Dominating the Discourse of Terror

Abstract

In his formal address to a stunned and grieving nation on the evening of September 11, 2001, President George W. Bush framed that morning’s terrorist attacks as deliberate, despicable, and unprovoked acts of aggression against a virtuous nation and its blameless citizens, heinous actions taken not in retaliation for some specific occurrence or policy but because of who we are and what we stand for. “Our way of life, our very freedom,” was targeted, the president asserted, because we are “the brightest beacon for freedom and opportunity in the world.” Noting that “today our nation saw evil,” Bush promised that we would “find those responsible and bring them to justice,” and he issued the ominous warning that in our “war against terrorism,” we would make no distinction between the terrorists who committed the acts “and those who harbor them.”¹ Claiming the next morning that “freedom and democracy are under attack” by a “different enemy” who “hides in the shadows, and has no regard for human life…who preys on innocent and unsuspecting people, then runs for cover,” the president warmed to his theme, declaring that we were now locked in a “monumental struggle of good versus evil,” a contest we did not seek but were fully prepared to engage. And this was not merely America’s fight: “This enemy attacked not just our people, but all freedom-loving people everywhere in the world;” thus, all who would place themselves on the right side of the moral ledger must “go forward to defend freedom and all that is good and just in the world.”²