I’m sitting behind a white pickup truck on the exit ramp yesterday and in the back window is a decal: “Remembering those we lost” with an outline of the twin towers, 9-11-2001.
My thoughts run on a treadmill digesting what I see: That was over 7 years ago almost a lifetime and yet not so far that our psyches are still bruised by its memory. Hmmm, that sticker looks very new, must have been a recent purchase. I guess someone is still selling these stickers for those that need to pin a huge ‘look at me, I'm hurting’ announcement on their sleeve. Whatever, we all hurt and we all carry the feeling of loss from that day, but not all of us choose to shout it out to complete strangers on the street. But even worse is when I realize some company is making money off of the lives that were lost. Exploitation of the dead is a grand money making venture to them. Is violence nothing more than a marketing strategy to the peddlers? I wonder if the sticker designer thought of this when sketching out his or her product. Did any profit go to the victims or their families? Maybe some organizations exist which do pass on the proceeds, but I assume many do not.
Like hungry vultures the sticker and t-shirt companies eagerly wait for the next tragedy to occur, ready to manipulate emotions and sell their blood wares. Unless authorized by a group that give profits to victims’ families, counseling or medical care to the survivors of any tragedy please do not purchase products tainted with the misfortune of others.
