Students and faculty on Baker University’s Baldwin City campus reacted to the discovery the al Quaeda leader responsible for the September 11 attacks, Osama bin Laden, was killed Sunday.
“I didn’t really know what to think,” sophomore JaNay Adgers said. “It was kind of like a sigh of relief, but at the same time it was kind of like, ‘what happens next?'”
Ryan Beasley, associate professor of political science, was curious how the rest of the country reacted to the news.
“I wondered whether there’d be celebrations around the country,” Beasley said.
The death of bin Laden evoked different emotions in students. Many Facebook statuses celebrating bin Laden’s death were vulgar, and some people were disappointed in the lack of respect for a dead man.
Beasley said he understood why some might be upset, but thinks the statuses aren’t meant to offend others.
“I’m not sure people are rejoicing that a person is dead. I think they’re celebrating a sense of closure on a national trauma,” Beasley said.
That trauma is what gives Adgers sympathy for those who may have lost family members during the time the U.S. has been in the Middle East, because Adgers almost lost a family member during the September 11 attacks.
“I feel sorry for the civilians that died at our hands during our search, but I’m grateful there is a sense of relief for those families knowing (bin Laden) is not coming back and he can’t do anything else,” Adgers said.
Adgers isn’t sure how bin Laden’s death may affect the U.S., and the government in the future, but thinks ideas will surface concerning the government’s involvement with the al Quaeda leader’s death.
“There are some people coming up with conspiracy theories, and honestly that’s just going too far,” Adgers said. “I don’t think it’s even a possibility.”
Sophomore Orlando Soto is one student that does believe in the conspiracy theory.
“Everything that I have researched shows that the military set it up,” Soto said.
The conspiracy theory is the idea the government planned 9/11 as a way to get troops into the Middle East and to gain control of that area.
“Conspiracy theories have existed for a long time, but they are usually associated with the very uninformed,” Beasley said.
Soto said sometimes people take his beliefs out of context.
“People always want to debate and they think that by what I say that I don’t care about families, but that’s quite the opposite,” Soto said.
Whether or not the conspiracy theory is true, Beasley believes bin Laden’s death will cause some changes in the political atmosphere.
“(bin Laden’s death) might bring some political pressure to withdraw from Afghanistan sooner and I think it might help Barrack Obama’s chances of being re-elected,” Beasley said.
