Sept. 11: Opinions from college newspapers
What we do in the coming days and weeks will define this nation, perhaps for the rest of its history. Any social progress we have made will either be erased or solidified depending on what we do today and tomorrow, day after day, until we are no longer afraid. If we, as a nation or as individuals, choose to persecute any group for the acts of so few, no more buildings need be destroyed, for America will already be gone. Throughout our history, our fathers and mothers fought and died to protect our freedom from those outside our borders who would steal it. But soon we will have to fight like never before against the urge to take those freedoms from ourselves....
Much has been taken from us. Our great nation has been robbed of too many things we hold dear. But we must go forward with the knowledge that no one but ourselves can rob us of our humanity. We must keep this in mind as we meet whatever tomorrow holds, and we must remember it the next day and during the days that follow until the morning comes when the cloud is lifted and we are no longer afraid.
- Editorial in the University of Minnesota's The Minnesota Daily
Should any student here harbor racist sentiments for Middle Easterners, they would be well served to speak intelligently and critically with someone knowledgeable on the region and Islam.
To those coming to [the University of Arizona] from North Africa, a Gulf nation, the Levant, and ... Iraq and Pakistan, let it be known that you are cherished as academic treasures.... If you have the choice, please choose to stay.
- Editorial in the University of Arizona's Arizona Daily Wildcat [Thirty students have withdrawn from the school since the attack, 26 of them from the United Arab Emirates.]
Should our action against [a country that shelters terrorists] be to the utmost of our capabilities, would any other country dare shelter such terrorists again? Although anyone that would kill 5,000 civilians is beyond reason, most heads of state are not.
We have two options for dealing with terrorism. The first is to deny our freedoms in a probably futile attempt to prevent such atrocities from happening again. The other is war.
Even if I were to be drafted, I would still choose war. What is life if we do not have anything worth dying for?
- Student Benjamin Thompson, in the
University of Wisconsin's The Badger Herald
Even though they destroyed our buildings, the foundations [are] still there. They ha[ve]n't moved. We have to be the foundation for our nation....
Let's show whoever did this what being an American is all about.... Let's show them the unbreakable bond of our people, who may not all have the same beliefs, but share a common bond of unbreakable faith; a cohesion like no other.
- Student Kimberly Dudley, in the University of Mississippi's The Daily Mississippian
All of us in the university community ... must continue to teach, study, learn, discover and create. We must not give in to the feeling that what we do in the classroom, the library and the lab is now trivial in the face of war. It is not....
Something must happen now on our college campuses to free us from the apathy that has come to define a generation. You must gather, peacefully, to share, talk, embrace, argue, seek new ideas and attempt to understand. Students, you must transmit your unique perspective to the community and to the nation. If you do not do this, then there is surely no hope, for it is your future that hangs in the balance.... From your ranks must come the leaders of a new world....
We will all sacrifice in the time to come. Some will go to war, some will lead prayer, many will give blood. You must decide what you will do.
- Craig W. Trumbo, journalism professor at the University of Missouri, Columbia, in the online publication themaneater.com