God and Guns: What life was like in America before 9/11, and why it matters before the election

OPINION: In the lead up to the US Presidential Election, a spotlight has been cast on conditions of inequality and poverty, through the Black Lives Matter movement, and the impact of the pandemic. Zachary Gardner, an American now living in Australia, argued that many of these issues were prevalent prior to 9/11 - and haven’t yet been addressed.

Source: Zachary Gardner

As a child, I remember riding shotgun with my father in his truck on our way home from watching a dirt track race at the Muskingum County Speedway when a drunk driver ran us off the road just outside the city limits. I remember the driver pushing his car door open, standing up, pulling something from his waistband, and then walking towards my father.

I remember reaching for the ammunition in the glovebox to load the rifle that was hanging from the gun rack behind my head, and my father stopping me. I knew that the man had a gun, but I couldn’t see it. He stood at an angle with his left foot forward, trying to hide what was in his right hand. I think he wanted to see how close he could get to us because he was too drunk to hit anything more than a few feet away.

I remember the man screaming through the window, and my father yelling back at him, but I don’t really remember anything else from that night, not even the race. I don't think I've ever really spoken to my father about what happened, it really wasn't that big of a deal. Things like that were common, and I’ve never really given it that much thought until now.

I come from a violent place, and for a long time I thought that violence was normal. I thought that it was normal to announce yourself before stepping onto a stranger’s porch, and I thought that it was normal to move to the side of the door frame before knocking if you didn’t hear a response. I don’t like it, but I get it. People are scared, and they don’t feel safe.

Zachery reflects on his home country. Source: Zachary Gardner

When you are scared that someone is going to hurt you, you start to make things simple. Complex issues become moral hazards, names become pronouns, and strangers become threats. It’s a hard way to live, and it can bring out the worst in people. Fear can make good people do bad things, and it can make children think that it’s a good idea to bring an assault rifle to a Black Lives Matter protest.

I would like to believe that we are better than this, but then I remember our history, and I think about how we got here. As an elementary school student, I watched things like the Rodney King beating, the shootout at Ruby Ridge, the fire at Wako, and the destruction in Oklahoma City on a small TV in a crowded gymnasium with hundreds of other kids because our teachers thought we might learn something from it.

At the time, I didn’t really care. I didn’t understand what was going on, and I was more interested in playing with Pogs than the business of government. However, I did learn something in that gymnasium, and I’m glad that they made me watch those things because it gave me perspective. I’ve heard a lot of people say that they want to make it great again during this election, but I’ve never seen anyone reference a calendar.

America hasn’t been great for everyone, and I know what it was really like before 9/11 because I lived it. Before the planes started crashing, everyone was arguing about guns, abortion, disease, immigration, terrorism, poverty, corruption, civil rights, and what the government should do about it. The only thing that really changed after 9/11 is that we started looking at people in other countries, and we stopped looking at ourselves.

Americans haven't forgotten Osama Bin Laden, but they have forgotten Eric Rudolph. They have forgotten that between 1996 and 1998 a former US Army Paratrooper and pro-life extremist, blew up a pipe bomb in an Atlanta park during the 1996 Olympic Games, two abortion clinics, and a lesbian bar before running off into the Appalachian wilderness like some kind of crazy Christian Rambo.

Rudolph was politically motivated, he was a terrorist, and he was an American. He believed that the Olympic Games were a front for spreading global socialism, he believed that homosexuals were ruining the country, he believed that abortion was murder, and he believed in killing people that disagreed with him. Does any of this sound familiar?

Zach believe his home country will survive the election, but at a cost. Source: Zachary Gardner

It took five years to catch Rudolph after he ran into those woods, and he was caught by a rookie police officer while going through a dumpster behind a grocery store less than 30 miles from his hometown. 

The sad truth is that some people liked Rudolph, even after he killed. Two days after Rudolph was caught in Murphy, North Carolina, a local diner changed their sign from “Roast Turkey Baked Ham” to “Pray for Eric Rudolph”. I don't know if they changed the sign on the dumpster he ate out of, but I have my own theories.  

The even sadder truth is that it’s been almost 20 years, and there are still people in America that sympathise with people like Rudolph. They like his politics; they just don’t like his methods. Instead of bombs, they use lawyers, lobbyists, journalists, and politicians to push their way into the Supreme Court.

It’s been 20 years since the United States declared war on terror. In that time, no one has come up with any good ideas about what to do about our old hatreds. I think most Americans were hoping that these problems would just go away like a hiker climbing a tree to get away from a bear, or like Donald Trump golfing to get away from the pandemic.

Our problems aren’t technical, they’re emotional. There isn't a group consensus about things like abortion in the United States. Some people are okay with it, and some people aren't. The problem has nothing to do with the procedure, it has to do with how people feel about the procedure. A solution to a problem like this requires empathy, not shame.

The Bible condemns a lot of stuff, and it condemns interest loans just as much as it condemns anything else.

I don’t think anyone will benefit from a return to black market abortions where doctors give their patients a fetus to take home and burn in the woods behind their house because no one else will help them.  

The United States has a long and chequered history when it comes to progress, and change comes at a price. We ended slavery, but we had to use the army. We ended segregation, but we had to use the national guard. I know we’ll get through this election, but it will come at a cost. Unfortunately, I think that more people than Eric Rudolph will be eating out of a dumpster before it's all over.