It's 9/11 today, a dozen years after Islamic nutjobs took thousands of innocent lives because of their irrational, disgusting, delusional religious beliefs. It was the saddest day in recent memory, and it affected me in a very direct way. That morning my wife and I were scheduled to fly to Philadelphia and then on to Italia, a trip I had waited a lifetime for and a trip I had prepared for with 18 months of studying the language, traditions, geography and cost.
My flight was just late enough that we never made it to the airport, and it was easily the most depressing day of my life. Now, I'm not so egotistical as to say my pain was anywhere near what those who lost family members felt, but I would venture that I suffered as much or more than those who weren't directly affected by the tragedies.
That day is easily the single biggest moment in atheism history, turning thousands of people against religion and confirming any doubts people on the fence may have had. Three major publications that changed the face of atheism arose from that tragic morning: The God Delusion by Richard Dawkins, The End of Faith by Sam Harris and God is Not Great by Christopher Hitchens. These books are required reading for anyone looking to dissect the evils of religion or affirm their convictions as atheists.
But it's been a dozen years and people still don't understand this terrorist act was religious-based, that these jacknuts flew these planes into our buildings because they believed they would go to heaven and be rewarded with 72 virgins each. We lost thousands of lives to an irrational insane belief, and consequently thousands more died in a war that still rages today. The title of this post is 9/11: Misdirected anger, and I stand by that. Americans may still be angry by this attack, but they are angry for the wrong reasons. They are angry because they think we were attacked by terrorists who picked a fight because they think we shouldn't be in their countries trolling for oil.
That is not it at all. Al-Qaeda (and the like) hate Americans because they're convinced we are infidels, that we shouldn't be supporting Israel and, because of these beliefs, they're instructed through their Koran to kill us and to die doing it, thus being rewarded with the highest honor a Muslim can achieve, martyrdom.
It's all religion, and it sickens me. And what happened after the attacks? We had a national day of prayer. First, what a slap in the face to the non-religious, but second, that's like saying we are going to pray to our god so he'll beat up your god. Where was "our" god when these fuckers were slitting the throats of our captains and melting our nationals with jet fuel? Want to throw free will out there again? Don't even insult me.
People should be pissed off that religion led to these deaths, these actions and these relations. It's terror, but it deserves a qualifier: religious terror. Politicians are too scared to use this hot button, which explains why so many atheist politicians never come out of the closet. It's statistically improbable that we have thousands of politicians and none are atheists. So they are lying, but is that any surprise coming from a political figure?
Be angry about 9/11, but be angry for the right reason.
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