9/11 Impacts on State and Society

Islamophobia- “irrational fear of, aversion to, or discrimination against Islam or people who practice Islam” (Merriam-Webster Dictionary). Islamophobia has caused Muslims and Americans to be afraid that the other is going to attack them. It has resulted in more than 200 hate crimes against Muslims in 2018, and over 1300 since September 11th, 2001. “Muslims have been shot and killed, execution-style, in their living rooms and outside of their mosques. They have been fatally stabbed on their way home. They have been beaten in their stores, in their schools and on the streets.

They have been kicked off airplanes, egged outside Walmart, scorched with hot coffee in a park, shot in cabs and punched while pushing their children in strollers,” states CNN. Not only are Muslims targeted, their place of worship - a mosque - has also been targets of anti-Muslim hate crime. “People have covered the doors of a mosque with feces and torn pages of the Quran, left a severed pig's head outside a mosque, firebombed mosques, urinated on mosques, spray-painted the Star of David and satanic symbols on mosques, carved swastikas and crude drawings of penises into signs at mosques, set fire to mosques, and threatened to blow up mosques. ” (CNN : The Secret Costs of Islamophobia). More than thirty states have considered passing bills “protecting” courts to protect Islamic Law from making a law to protect them when put on trial. Nine of those states (Alabama, Arizona, Florida, Kansas, Louisiana, Mississippi, North Carolina, South Dakota, and Tennessee) have passed these bills. To make laws against religion is absurd. Muslims are every bit human as any of us. 9/11 has caused the hatred against Muslims to go up 82%. 9/11 has Islamophobia bursting at the seams. Another major impact of 9/11 is airport and airplane security.

The changes made in airports and planes are major. Before 9/11, private companies would watch airport screenings. Now the government oversees it. Flyers could bring 4-inch blades, baseball bats, box cutters, darts, knitting needles, scissors, liquids, and printer ink cartridges. These are now banned. No one paid any attention to odd behavior in airports. There was no such thing as a “Watch List” or a “No Fly List. ” Everything listed above is now the opposite. “The Transportation Security Administration, which currently screens travelers, was created two months after the attacks as part of the Aviation and Transportation Security Act. ” (Huffington Post This Is What It Was Like To Go To The Airport Before 9/11) While travel is much safer, it is also harder. Before the attacks, a traveler would leave their house forty minutes before takeoff, get there with twenty minutes to spare, and still make their flight. It takes a longer time to get through security so some people arrive as early as four hours before their flight leaves. As listed above 4-inch blades, baseball bats, box cutters, darts, knitting needles, scissors, liquids, and printer ink cartridges were all allowed on planes before 9/11. According to the Huffington Post, “All these items were banned from flights in the aftermath of the attacks ― some immediately, some later, as the government detected new threats. ” Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD)- “a disorder that develops in some people who have experienced a shocking, scary, or dangerous event. ” (NIMH) PTSD can develop anywhere from getting bullied or even sexually assault. It doesn’t just develop from war. It also isn’t limited to soldiers. Regular people are actually the majority. 1 in 5 veterans has some sort of PTSD and half of them don’t get treated.

More than 300,000 veterans from Iraq and Afghanistan have been diagnosed with PTSD and ⅔ of those patients aren’t receiving treatment. Without treatment, a veteran could suffer their entire life from PTSD. “One study looked at members of four United States combat infantry units (three Army units and one Marine unit) who had served in Iraq and Afghanistan. The majority of soldiers were exposed to some kind of traumatic, combat-related situations, such as being attacked or ambushed (92 percent), seeing dead bodies (94. 5 percent), being shot at (95 percent), and/or knowing someone who was seriously injured or killed (86. 5 percent). After deployment, approximately 12. 5 percent of these veterans had PTSD, a rate greater than that found among these soldiers before deployment. ” (Very Well Mind Rates of Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder in Military Veterans).

Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder doesn’t only apply to wars. September 11, 2001 also a had a major impact on PTSD. A study of 2,733 people who lived in NYC on the day of the attacks showed 15. 2% developed PTSD almost immediately after and 7. 5% developed it 5-9 weeks after. Another 20% of the 2,733 who lived on Canal Street (a few blocks away from the World Trade Centers) were found to have PTSD after 9/11. Out of 109 relief workers, 11% got PTSD. 4. 6% got it from hearing horrifying stories and the other 6. 4% got it from direct exposure of the attacks. Surprisingly, most people who developed PTSD from 9/11 were ‘cured’ after about 6 months after the attacks.