Understanding 9/11 Attacks and Societal Death Systems

• September 11, 2001

• At 8:46 a.m., the North Tower of the World Trade Center was struck by a plane

• Eighteen minutes later, the South Tower was struck by a second plane

• At 9:37 a.m., the southwest side of the Pentagon was struck by a third plane

• A fourth plane crashed near Shanksville, Pennsylvania

• The planes carried 246 passengers and crew, as well as 19 terrorists who later died in the attack

• At the World Trade Center, 2,752 people died, including firefighters, police officers, and emergency medical responders

• 125 people died at the Pentagon

The Death System in Every Society

• Death-related practices are the third key element in portraying the experience of death in American society

• Encounters and attitudes affect practices

• September 11, 2001, attacks drastically affected American attitudes and practices

• Practices cannot be fully separated from encounters and attitudes

• The concept of a death system organizes and provides context for death-related practices

• Kastenbaum theorized that one simultaneously faces death alone and as part of a society

• The sociophysical network mediates and expresses our relationship to mortality

• The interpersonal, sociophysical, and symbolic network is how society mediates the individual's relationship to mortality

• Societies form systems to cope with the challenges raised by human existence

• These systems are formal, explicit, and widely acknowledged in some aspects

• They are also largely hidden and unspoken in others

• The coronavirus and COVID-19 in 2020 challenged the American death system and altered everyday life

Functions of a Societal Death System

• Warnings and predictions

• Prevention of death

• Care for the dying

• Dispose of the dead

• Social consolidation after death

• To help make sense of death

• To bring about socially sanctioned killings of either humans or animals

Components of a Societal Death System

• People i.e. funeral directors, lawyers, medical examiners, florists

• Places i.e. cemeteries, funeral homes, "hallowed ground," health care institutions

• Times i.e. Memorial Day, death anniversaries

• Objects i.e. tombstones, hearses, obituaries, gallows

• Symbols i.e. skull & crossbones, black armbands, "Ashes to ashes, dust to dust"

The American Death System and the Events of September 11, 2001

• Death is often minimized and removed from mainstream life, glossing over its harsh aspects

• These systems often support distancing or denial of death

• These systems protect from the very things that we most need to know

• Death systems can change when confronted by new situations e.g. September 11, 2001, the COVID-19 pandemic

• The American Death System's effective and ineffective aspects were revealed by the events of September 11, 2001

• Failures of intelligence agencies and coordination became apparent

• Immediate responses by emergency, aviation, and medical systems also became apparent

• Social consolidation occurred among many American citizens

• Freedom, rights, and personal liberties were redefined in the United States

• The Department of Homeland security was created

• Led to military responses by the United States and others

Human-Induced Death

Accidents:

• 224,935 deaths occurred in the United States in 2021

• Efforts to reduce accidental deaths are strained as the population expands, ages, and life stresses increase

Encounters with the opioid epidemic:

• 107,000 opioid-related deaths occurred in the United States in 2021

• Fentanyl was involved in the largest number of these deaths

• In 2022, the CDC published new guidelines for prescribing opioids

Homicide:

• 26,031 homicides occurred in the United States in 2021 (7.8 per 100,000)

• The United States leads the industrialized West in homicides

• Approximately 50% of all homicides occurred between family members or acquaintances (21,084 men, 4,947 women, and 32.3 per 100,000 within the Black community)

• Firearms were involved in 20,958 deaths

Homicide in schools:

• There were 93 school shootings with casualties (43 deaths) in 2020-2021

• Youth homicides occurring at school remain at less than 2 percent of the total number of youth homicides

Homicide and Its Aftermath

• Survivors face an unexpected death in circumstances that may be unclear, traumatic, and often involve some social stigma

• Grief may be further complicated when: the agent is a family member, friend, or peer, or the homicide has been deliberately perpetrated on innocent people

Terrorism

• Terrorism: the intentional use of violence by non-state actors against civilians in pursuit of political objectives

• It is done for revenge for perceived hurts

• For publicity, attention, and glory

• To force a surrendering or impose a repression on others to show strength

Kinds of Terrorism

• Individual terrorism: done to express anger or frustration

• Group terrorism: attempts to do harm for religious, political, or ideological reasons

• State-supported terrorism: employed by a political administration against its own or a neighboring population

• Means employed by terrorists involve various forms of violence

War, Genocide, and Ethnic Cleansing

• War: to overcome another society or group (or to repel some aggressive action)

• Genocide: violent crimes committed against groups intending to destroy the very existence of the group and its members

• Ethnic Cleansing: involves the forcible relocation of population groups; often becomes a form of genocide

Two General Points:

Produce social disruption resulting both directly and indirectly in suffering and death

• Difficulties in grasping or making sense of these events and resulting deaths

The Holocaust

• The Holocaust was a Nazi program to eliminate entire classes of people

• Six million European Jews and millions of others were killed

• "We have the choice between the Holocaust as a warning and the Holocaust as a precedent.” (Bauer, 1986)

• The reality of the Holocaust and its implications continue to resonate within the North American death system

The Nuclear Era

• Nuclear weapons were first tested and used during WWII

• They were dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, Japan

• Weapons of Mass Destruction

• Potential for global annihilation

• Concerns exist about terrorists, rogue governments, and other “enemies”

Nucler Energy

• There is always the threat of accidents and natural disasters

• Death-related experiences in the 20th century cannot be understood without considering these various forms of human-induced death

• All of these involve mass death or the potential for such destruction

• "Horrendous death"

Death and Language

• Society's Death System tries to control and influence death via the language it uses

• Language about death is used

• Death-related language is used

• This reflects strong social messages

• Emotions and behaviors appropriate to death are reflected in these language styles

Language About Death

• People avoid words like dead and instead use euphemisms

• Euphemisms are pleasing ways of speaking

• They substitute a pleasant or inoffensive word or expression for language viewed as harsher or more offensive

• Euphemisms usually involve underlying attitudes that seek to "prettify" language

• These arise out of human experiences with death

• Overreliance can distance us from important and fundamental events of life itself

• Death-related language can contribute to confusion, misunderstandings, and miscommunication

• Death-Related Language is frequently used in talk about events that have nothing to do with actual death and dying

• I.e. Dead batteries and dead letters

• They are are also used to emphasize, exaggerate, dramatize, and intensify in order to get a specific message across

The Contemporary American Death System

• Death language is frequently avoided when people speak of death itself

• It is often employed when people do not intend to specifically discuss death

Death and the Media

• Vicarious death experiences occur through news reports in the media

• "If it bleeds, it leads"

• This may create a kind of psychological immunity to the impact of death among the general public

• The media represents a highly selective portrait of death and life, including terrorism

• Unusual modes of death come to be seen as ordinary or typical

• One's own death is perceived as less likely to happen and more remote

• This can result in a looser grip on the genuine experiences of life and death

Fantasized death and violence

• Fantasized death and violence is used prevalently in entertainment

• Typical portrayals of death are usually very unrealistic or fantasized

• The realities of death, dying, and bereavement are rarely apparent

• Death is distorted and associated more with violence and gore

• More and more people are turning to online and social media sites for avenues of grief resources and support

• Thanatechnology

This quiz explores the events of the September 11 attacks, including the timeline, casualties, and impact. Additionally, it examines the functions and components of societal death systems, particularly in the context of the coronavirus pandemic and how did the coronavirus pandemic challenge explicit functions within the American death system.