The
Innocence of Freedom
By Theo G. Zacharatos
The
Webster Dictionary defines innocence as freedom from guilt or sin through
being unacquainted with evil. A very real and appropriate characterization
of where we were as a nation just a year ago. For this freedom from guilt
and evil was the state which powers our social behavior since the birth of
our Nation to give of all the treasures we have to anybody who comes to
our shores to live, work or play with us here. It was not the distance
from so many areas of conflict around the world since the day of our
independence in 1776 which gave us this. Rather it is our freedom from
oppression which we always shared
with friend and even to foe alike. Our friends became closer, our foes
changed and no longer hated us as they too became free and many of them
stayed here to become Americans. Whether it was as fugitives of enemies of
the then communist world, to prisoners of world wars who were released at
the end. We were here, available and giving freedom to all of them to
partake in this unique and once in the history of mankind experiment of
social freedom coming right down to the state of the individual as in no
other society in the world.
This
explains why America in her statement to the world community has never
taken a square inch of territory, or colonized anybody. When others were
killing to disrupt and take over countries, we were thee dying for them to
secure their state of freedom only because we believe in it. When others
were monopolizing their power in isolated countries through dictatorships,
we were knocking on their doors reminding them that their people needed
individual freedom like ours to choose their lifestyles as opposed to have
such basic life decisions of their made up for them for decades without
their choice. Where countries showed their illegal and inhuman conquests
of territories which did not belong to them and which they occupied by
force and coercion, we showed our support to what is right.
Now evident in
small individual monuments of young Americans who rest in peace in
cemeteries in the battlefields of Europe, the Middle East and the Pacific
or the bottom of the oceans around our troubled world where they were to
fight for the freedom of others.
On
September 11th of 2001 a new type of attack came upon us from a small evil
and wicked group men to the many people who were going on with their lives
working at New York=s World Trade Center, traveling across America,
working in the Pentagon, the Capitol or the White House in Washington, or
just staying at home to wait for their loved ones who were at work. Now
with all these lives abruptly terminated and for those who are left
behind, permanently damaged only for an evil statement against America.
Powerful and enormously costly, yet without value and
loosing its might as time goes on. It is true that we lost the
innocence of our giving which empowered the quality of
life in our country but this was
only felt the day after the event. Now a year later, time and the
support of so many people and societies around the world who came out to
share their feelings, helps us heal, redefine what we stand for and who we
are. From Australia to New Zealand to two small communities in
Newfoundland and Labrador in Canada who stopped their lives to accommodate
thousands of stranded passengers in tens of diverted aircraft in their
shores. Not only then but now a year later who came out again to remember
us in our moment of grief and recollection of this sad day. Our thoughts
and prayers are with all those who perished, many of who did not meet
their deaths with this violent act, but who walked out helping others and
went back to the World Towers to help more people and never came back. To
give more than to take. Even the rest of their short
lives.
America
is not going to change for we stand for freedom of the individual which
powers the majesty of our democracy and as alone as we are in today’s
world we are committed to this basic need of all human beings around this
troubled world of ours. Contrary to other societies where the state
empowers its citizens, we the people, are the ones who empower our State.
Whereas others work for their systems of government, in our society here
it is the System which we empower day in day out, which works for us. But
as we are now left alone in the world and expected to feed the hungry,
heal the sick, and protect weak, we are being tested by this new evil
attack of terror which we are faced with now. In the short term it is the
price we have to pay for being on the top of the tree of freedom and
liberty in the world. For the view of the bigger picture at the top, we
must sustain the cold of the winter and the heat of the summer, because we
are where we are to provide this view for all those who are in our tall
tree of humanity.