-how-military-drones-are-changing-war

Our Present-Day Will Become History: Portraying 9/11 to Future Generations

After reading David Rieff’s article, “After 9/11: The Limits of Remembrance,” I’ve considerd how we will portray the attacks of September 11, 2001 as an event in history. For our class, excluding our professors, these attacks mark the first largely infamous event that affected America in our lifetime. With that being said, I think it is important to consider how we view events in history that we have not experienced. Accordingly, we must consider how we will portray the events of September 11 to the generations of people in the future who will only have our stories as a means of understanding.

I started thinking this way after considering Rieff’s comparison between 9/11 and Pearl Harbor. I don’t know many people—aside from my grandparents—who lived during the time of the attacks on Pearl Harbor, so the only knowledge I have about this tragedy comes from a history textbook. I started thinking that this medium of communication could be highly dangerous. If we only communicate events in history through one medium, that medium becomes the monopoly on the topic, and we receive a one-sided account.

Considering this danger, I think we should practice caution when we plan to portray the events of September 11 to future generations. For me, it’s hard to fathom that someone will only know of the attacks through word of mouth. However, this concept will become a reality in the near future, as our youth will learn about this event from a textbook.

With that being said, I wanted to pose some questions to the class. How do you think we should portray these events? Should we take any specific precautions? Should we teach them, like Rieff suggests, to move on and eventually forget the events?

To answer my own question, I would advise using caution when portraying al-Qaeda, because I can see our anger influencing future generations and ultimately perpetuating violence. I would take caution against portraying the events with an “us versus them” mentality, for I could see our grievances overflowing onto future generations. Do you agree? Disagree? Suggest otherwise?

Iran a Potential Cyber Threat?

Jon, just going off of your project and your main focus in your education here at Carroll, I thought you might be interested in this. It's a little different from a majority of the concerns being raised up until this point. A lot of the focus has been on China and potentially Russia, but not a lot of attention has been on Iran. This ties in nicely with America's standing in the post 9/11 Middle East and how it has been impacted by decisions made by the United States government.

http://www.npr.org/2012/04/26/151400805/could-iran-wage-a-cyberwar-on-the-u-s