25 years of 9/11 | Pop culture and 9/11: Between escapism and shitposting

The attacks on the World Trade Center on September 11, 2001 remained a blank space in popular culture for a long time. Photo: Wikimedia [M] There are coincidences that sound almost too absurd to be true. The nu-metal band Limp Bizkit was honored at the MTV Video Music Awards on September 6, 2001 for their video for the song "Rollin'". Very prominently visible: the two twin towers. Five days later, “Rollin’” was taken off the television schedule. A fate that was shared by numerous songs, including many that had nothing to do with the World Trade Center but could only be vaguely associated with it. This affected, for example, the song “Free Fallin'” by Tom Petty or bands that were too critical of the USA, primarily Rage Against the Machine.

American pop culture often doesn't know how to respond appropriately to major political or social events. This inability is particularly blatant in the area of ​​series, even among those that have intellectual demands and go beyond purely escapist entertainment in their self-image. Global events that are not relevant to the characters - currently the wars in Ukraine, Gaza or Sudan - can be ignored anyway. It becomes noticeable where the USA is specifically affected.

Apart from hospital series like "Grey's Anatomy", which deal directly with the corona pandemic in its seasons broadcast in 2021, it was almost completely ignored in the rest of the entertainment. Even the series that are clearly set in the years 2020 and 2021 only mention Covid-19 in passing. The situation is similar with the Black Lives Matter protests in the summer of 2020. The sitcom “Brooklyn Nine-Nine,” which takes place at a police headquarters, had no choice but to weave the theme into the plot; But she was an isolated case. Trump's presidency is also a big blank space in much of pop culture, with the exception of the satirical animated series "South Park," which made fun of Trump.

But never was the inability to bring entertainment and politics together more evident than during the attacks on September 11, 2001. Two of the most popular television series of the time chose to ignore the attack, even though both were set in Manhattan. The eighth season of “Friends” premiered just 16 days later. The first episode is dedicated to the “people of New York City”; there are no other references. Scenes from the third episode in which one of the main characters, Chandler, makes a joke at the airport about carrying a bomb in his luggage were reshot. The fact that “Friends” opted for escapism and distracted the audience from their fear and uncertainty paid off. With an average of 24.5 million viewers in the USA alone, it was the most-watched season of the cult series.

“Sex and the City” talks about the “patriotic duty as New Yorkers” and how shopping generates “much-needed revenue” downtown.

The fourth season of “Sex and the City,” which coincided with the terrorist attack, had already been filmed before September 2001. Instead of the Twin Towers, the opening credits now show the Empire State Building, and the season finale is dedicated to the city, “then, now and forever.” The fifth season also focused on the escapist factor of the show - apart from the subtext. In the first episode, broadcast in June 2002, the four protagonists talk about their “patriotic duty as New Yorkers” and about the need to generate “urgently needed sales” downtown through shopping. This refers to downtown Manhattan, which at that time was still heavily affected by the consequences of the terrorist attack. To improve the image, Robert De Niro launched the Tribeca Film Festival in 2002 - the Tribeca district directly borders the Financial District, where the World Trade Center was located. With success: Today it is an internationally recognized, prestigious film festival, and Tribeca is a popular district.

Overall, pop culture was in a kind of limbo in the years after the attack. Films and series struck a patriotic tone, humor was out, kitsch and pathos were in demand. Anyone who dared to publicly criticize the USA or the policies of George W. Bush's government (including the "war on terror") was ostracized in the media, as the cultural journalist W. David Marx describes in his book "Blank Space" about the cultural history of the 21st century so far. Solidarity with the USA had to be unconditional, all-encompassing and unapologetic, not just in our own country, but in the entire West.

Images of the World Trade Center were cut out of films that had already been shot, the theatrical release of others that dealt with flights, terrorist attacks or similar topics was postponed or filming was canceled completely. It took five years for the disaster to be dealt with. It wasn't until 2006 that the drama "World Trade Center" was released in the cinema with Nicolas Cage in the lead role, who plays a police officer on duty at Ground Zero. The film was a moderate commercial success, grossing $163 million globally. For comparison: “Pirates of the Caribbean,” the most successful film of the year, earned 1.06 billion).

It would take until the success of the superhero blockbusters before cinema dared to depict violence and terror in Manhattan again. But even ten years after the attack, the variations of this trauma could only be told with a happy ending and free from criticism of US politics. In “Marvel’s The Avengers” (2012), the superheroes, including Iron Man and Captain America, defeat the “bad guys” after an attack on Manhattan and save the city. Police officers and FBI or CIA agents have also been portrayed as heroic in action films and series for years in order to restore the audience's trust in state institutions.

Of course, there are again many commemorative events in the USA for this year's anniversary, but dealing with its legacy has become much more difficult today. The enormous racism and nationalism of Trump, whose MAGA movement is simultaneously losing popularity, makes it difficult for all those who are not part of his camp to show unbroken patriotism. For Trumpists, on the other hand, direct solidarity with New York City, a city that has a Muslim mayor, Zohran Mamdani, is no less problematic.

For many younger people who have no memory of the attack, it has long since become a punchline. Although it took around twenty years for 9/11-related humor to leave the dark corners of the Internet, jokes about it are common these days. The photo showing George W. Bush being briefed on the assassination attempt by then-Chief of Staff Andrew Card has become a meme, as have variations of the phrase "A second plane has hit the...". Edited photos of the burning towers with a humorous context can now often be found on social media.

This new approach is also a sign of the crumbling of US hegemony. Not only in Europe, but also in the country itself, many people no longer see the USA as the undisputed world power and leader of the West, but as a fragile democracy that is slipping into authoritarianism. The failure of his political opponents' strategy to bring Mamdani ideologically close to the 9/11 attackers shows how much power the attack has lost as a national reference point with quasi-sacral status. It is perhaps the clearest sign of the United States' decline in importance.

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