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Earlier this summer, I arrived at Newark Liberty Airport from Mexico for a short stop in New York City. This is my first visit in many years. It violated my self-imposed travel ban on the United States. Although the United States is the country where I was born and raised, I found this to be a very disturbing place, irreparably related to the human condition. Alienate.
I left the United States in 2003 after graduating from New York University, almost two years after the thrilling attack that triggered a “war on terror” on September 11, 2001. Consistent with the United States’ preference for shameless satire, this war ultimately caused fear in communities at home and abroad.
Freedom to fly into Newark-renamed to commemorate 9/11-it is clear that 20 years after the events of 9/11 are still strong.
My homecoming began with the endless schizophrenia supervision passport line. During the waiting period, American citizens and guests can admire the signs of the Department of Homeland Security’s Customs and Border Protection, advertising themselves as the first and last line of defense to protect the United States and its “lifestyle.”
But what exactly is the “lifestyle” of Americans—how much “freedom” does it actually contain?
American scholar Roxanne Dunbar-Ortiz (Roxanne Dunbar-Ortiz) in her book “The History of Native American People” lists some factors that determine the survival of the indigenous people, such as “endless wars of aggression and occupation” and ” Trillions of dollars spent on Gears of War”. , Military bases and personnel rather than social services and high-quality public education”.
Other highlights include “total profit of the company” and “imprisoning the poor, especially the descendants of enslaved Africans”-not to mention “suicide, drug abuse, alcohol abuse, sexual violence against women and children, homelessness, dropouts” High rates of “school and gun violence”.
It sounds, well, not as good as “liberation”.
Of course, “terrorists” and other enemies always take action against your national narrative to provide a convenient distraction from punitive capitalism and the institutionalized inequality established by the state.
When I passed the Newark passport control and crossed the last line of defense to gain apparent freedom, I found that the danger hardly ended there.
A huge poster on the wall of the terminal-the bottom of which says “Funding for this information”​​is funded by a grant from the Department of Homeland Security-depicting a heavily armed policeman and a blue The man in the blue buttoned shirt and khaki pants represents ordinary Americans. The accompanying text reads: “Officer Greg Elgin is well equipped to ensure the safety of our area. So is Jason.”
In order to prevent Jason’s contribution to regional security from being discovered, his eyes, ears and mobile phone are all labeled useful.
Another line in the ad warns passers-by: “If you see, hear, or notice something suspicious, please say it”-this is an approximation of the government trademarked “If you see something, say something®” campaign, It prompted countless Americans to report suspicious behaviors of their fellow humans in the post 9/11 era, such as what appeared to be Arabs or Muslims.
After being freed from the freedom of Newark, I traveled to Manhattan and in the following week I re-acquainted with New York City and the policy of the United States, which is to strangle life by setting rules for everything under the sun and forcing people to live in fear. Break them.
First, for any community that considers itself free, the concept of public space has been effectively replaced by over-regulated space-so much so that even the smallest sidewalk plaza in New York has a large number of signs listing all prohibited activities , From showing signs-ha! -Feed the birds and lie down.
To be sure, when the events of 9/11 can be linked in some way, over-regulation becomes even more absurd—just like in the New York City Fire Museum in Manhattan’s SoHo district, I was in an innocent search for orange juice. In the process, I accidentally discovered that it is not equivalent to Mexico’s two seafood dinners and beer.
At the entrance of the museum, inexplicably, a 9/11 commemorative bull statue-yes, the bull-is decorated with an American flag pattern depicting the image of a 9/11 fireman, and on the left shoulder of the bull is the front Portrait of the President of the United States-George W. Bush, the anti-terrorist king, and Rudy Giuliani, the anti-social former mayor of New York City.
Beside the animal, the sign on the pedestal reads: “Please don’t let children sit on the memorial cow.”
So much freedom.
At the same time, in the depths of the former World Trade Center site-now with a Dubai-style skyscraper and other monuments of material excess that suit the American “lifestyle”-rules abound.
A sign stating “Prohibited items include [sic], But not limited to “weapons, tools, paint, glass bottles, open flames, and “powder and liquid soap”-this is undoubtedly a strange ban during the pandemic.
Another sign lists a series of prohibited activities, from “obstructing, wandering or disturbing the safe and orderly movement of pedestrians” to “bathing, showering, shaving, washing, changing or undressing.”At the bottom of the list is a QR code that says “A copy of the complete World Trade Center rules and regulations is [sic] Available here”.
Then there is “Oculus”-the focal point of the World Trade Center transportation hub-a white monster with high-end shops, built with only 4 billion U.S. dollars in public funds. Oculus escalators are equipped with audio rules that stipulate that there can only be one passenger at each step, as well as other important survival skills.
In fact, when most of the content that makes up American life is not a joke, it seems foolish to shout about trivial things—for example, you know, the police tend to kill unarmed black people.
In the end, however, the over-regulation in the United States is related to the de facto criminal convictions of blacks, browns, Muslims, poverty, mental illness, and in many aspects of general life.
The conditional fear of ubiquitous crime is in turn used to defend the huge police and military institutions, which themselves tend to commit fatal violations of the law.
As I spun through the secure dense grounds of the National September 11th Memorial and Museum across from Oculus, a map led me to the “American Response Monument” in nearby Liberty Park, where I was half expecting to find disabled Afghans Or a flat copy of Baghdad.
Instead, I found a bronze statue of a U.S. Special Forces soldier on horseback. The subtitle is “De Oppresso Liber”-the motto of the Special Forces, which translates from Latin to “Liberate the Oppressed.” The monument pays tribute to the U.S. military’s contributions, especially the “overthrow of the Taliban regime in Afghanistan, the most dangerous country.”
Oops.
Now, 20 years after 9/11, Afghanistan is still as dangerous as ever, thanks in large part to-who else? -The U.S. military. As Americans continue to live in state-induced fear of those suspected of conspiring to subvert our “lifestyle”, it may be time to get rid of oppression.
The views expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect Al Jazeera’s editorial stance.
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