#Charleston has it's 9/11....

Clementa Pinckney 41
Sharonda Coleman-Singleton 45
Cynthia Hurd 54
DePayne Middleton-Doctor 49
Tywanza Sanders 26
Myra Thompson 59
Ethel Lee Lance 70
Daniel L. Simmons 74
Susie Jackson 87

I had a dream during my junior year of high school. I was riding over the Grace Memorial Bridge which is called around town here as the "Old Cooper River Bridge". I was in the passenger seat as my dad was driving and witnessed an airliner crash into the bridge below. This was in September on 2011. Two days later I sat in philosophy class and watched on TV as the North and South Towers of the World Trade Center burned and collapsed. My dad picked me up from school and took me home. I continued to watch the news in shock. The only solace I got was the same that most in our town had. It went along the lines of, "Terrorists would never attack Charleston". We all thought we would never have a 9/11. Now we have 6/17 and that day will become synonymous with when terrorism came to The Holy City. 

The names above are of the victims who leave behind loved ones whom are now left to find a way to move forward. They have to move forward while feeling as though their heart has been ripped out of their chests. This time it wasn't Al-Qaeda that Lindsey Graham preaches that we should put all our tax money into fighting. It wasn't ISIS. It wasn't some rogue state that starved it's citizens while building nuclear weapons. It was a 21 year old kid from Columbia; a graduate of White Knoll High School. A school I would see at wrestling tournaments. 

This is the sort of terrorism that everyone doesn't want to admit exists. It's fermented on gun ranges, in golf clubs, at cook outs, weddings, Wal-Mart, bars, strip clubs, truck stops, and even high school proms. It's bred in our households and now we live with the consequences of someone whom was radicalized by it. A kid that most would overlook that decided he had to "save the country". In their minds they feel as though this kid might be some sort of savior. Just like how those that become radicalized in the Middle East view Osama Bin Laden as a martyr. We are sickened by that but there are citizens of this country whom are right now cheering the fact that this kid turned monster carried out their sinister desires. They see what happened on 6/17 as a victory but they aren't burning the American Flag. They are hiding behind it while hugging the Confederate one. This goes on while we live in a state that still flies that flag at it's capital. 

This shit needs to stop; but it won't. We are too caught up in ourselves and in our individual perspectives. We are to concerned about me, mine, and myself. We don't care about tragedy until it's on our door step and the danger is still at large. We don't realize that we are the danger and that our apathy is what feeds it. It's what turns ignorance into malice. How do we become what this country was meant to be instead of what it is becoming? Do we even care about what we could be anymore or is it now a case of what could have been? Is it too late for us to change? Are we going to be proactive and look at how to help lend each other a hand to let those on the edge know that there are people that care if they step back? Or are we just going to continue to give that nudge?

After 9/11 I had some optimism for us but after 6/17 that has turned into a pragmatic sense of pessimism. I guess I hope that the nameless faces I see each day can prove me wrong. Can they?