Archives » Tuesday, January 06, 2009
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Kurt Soller
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Jan 6, 2009 01:22 PM
In this week's magazine, Eve Conant put together a fascinating story
about the identification and eventual resting place for the remains of
the terrorists from the September 11 attacks. Much of the story focuses
on how the remains were untangled using DNA testing. Of course, the
majority of the families who lost a loved one in the attacks believe
these ashes shouldn't be buried with the innocent. But as they sit in
FBI refrigeration waiting for their fate, many readers had their own
ideas as to where the ashes should end up. Naturally, toilets, trash
heaps and swine fields were among the most popular answers.
But others thought through this a bit more. "Put the remains in the cement of the new towers," suggested one reader. "Let the terrorist see that no matter what they throw at us we will rebuild." Others agreed, more pessimistically: "Perhaps they should be buried under the new Freedom Tower, forever a doormat for those with actual souls." Elsewhere in New York, the reader Capt Maniac suggested that we "just bury them in an unmarked grave with no public attention or religious ceremony." That reader adds:
"Destruction isn't the answer. My first instincts were to grind their
ashes to dust and throw them on a garbage heap, but that's the
terrorist's way of thinking. When we become them, they win."
According to another set of readers, even talking about this issue
gives the terrorists more attention than they deserve. Many were
unhappy that we paid such attention to the subject, drawing attention
to a group of individuals and a day to which many readers would rather
not return. "Leave them where they are in some freezer in some
undisclosed location for all eternity to be forgotten by both the World
& history," offered one commenter. "These cowards do not
deserve anything resembling a Christian burial. Maybe the remains (or
what is left of them) should be returned to their families so they can
face the consequences." That wasn't the only reader who suggested
returning the remains to the families. (But as Conant points out,
accepting the ashes would be accepting the terrorists' guilt, so no
family members have yet come forward). "Yes, they did a horrible
thing. However, murderer's remains are handled over to family members
daily. If they have the ability to separate out of the innocents, then
by all means they should have the ability to turn over those remains to
the families. We would expect the same from other countries." Echoed one other: "They
should return whatever is left of the hijackers to their families even
if they have been too afraid to come forward and ask for them. Their
mothers, most likely, were never involved in the fanaticism they
believed in."
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