Twenty-three Years After 9/11, It's Time to Stop the Talk about Unity

Unity only works when people can adhere to the same basic values and principles and respect honest differences; the years since 9/11 have shown that is not possible in modern-day America

Whatever happened to the values of humanity?
Whatever happened to the fairness and equality?
Instead of spreading love we're spreading animosity
Lack of understanding, leading us away from unity

That's the reason why sometimes I'm feelin' under
That's the reason why sometimes I'm feelin' down
There's no wonder why sometimes I'm feelin' under
Gotta keep my faith alive 'til love is found
Now ask yourself

Where is the love?

— Lyrics from “Where is the Love?” by the Black Eyed Peas

Each year that we mark the tragedy of 9/11, the conversation inevitably turns to the subject of unity: the unity that Americans felt in the wake of that horrific attack, and how we can recapture it during these polarized times.

But the 23 years that have passed since that fateful day have proven that the American people of the 21st century are not capable of sustaining the type of unity that we felt in the aftermath of the terrorist attacks, or even summoning it absent such a tragedy.

That may not be what we want to believe; but it’s what we need to accept. For failing to accept it risks something even more important than national unity: preserving the freedoms, rights and liberties upon which our nation was founded, and to which at least some of us still aspire.

The unity that we felt as Americans in the wake of 9/11 was fleeting because it was based not on a common purpose, but a shared feeling of grief and righteous indignation. And once that grief began to wane and the focus turned to how to respond to the tragedy, unity quickly dissolved because there were no easy answers, especially when grief turned to a quest for retribution, not just against the perpetrators of 9/11 but against all our perceived enemies, foreign and domestic.

Rather, what 9/11 proved was that America lacked a common commitment to its foundational principles. We granted our president too much power, which he misused and abused. When some of us questioned that abuse of power, our patriotism was immediately questioned and challenged for political gain. The flag that unified us in the aftermath of the attacks on the Twin Towers was quickly weaponized by those who claimed it as representing only their vision of what America was, and what it should be; it quickly morphed into a symbol not of the America that was attacked on 9/11, but of the slice of America that believed that it, and it alone, represented the true American values that were under assault, not just by foreign terrorists, but by their fellow citizens.

And that inevitably led us to the horror of the last eight years and Donald Trump’s assault on democracy itself — an assault that culminated on Jan. 6, 2021 when domestic terrorists attacked the Capitol and tried to overthrow an election.

When the Black Eyed Peas released their hit song, “Where is the Love?” in 2003, it was a reflection of how much had changed since Sept. 11, 2001, when the spell of unity consumed us. Long before Donald Trump arrived on the political scene, we were already divided and polarized at home, unable to summon a common purpose to address the challenges tearing apart our society, let alone protect ourselves from the terrorists of distant shores. Animosity and bitterness drowned out the love that was supposed to bind us.

Overseas, yeah, we tryna stop terrorism
But we still got terrorists here livin'
In the USA, the big CIA
The Bloods and The Crips and the KKK

But if you only have love for your own race
Then you only leave space to discriminate
And to discriminate only generates hate
And when you hate, then you're bound to get irate, yeah

Americans were irate, but not just at Osama Bin Laden and his terrorist organization; we were irate at one another. And the anger would only grow.

In 2004, an unknown politician by the name of Barack Obama would try again to summon that elusive unity that seemed to be at our fingertips after 9/11, with soaring rhetoric that turned him into a national figure overnight, calling forth a vision of America not steeped in red or blue, but common values and a common purpose.

But while that vision would propel him to the presidency four years later, it was a mirage. Yes, there was a Red America and a Blue America, and words alone could not span the two. The nation’s first Black president would not once again teach us the value of unity, as hard as he tried; his very presence in the White House would drive the divisions far deeper and wider. It wasn’t his fault. It was America’s.

As it turned out, too many Americans really didn’t want unity at all, because unity meant reckoning with the realities of a growingly diverse, multi-ethnic and cultural population, and extending the same rights, opportunities and privileges to those populations that had long been the domain of white men. Trump saw this and exploited it with a darkness and depravity many of us thought was no longer possible in the America that had twice elected Obama president.

A few months after 9/11, a football team with the perfect mascot to symbolize national unity — the Patriots — would win the Super Bowl. In the years that followed, that franchise would continue to win Super Bowls while being embroiled in cheating scandals (“Spygate,” “Deflategate”). Fans shrugged at the cheating in a sport that increasingly showered itself in patriotic spectacles that glorified the military and law enforcement as the quintessential symbols of America. All that mattered was perpetuating the image of what it meant to be a patriot, and that meant, first and foremost, winning at any cost.

So when cheating crossed from the realm of trying to steal football games to trying to steal elections, Americans shrugged. When a Black player had the gall to call out some of the racial injustices perpetrated by some of those symbols of American greatness that the league trumpeted, he was shown the proverbial door, and, guess what, Americans shrugged. The illusion of patriotism and national unity was apparently much more important than the principles that supposedly girded them. The integrity of the game was as disposable at the integrity of an election or the integrity of a profession employing lethal force that lacked accountability and guardrails. In some ways, Americans’ willingness to break the rules, and let anything go, in the sport they loved paralleled their willingness to look the other way to assaults on democracy and civil rights in society at large.

Perhaps the true unity that bound us was our willingness to sacrifice principle for self-interest?

Now, we find ourselves at an inflection point again, and the talk of unity has returned. If we can just rise above the scourge of MAGA, move on from Trump, we can rekindle that sense of unity we’ve long aspired to and make it a reality yet. It’s a tune Harris and Walz are singing on the campaign trail.

But it’s a pipe dream, and a dangerous one at that. For if Trump is defeated in November, and this time for good, in a resounding fashion, we will face the same temptation that has afflicted us at some many other inflection points in history: the temptation to turn the page, forget the past, and extend an olive branch to those who caused so much harm to so many.

We tried to do so after the Civil War, and we got 100 years of Jim Crow as a result. We tried to do so after the civil rights upheaval of the 1960s, and systemic racism continues to this day. Joe Biden tried to offer that olive branch to the other side after the bitter, contentious 2020 election and talked about unity, treating one another again as fellow Americans, and how did that side respond? Four years of "Let's Go Brandon," election denials, voter suppression, attacks on the LGBTQ+ community and minority groups.

From a political standpoint, Harris and Walz are smart to trumpet the idea of unity. But from a practical standpoint, it’s misguided and dangerous. A resounding defeat of MAGA may convince those who enabled, and tolerated, its assault on democracy and governmental norms for the past eight years to finally give up on its promise. But it won’t change the backward thinking and misguided beliefs that fueled its rise in the first place.

For all the effort to distinguish Trump the corrupt criminal from the voters who have stood by him through every assault on the Constitution, the fact of the matter is that he would not have been possible without them. And if they couldn’t release themselves from his grip after the events of Jan. 6, nothing will make them change.

It will be the task of a future generation of Americans to try to capture the unity we felt for a fleeting moment after 9/11 and which so many of us have longed to achieve in the years since. Hopefully, they will learn the lessons of these trying times in the way we failed to from the injustices and travesties of our past. Hopefully, they can forge a common national purpose based on a true respect for common democratic principles, with an ability to hash out their differences and debate competing visions from a basis of mutual respect and dignity.

But that’s not possible now. It won’t be possible after Nov. 5, whatever the results of the election. The only unity that will truly matter for the foreseeable future is the unity among those of us who are determined to protect and preserve our democracy from the continued onslaught of our fellow citizens who have chosen to value party over country, power over principle — and those who have chosen to sit silently by and watch it happen.

It’s unfortunate that it has to be that way. But that’s the harsh reality that the 23 years since 9/11 have taught us. We may not like it, but we need to accept and deal with it, if not for ourselves, then for our children.