Human Extremes, Lessons, and Unity

I wasn't there.?

I was one of the witnesses from afar.?

Many good friends in my long entrepreneurial journey were there. Some in the Pentagon - getting people out of the fires of the E Ring. Others making it out of the World Trade Center because they just happened to be a floor below the flames. Others where enlisted or decided too and ended up on the other side of the world fighting to prevent it from ever happening again.

Those that remember will talk about what a beautiful and clear day it was that morning. The kind of morning that makes you relish being alive. The kind of perfect day where you could walk from City Hall all the way up to Central Park and love every minute of the journey through all of the diverse neighborhoods along the way.

No one could know that hours later, hellish smoke would rise to the heavens from the aftermath of a true horror scene. Who can ever forget the crowds fleeing the billowing cloud of debris rushing down the streets? The people who jumped from a hundred stories up rather than face the raging fires?

9/11 was perhaps the greatest contrast of human extremes I've ever witnessed in a single day. From tranquility to horror. From horror to heroism. From heroism to mourning. And from mourning to resilience and... unity.?

While the images and emotions of that day sear it into our memories, it is the unity of the aftermath that I miss most of all. For the overwhelming majority there was a recognition that what had happened was unjustifiable evil. There was a moral clarity that brought us together. It was not some great accident that had taken 2,996 people from us. It was malice. It was intentional and it required a coming together to both mend our wounds but also to sacrifice to defend our way of life and the freedoms we enjoy.

So, twenty years has passed and, unfortunately, so has the unity and the moral clarity.

There is hope in today, in the many stories we tell each other so that we do not forget that awful day, is that we also remember what led to that day, what we had to do together to prevent it from ever happening again, and let those lessons inform us at a time we are so divided and so uncertain.?In reflecting on 9/11, there are three lessons that emerge for me on human dignity and charity, real priorities, and vigilance for justice.

The first lesson that I learned from 9/11 is:

Evil always begins with the simple step of seeing people as a means to our ends.

The more we lose touch with the dignity of others, the more extreme the malice we ultimately unleash. Those that attacked us thought their wickedness was justified. They had stated their intentions and rationale for years leading up to that day. And we did not act until the cost was utterly horrific. For them those people who died and died in horror were a means to an end. Not even a number but a message to send.?

Too many of us view our neighbors with too little inherent dignity. When the FDNY ran into those flames – and many would never come out again - the last thing on their mind was the views and opinions of those they were trying to save. They gave their lives for strangers without any thoughts on if saving those human beings advanced their personal views. They were human beings and they had to be rescued.?

The terrorists did the?opposite. The people - men, women, children, young, old, black, white, Asian, Hispanic, and even Muslim - in those towers deserved to die because of where they lived and what that implied about their values. It was the extreme of prejudice meeting the extreme of malice in one vicious motion. It saddens me that we have taken too many of the biases of those that attacked us in how we treat one another and not the charity of those that saved us and even sacrificed themselves for us. Let us reflect on that and see if it can drive us to find more charity toward one another. I believe that honors the legacy of those who died far more than our present discord.?

The second lesson that I take away from 9/11 is:

Many things can seem important until you are faced with the loss of what is?really important.?

I remember on 9/11 how rumors of others planes en route to other cities circulated wildly. In an instant, so much of what we took for granted was truly at risk as the canopy of safety fell in the face of our new reality. I knew of many heroes in the US Intelligence Community and US Military in the decade that followed who were in a race to prevent people like the murderers of 9/11 from possessing a weapon of mass destruction or other mechanism for creating mass casualties. Many were haunted by what they missed and swore that it wouldn't happen again. They lived their lives for the this generation trying to live up to that calling so we could enjoy safety and security again. I want to honor them along side of those we lost on 9/11. Like the FDNY, NYPD, and other first responders they choose to run into the fire. Not just that day but for?years?after that day.?

I call this out because if we can be humbled by the sacrifice that makes the freedoms we have possible, it will hopefully create space for us to have perspective on what really matters.?

And that leads into the third and final lesson I take away from 9/11:

Without defending justice, evil endures and suffering continues.

The reason so many had to give so much for so many years just to try to make sure that we have a memory of only one 9/11 and not many catastrophes to endure is that the malice embodied in that day is always with us. Too many of us have forgotten that. I can say this because our tolerance of evil in the world is much higher than our tolerance for inconvenience or difference at home. We spend an order of magnitude more attention on the later than the former. Not only does this continue to drive us apart, it will inevitably bring us back to another tragic morning here at home if we let the suffering in the rest of the world fester.

The last twenty years were us living, learning and leaving the aftermath of 9/11. Today we should not only honor those we lost, but the heroes who came to their rescue or went to war to stop another one from happening. We also have the opportunity to find a light from that dark memory if we can remember how unity and dignity were resurrected in the sunrise of the mornings that followed.

Those of us who were witnesses owe it to those that were lost to be that again.