LETTERS TO THE EDITOR, 9-8-2011

Reflections on 9/11
Editor: On September 11, 2001 at approximately
9:30 a.m. in Shanksville, PA, our niece, Deora Bodley, died in the
crash of United flight 93. She was 20 years old, the youngest
passenger on board. She was returning to the west coast to start
her junior year in college. Over the past 10 years, our family has
wondered what type of a young woman Deora would have become. She
was a young lady whose life held a lot of promise and hope.
If Deora had not been on that flight and taken from us that day,
what would have been her response to 9/11? What would she have
thought about our country’s response to 9/11? Her dad, Derrill
Bodley, a music teacher, became a peace activist until his untimely
death four years after his daughter’s death. Derrill was also a
music composer, and several days after Deora’s death in this
national disaster Derrill wrote the song “Steps to Peace,” which
includes these words: “The world’s made up of those who do, those
to whom it’s done. But peace will come to every soul when both of
these are one.”
An entry in a journal that Deora wrote as a teenager may give us
a more direct picture of her attitude:
People ask Who?
People ask What?
People ask Where ?
People ask Why?
People ask When?
I ask Peace!
Ten years, two wars, so many American causalities and untold
civilian deaths in Afghanistan and Iraq … Where are we as a
nation on this 10th anniversary? Deeply in debt? Did we seek
justice, or retaliation? Is the world a better place because of our
country’s response to 9/11? Is the world even a safer place? Is
American democracy valued as an ideal by people seeking freedom
from oppression, or is the United States seen as a conquering world
power? As our family gathers in Shanksville for this 10th
anniversary at the memorial being built to honor the passengers and
crew of flight 93, we hold these questions in our hearts. Some of
the families of those who died on 9/11 formed an organization
called September 11th Families for Peaceful Tomorrows. This
organization joins with other groups to support peace to avoid war
as a strategy for achieving justice. The group has used Martin
Luther King’s statement, “Wars are poor chisels for carving out
peaceful tomorrows.”
The website for Peaceful Tomorrows is
www.peacefultomorrows.org.
Sandra and Walt Bodley
Sebastopol
Ten years later.
Editor: It is easy to remember where we were
when we heard about the attack on America on September 11, 2001.
That horrific event was seared into our brains and consciousness by
the violence of those falling towers. The 3,000 lives lost on that
day was a tragedy without equal in our history, but we should also
look at the tragedy of our response to this event that has cost us
dearly.
Add to those 3,000 killed on that day the 6000-plus American
soldiers killed; the additional thousands physically wounded or
emotionally damaged by the horrors of war; the trillion dollars
spent to support two wars being sucked out of our economy; and the
loss of the moral standing of America to the rest of the world.
I am sad to say that my country has killed more people in the
last 10 years than all other nations and terrorist groups combined.
All this has been done while we sit back and watch “unreality TV,”
which stokes our ambitions for winning, while keeping us
anesthetized to the horrors of war. We all share in this legacy,
and we all share in the consciousness of revenge, anger and
hate.
It was Ghandi, who on September 11, 1906 said to an angry mob of
Indians in South Africa, “I am willing to die for peace, but I am
not willing to kill for peace.”
It was that statement that led to satyagraha (the force of non
violence resistance), which turned Ghandi, and later Martin Luther
King, Jr., into revered leaders. These men won their battles by
holding to the principles of non-violence, and even died for their
causes. Violence begets violence. Peace and love evoke peace and
love.
But we are all guilty of using anger, hate and even violence
against our “enemies.” We can see this clearly in our political
discussions.
Each party hates the ideals of the other; rich and poor have
been pitted against each other; black and white still harbor
resentments; even husbands and wives lash out at one another.
The truth is that each of us can recount some evil done to us by
our “enemy” that fills us with the desire for revenge. It has been
bred into us by our society. But we are also Divine Beings capable
of loving one another even in the face of insult or injury.
There is a great shift happening in the consciousness of the
world, as we compare the spoils of war and the fruits of peace.
More and more people are discovering within themselves a deep well
of peace that guides them to return love for hate, forgiveness for
injury, understanding for insult.
Indeed, as a country that ascribes to being a predominantly
Christian nation, we should take to heart the message of the Master
of that religion, who said quite clearly, “Love your enemies.”
Our future depends on following those words. So be it.
Jim Corbett
Sebastopol
More on Operation Access
Editor: Thank you for your article on Operation
Access (“Operation Access provides surgery to low income patients,”
Aug. 18). This organization does a great service by arranging for
outpatient surgical care for uninsured patients in Sonoma County
who are unable to afford medical care.
I want to let patients know that this organization also provides
access to these patients for gynecologic surgery.
I am the front office manager for Dr. Brad Drexler, an
obstetrician/gynecologist with offices in Healdsburg and Santa
Rosa, and our office has been working with Operation Access for
more than a year to also provide gyn surgical care to uninsured
women in the area.
We appreciate all of the great work that Operation Access is
doing. Our county is very lucky to have them as part of our
dedicated health care team. Any patient who needs these services
can ask to be referred to Operation Access by their primary care
physician.
Julie Thomas
Healdsburg
Look to local news
Editor: Does anyone remember when “Redwood
Empire” was replaced with “Wine Country”? This was a deceptive PR
move by insiders that indicate the values that are being forwarded
– wine over redwoods. So when it comes to getting important news in
Sonoma County on environmental or socio-economic impacts of
vineyards and wineries, one has to get it from the L.A. Times, the
N.Y. Times, actually any Times or news source other than the Sonoma
County’s own (daily newspaper).
It is not a minor story that the largest conversion of redwoods
to vineyards in recent history is taking place in our Sonoma County
coastal area or that most Russian River tributaries are being
sucked dry by grape to wine production. The so-called media of
record is not covering these stories. Instead, (it) regularly
covers stories on individual wineries’ successes and wine/food
pairings, etc.
The conversion of redwoods and redwood forest watersheds to
vineyards and the drying up of fish bearing streams is a travesty
most reasonable people would recognize.
To get the news of historic redwoods conversions or turning
rivers into wine here, you will have to go to our local independent
newspapers or newspapers outside of the county like New York, at
www.nytimes.com, or Los Angeles at www.latimes.com.
Larry Hanson
Forestville