Well it may be unpleasant to hear, but America is preoccupied with trying to forget 9/11.

No - not the victims. Few are that callous.

What they are trying to forget is that we live in a shrinking world in which many of the world’s citizens live under tyrants in societies dominated by superstition, irrationality and fervent nationalism. Where one does not grow up asking “what do I want to be when I grow up?” Such are silly questions.

Instead there are grievances to be addressed and past wrongs to be avenged.

But Americans can’t think that way and don’t understand those who do. Instead, we recast them as a class of victims who are in need of either our respect or aid. We recast the world so that we can operate in ours uncluttered by the fact that most of the world is only vaguely familiar with modernity and pluralism.

So people forget. They hear the words “nine eleven” with a sense of foreboding. The sense that the person saying those words will try to use that event to impose a reality on them that they’d rather not live with.

America has an escapist culture. Perhaps that is a good thing since we allow past wrongs to stay in the past. We do move on. But do we learn? Are we prepared to fight a multi-generational war? Or are we culturally moving on while, in the back of our minds, allowing the dirty work to be outsourced to a few men and women in uniform who will bear the burden of seeing things for what they are?

I will never forget, but I feel that I am a member of a shrinking minority out of step with my countrymen.