Most of us can remember where we were ten years ago. That day’s images are, for many of us, imprinted in our memories, permanently. I was in third grade. It was in the middle of second period. Leaving school six hours later I could still see smoke and soot sitting above the New York City skyline, twelve miles from home in Montclair, New Jersey. The memories of that day will always remain in our collective consciousness, but the question now is what the dominant narrative of that horrible day should be. What should be the lasting legacy of 9/11?

A week before freshman orientation I sat in on a live broadcast of WNYC’s “The Brian Lehrer Show.” Lehrer spoke with New Jersey residents—a cross section of age, gender, race, ethnicity, and experience—to discuss their views on how their communities have changed since 9/11. A young college graduate stated with great pride that he believed that there has been a general coming together of people since 2001 and that mutual support and trust have now become integral to civic life. I couldn’t help but feel uncertain about whether his view, which shouldn’t be questioned at a personal level or even, to an extent, a collective level, is indicative of a larger American experience. Then Bill Howard, a pastor from Newark, said what I quickly realized had been boiling inside of me. There has been—and still is—inspiring togetherness in the wake of the attacks, but it largely remains superficial. Togetherness doesn’t mean a spike in the American flag industry or in a blanket statement of patriotism, it means continuing collectively, even with pent up anger, to stand up for the values of social justice: equality, fairness, and truth.

In a recent NY Times article, Stephen Doyle wrote, “by the standards of…the internment of Japanese-Americans during World War II and the McCarthy era, the contraction of domestic civil liberties in the last decade was minor.” Is that really the bar against which we should evaluate our actions? Has our grasp on civil liberties in the U.S. been so debased that as long as we don’t corral suspicious Americans or bring extreme prejudice to the forefront of the democratic process (though Congressman Peter King, in his radicalization hearings, came close), we are in the clear? The question for the last decade has been where the line between legitimate security concerns and unjustified civil rights abuse lies. The truth is that the line is not clear, and I won’t claim to know where it is. What I do know is that there must be more transparency and accountability on the part of the free press and government employees so that we, as students—and as a nation—can determine when that line is crossed.

The other pressing question is whether our acceptance of shifts in security policy—boosted checks at airports, Patriot Act wire taps, and more—has reinforced a still strong distrust of the Muslim American community. Recent polls show that even though anti-Muslim sentiment in America has decreased since 9/11, it still pervades a significant portion of the U.S. Sitting in the audience for the radio broadcast I wondered how we can claim a recovery through togetherness when part of that “togetherness” has meant making some Americans feel safer at the expense of others. As Michael Slackman and Mona El-Naggar recently wrote in the NY Times, the Arab Spring embodied a desire to challenge violence, deceit, and suppression and emphasized a movement away from the 9/11 decade.  Perhaps as Algeria and Egypt, though in struggle, move toward true democracy we can observe and learn a little about ourselves through their efforts.

Ten years after the cataclysmic and unforgivable events of September 11, there must be remembrance. We must still mourn and celebrate the lives lost in full (as Wesleyan did on Friday at the interfaith prayer vigil), and continue to share those important memories. But then we must fight. We must fight, as students and members of a larger community, for equity and acceptance in public policy and sentiment. If Brian Lehrer should question us at the fifteenth or twentieth anniversary, we must feel more confident in claiming true togetherness. That should be the lasting legacy of 9/11.