American Self-Importance and A Certain Day in 2001

Recently the Coalition for 9-11 Families filed suit to block the start of construction on the memorial at the site of the former Twin Towers (this column only uses the term ground zero to refer to the atomic bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki in World War II). These public battles have been tiresome in the extreme, populated with all sorts of strident proclamations designed to remind all within hearing range that the families are the real victims of this historic attack, while also displaying all the distasteful "what about ME??" tendencies of American victimhood. This group declared that their opposition to the monument was linked to the idea that the Tower footprints are now sacred ground, and should therefore be left permanently uncovered. Apparently the irony of declaring anything sacred ground in a secular democratic society was lost on these families.

In the 1860's the US fought a civil war that pitted the southern slaveowning states against the more industrialized northern region. Between the two armies over 600,000 were killed by combat or disease in the course of hostilities. The battles of Antietam and Gettysburg resulted in the deaths of over 10,000 soldiers alone, and the casualty totals were equally horrifying--over 23,000 killed or wounded at Antietam, and the astonishing total of over 50,000 killed or wounded cemented Gettysburg's claim to the prize of bloodiest battle ever fought on the North American continent. This war was no mere Red state vs. Blue state in the newspaper columns; this war was blood and iron, in pure enough form to make Otto Bismarck smile. Yet this war and its dead never made the demands for attention that the 9-11 families have; there are plaques and small monuments at these battlefields, and many many graves, and that is how it should be. The lack of media saturation in 19th-century America helped as well, as did the fact that those who died in the war knew the magnitude of their own sacrifices.

Three thousand innocent victims deserve a memorial. This memorial should be what it is--a memorial--and not some hyperventilating pseudo-patriotic screed of propaganda. When the Twin Towers fell, the area beneath them became a mass grave. To suggest that they must remain forever unsullied in the busiest section of America's busiest city is unrealistic (cemeteries have been moved many times in NYC's history). The willful and pompous self-importance of those American families who wish to call the Towers' footprints holy ground assists the Bush administration in powerful ways--it allows them to utilize the language of the pulpit in constructing their multifarious deceits, and it allows them to cover their misdeeds with a blanket of principle and honor. The victims of 9-11 were not victims of a military attack, as this nation's government has repeatedly claimed--they were innocent victims of the horrors of American foreign policy since WWII, collateral damage in the attempt to placate and protect American oil companies. Like German peasants caught between armies in the Thirty Years' War, or Serbian refugees of the First World War, or Japanese citizens of Hiroshima in August 1945, the people who died on 9-11 lost their lives as an ultimate result of disastrously aggressive actions by their own country's governing bodies or executives.

In the long history of human atrocities, the number of dead from 9-11 is dwarfed by such memorable slaughters as the Christian conquest of Jerusalem in 1099, the clearing of native peoples from the American continents, the Vietnam War, or the Nazi-engineered Holocaust. Americans of our generation have not suffered through anything as horrendous as these events. Despite the horror of that day, no special classification should be required to memorialize those who died. Their lives and deaths were no more special or sacred than any of the other millions of innocents who have died throughout humanity's long and bloody history. Being American does not give your death extra significance, or extra sanctity. Being unable to bury your dead family member is a something that millions of people the world over have experienced, whether through war, famine, or natural disaster. Just ask any survivor of Hurricane Katrina about that, and see if that person is looking to make all of New Orleans into sacred ground.

Nick Sylvester, Traditionalist

Jayson Blair, Judith Miller, and Stephen Glass are starting to look like trendsetters now, rather than the abominations that they are. Joining their sad parade a couple of weeks ago was the annoying Nick Sylvester of the Village Voice and Pitchfork Media. It turns out that Sylvester was caught fabricating the details of a recently published article in the Voice and has been suspended indefinitely. Whereas the revelations of Glass' or Blair's misdeeds earned them immediate dismissals, dearest Nicky has not been fired yet by the Voice--although I doubt we will see him doing the Judith Miller perp walk accompanied by Voice publisher Michael Cohen or Pitchfork chief Ryan Schreiber.

Sylvester's most notable quality as a writer was his snideness. His music reviews for both the Voice and Pitchfork were shallow and lacked a real understanding of music. Too often he was fooled by a thick presskit, as this review of woozy and pretentious electro schmucks Excepter demonstrates. He would also disparage bands whose sound was too sophisticated for his ear while simultaneously passing himself off as a knowledgeable musician, as this review of Deerhoof shows. His visibility in the world of music criticism was considerable, however--and with dual jobs toiling for the Voice and Pitchfork he was approaching something close to critical ubiquity. Remembering, of course, that a music critic's job for a major publication like the Voice consists of being given free music and seeing live shows for free, it would seem that Sylvester's life was fairly set. Destiny intervened, according to some rumors, when his editor began to groom him as his protege journalist; and Nick's job began requiring more copy than mere review pieces as he was assigned full columns.

He choked in the face of that pressure and admitted to fabricating some details in his last story for the Voice, which now throws suspicious light upon his entire journalistic output. But as the numbers of fakers have increased in the American press, it appears that the punishments for them have disappeared. Jayson Blair got to write a book about his experiences, mysteriously equating his lying and absence of ethics with a slave battling against slavery, while Stephen Glass received the book and movie treatment for his own journalistic corruptions. And let's not forget the new breed of journalist/propagandist fakers on the rise, exemplified by former NY Times reporter Judith Miller, Ann Coulter, Armstrong Williams, or any of the assholes who work for Fox "News"--they remain unpunished for their participation in spreading the lies that took the US into war with Iraq, along with helping to quash any public discussion of the Bush administration's conduct on 9-11 itself. Tolerance for embellishment seems to be rising, and everyone from the last two presidents on down is willing to make reality as subjective as it can possibly be.

So little Nick Sylvester's crimes certainly pale in comparison with these other liars. But when an American journalist is caught fabricating their work, it usually ends up opening up a profitable new life for them. As he follows in the footsteps of those giants who came before him, he might be able to console himself with that thought. Life begins after getting caught, Nicky Boy.