The Generation 9/11 Made
And what should they know of the security state who only the security state know?
I have always said that my life began on September 11, 2001. I was three years old at the time, and I was seated in front of the television in my parent’s basement. At this point, I think both towers had been hit. In any case, the news channel played the second plane’s impact over and over again, until my mother, horrified, turned it off. It is my first memory.
The attacks that day changed the shape of American life, but only for those who remember them. For those who were too young to know what was happening—or who were not yet born—it is just history. Twenty-five years on, remembrance or nonremembrance is still one of the most useful tools for understanding generational divergence in opinion on the world 9/11 created.
The most obvious difference is in attitudes toward the security state. For those who remember 9/11, the term security state is itself pejorative. It calls to mind the Patriot Act, the Transportation Security Agency, the Department of Homeland Security, and other governmental novelties that smack of tyranny to those who lived through the supposedly carefree ’90s. These days, no one seriously discusses dismantling the agencies or rolling back the Bush-era surveillance legislation. And the security cameras, bollards, and metal barriers now ubiquitous on city streets are accepted elements of an urban environment. Still, those who recall life without these encumbrances grouse about them, and, sometimes in fits of pique, vow to smash them. That dissatisfaction often expresses itself as opposition to other innovations whose introduction works under the same compulsory, invasive logic: masking mandates, data centers, Flock cameras.
The desire to be rid of the security state and its accoutrements is baffling to those who remember nothing else. For most Americans under the age of thirty, constant surveillance and security mandates are not unprecedented; they are normal. And in some cases for some people, they are even comforting. The majority of younger people readily complied with government directives during the pandemic, and on college campuses many demanded tighter restrictions. Something similar could be said for the cameras. Older people hate them. Younger people are not nearly as bothered; a few years ago, one study found that a surprisingly high number—nearly a third of Americans under 30—support the installation of government surveillance cameras in houses. After all, in a state where everything must be accounted for, an unwatched area can only mean trouble. The logic of such a social arrangement is unthinkable without the security measures imposed after 9/11.
A broader example of the generational disconnect is in expressions of patriotism. It is common among those in the older generations to grumble that younger Americans do not love their country or that they don’t appreciate what makes their country great. This sentiment is understandable. If you can remember 9/11, odds are that you can remember the United States’ triumph in the Cold War after decades of struggle against an adversary whose collapse in the early 1990s was complete. But if you grew up after the so-called unipolar moment, then your understanding of your country is quite different. Plenty of people in the post-9/11 set love their country, but rarely with the candor of their parents and grandparents. Nowadays it requires more introspection to induce feelings of patriotism: At no point in the last 25 years has the U.S. been an unquestioned superpower. Afghanistan, Iraq, and other foreign troubles have bedeviled the country abroad—and called into question its claim to be a global force for good. At home, economic problems, worsening race relations, and the unraveling of national politics have not made the United States any easier to love. Of course many of us still do, but for those who only know the post-9/11 world, affection tends to come with qualifications.
Perhaps the most contentious generational difference is in humor, particularly about the September 11 attacks. The first televised joke was made about two weeks afterward by the comedian Gilbert Gottfried. It almost ended his career. These days, his joke, an improvised line about flying into the Empire State Building, seems tame in comparison to even the most stale 9/11 crack. Many people have smiled at least once at one of these, but those who remember the attacks—the confusion when the first jet hit the North Tower, the horrible moment when United 175 barrelled into the South Tower, the soot-covered firemen, the desperate people jumping, the roaring collapse—know that it is in bad taste to laugh. But for those who only know of 9/11 as something that happened in the past—tragic, certainly, but distant—it is fair game for any kind of gag. This is an inevitability with any historical tragedy. (“Aside from that, Mrs. Lincoln, how was the play?”) Those who live to see their own experiences become the butt of a joke are understandably upset at being swept aside by time.
Every momentous event eventually passes from memory into history. The most uncomfortable place to be in this generational schema is straddling the line between pre- and post-9/11. People like me have few memories before the attacks, but we remember that temperate and nearly cloudless day with clarity. We were not privileged to have known the world before, nor are we so blessed to think there is nothing strange about the world after. Our world began on that day, and we shall live in its shadow always.
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