hi everyone this is charles hoskinson broadcasting live september 11th 2021. you know it's an interesting day september 11th if you're an american it is indeed an interesting day you know time passes so remarkably fast it's been 20 years since 2001 20 years and i remember september 11th just like it was yesterday it's one of those days that's burned into my memory it's 13 years old i was very young barely a teenager and i'd just gotten through living through the 90s as everyone did and the 1990s were a time where we viewed america we viewed the world as kind of post history you know the great wars were over world war ii was over vietnam was over and the soviet union had been defeated and even though the world was a very dangerous place and a lot of things were happening it always felt like it was out there wasn't america it was in the middle east it was in africa rwanda happened in africa kosovo europe you know it's out there and america was past all of that and we were living in a new age where everything was going to be a little different and our problems seemed so local and so small and our biggest scandal of recent memory was the impeachment of bill clinton a rather trivial thing in the grander scheme of things and i think of my grandfather and his father they lived through world war ii and there was a day december 7th 1941. a little bit before 8 a.m this is 7 55 a.m uh pearl harbor was attacked and the day after fdr goes to this the congress and says december 7th is a day that shall live in infamy and never be forgotten and it was very impactful for my grandfather very impactful for his dad for everyone who grew up in that time it was burned in their memory but i could never connect to it my dad could never connect to it my mother could never connect to it because they didn't live through it 20 years later when i look at september 11th i lived through that although i was quite young it was the defining moment of my generation for americans of my generation those who were a little bit older just a few years older rushed in mass to join the military i've met many of them i know many of them and they wouldn't serve tours in iraq and afghanistan and other places specifically because of that event the entire perspective of america changed our safety and security as a nation our perception of it that we were far away from everything oceans on both sides changed and we ended up building a lot of things that we probably shouldn't have from the department of homeland security to unifying all the intelligence agencies and building the world's largest spy state to all the wars that we've prosecuted the people who are responsible for that day are all dead or in prisons for the rest of their lives very few are left that haven't been caught or found and to this day i don't know why we fight anymore what's the point of the war on terrorism what does it mean to be an american you know we started something because we were angry as a nation hurt broken we've needed some event to be able to carry us through to restore our pride and our sense of safety and security and i think to all the dead on that day what's the best way of honoring them as a nation i'm 20 years old a very different person than i was and all of you listening are probably very different people than you were back in we now have the luxury of time just like my grandfather had the luxury of time 20 years after pearl harbor 1961 and we have to ask ourselves where do we go from here what do we do from here recently we left afghanistan the longest war the united states has ever had two decades there ended up a loss there's no way to sugarcoat that there is no way to look at that any other way than what it is the enemy we sought out to defeat has prevailed and not only did they win they've been given 80 billion dollars of our military hardware to defend themselves against us and whomever they desire we look at the world as a whole and we can't with a straight face say the world of today in 2021 is a safer world than the world of 2001. everywhere we look we see a great degree of unrest monetary problems a pandemic that has severely damaged our freedom of movement and opened up interesting questions about whether we'll ever get back to a sense of normalcy or if this is now the new normal having to show papers everywhere we go we look at the spy state aided by artificial intelligence and big data we now are looking at a reality where the things we say and do are forever recorded archived and eventually can and will be used against us if we prove to be politically inconvenient either by mass media our competitors or the governments themselves as we see with the emergence of social credit and what has happened with social media and society this is not exactly the world that we envisioned as americans the day before september 11th as we entered the new millennia there was a sense of hope i sent a belief that we were evolving growing changing the internet was new so many new companies have been founded there was so much promise and prospect that the world before us was going to be better than the one that we inherited right now there's a great degree of cynicism there's huge deficits of trust there's many people floating around who think that things are going to get much worse conspiratorial thinking is no longer the outskirts of society it's become the norm for most of us at least every single one of you in some way some form has some thought that has now been labeled conspiratorial or unorthodox in some area and i am left wondering is this the legacy of september 11th is this the result of that attack or was that just an event like many others that was inevitable and we had a false sense of security it's a day of remembrance and it's a day of tragedy for many and there are so many families who are impacted in terrible ways either they lost loved ones directly or as a consequence of this something happened to them a trauma a scar that can never quite heal completely i remember traveling to new york city and seeing the 911 memorial it was an amazing sight the first time i saw it these two gaping holes with water rushing down surrounded by names roses placed in the names whose birthdays there were and i wonder will those holes ever be filled we all feel it i think on this day 20 years later we have to honor those who sacrificed honor those who died senselessly by reflecting on the ark of society in the direction of humanity and the best way of creating some meaning where there is none and to get justice which has been denied for quite some time is to embrace the kind of world where 9 11's can't happen and that's only going to be achieved if we start trusting each other again if we start loving each other again if we set aside our egos our biases the things that divide us and we have the humility to admit that we are stronger together than apart that's my belief it's always been my belief it's why i'm in this industry it's why this industry exists the point is that we build tools that are designed for all of us to participate and be part of all of us to find common ground even if we don't like each other don't trust each other don't respect each other we can at least trust and respect the immutable things the math the consensus the code and with that new social fabric perhaps we can find a way to fill those two gaping holes that we have rushing with water perhaps we can find a way for the wars to end perhaps we can find a way for us not to live in so much fear that we have to fear each other to the extent that we're willing to rob each other of our freedoms and liberties and create a global panopticon this is not the way and this is the antithesis of every single thing a free society demands we cannot allow the violent evil people who destroyed those towers and damaged the pentagon to win and the actions we have taken as a society in globally in my view are moving us in that direction totalitarianism fundamentalism these things are not the way forward the only way forward is for us to embrace peace and love and compassion and empathy if we want to have meaning on this day 20 years later i think the best thing we can all do is take a moment to reflect and think of someone maybe someone you know well maybe someone you don't know well and just close your eyes for a moment and wish that person empathy and well and hope their day goes well hope that they're living the best life hope that they have a happy good year and that they achieve the great success if we can all do that collectively maybe we can all learn that the things that divide us are much smaller than the things that bring us together and if society can find a way to embrace that mindset then all the things that we have done globally to each other these past two decades perhaps we can find a way to forgive set them aside heal and get back on track to a brighter tomorrow this will always be a deeply personal day for all americans especially those who lived through it and especially those who endured conflict as a result of it but for this day to have meaning it has to not be an american day it has to be a human day one that we remember we take to heart and it gives us a sense that we have to change and if we do then it could be a day that we can celebrate finally as the moment that humanity made a choice to be better instead of worse thank you so much for listening i appreciate it and i hope in the decades to come that change does come cheers
