“Never Forget” the News
“I’ll never forget where I was …” It’s a phrase people use to talk about witnessing significant events. We have individual recollections like place and time of day, along with what we were doing. We also rely on the news media to provide us information and images so that we may share the events with each other.
I was “there” for September 11, 2001. I lived and worked in New York City at the time and I truly will never forget that day. I remember my individual experiences, rushing up and out of the subway to the sound of blaring sirens which were coming from everywhere, a stranger in the elevator asking me if I’d heard the news (I hadn’t). She told me briefly and I flippantly rolled my eyes at what sounded like some absent-minded Cessna pilot bouncing off the girded steel and tempered glass of one of the World Trade Center towers. Inside my office, my coworkers asked me if I’d heard the news. I said I had. But I had not. What unfolded as my coworkers and I huddled around a small TV in the office would be one of the scariest days of my life. We saw the news media unwittingly broadcast the second plane striking the South tower.
We didn’t have social media then, and texting was still becoming a thing. We had print newspapers and television, but the news showed us the towers fall that day. When we stepped outside of the building in the afternoon, those images were confirmed; the towers which we’d seen daily from our street, stood no more.
For the events of January 6, 2021, I have similar feelings, though I was not on Capitol grounds that day. My level of news consumption is much higher than 20 years ago, though it’s probably a function of my age and the array of available media. I seek out news on television, satellite radio and online news subscriptions. I follow cues from social media to read stories and get information on events. I talk regularly with close family and friends about current events. The news cycle is fast and furious, and I try to keep up.
On that day, I was watching the CNN livestream video on my phone of the debates taking place on the Senate floor. Just after 2pm or so, as the Senator from Oklahoma was making his argument, he stopped, and the Senate abruptly recessed. I saw a comment from the livestream saying protestors from the rally just outside had breached the Capitol building. I was confused and the reporters were, too. They grasped for information and images; the word “protestors” soon became “rioters.”
I reached out to my circle of news people to make sure they were watching. We texted as we watched, and our outrage grew as we failed to understand. We followed the events of that day into the night on television, social media and through texts.
I still “talk news” with select family and friends, including exchanging memes in order to laugh about the absurdities we witness. I like to process events and stories with my trusted circle. Similar to sitting in front of the television with my coworkers in 2001, and thanks to the news media, we share these historical moments though we are not in each other’s presence.
Most of us don’t witness historical events in person. Instead, we turn to the news media to hear the stories and see the images, in real time. The powerful images and compelling stories of these events and others are shared as a collective memory. Through them we are bound together, and we will never forget.
Did you share a historical event with someone?
