“Future terrorist attacks are possible, but Americans are on guard” –the commentary that ran under that title in the Sept. 22, 2011 issue of The University News was a not-unusual response to the remembrance of Sept. 11, 2001.

The argument, as I understand it, is that being more prepared in the wake of 9/11 will allow us to better respond to a terrorist attack – not necessarily in terms of equipment or personnel, but in terms of willpower.

Mental fortitude. Victory by lack of surprise.

Unfortunately, this is part-and-parcel the wrong response to international terrorism. The attitude expressed in that kind of argument is exactly the way terrorists want us to think.

“It could happen at any time.”

“Be more prepared.”

Most of all, “Al Qaeda will be the perpetrator.”

Those are the thoughts of a people afraid. They prove that terror works.

We have identified an enemy, and we have accepted that they could strike again, at any moment. In short, we have created bogeymen. This is how terror wins.

That is nothing to be ashamed of, as countless countries have surrendered to the same line of reasoning. Look at Britain giving way to the colonial forces of America, or France leaving Algeria, or everybody ever (eventually) leaving Afghanistan. Terror works because it is senseless, random and very scary. It is perpetrated by people who think of themselves as “freedom fighters,” or some variation thereof, fighting for a cause they believe to be just.

Terror’s immense psychological causes and effects mean that a tragic attack in 2001  can still cause us to haul innocent men and women who just happen to look Arab off of planes and into jail cells. It causes us to invade countries and respond with too-heavy a hand in the case of current Palestinian statehood talks.

In the countries where these extremely misguided individuals came from, our actions demonstrate that we ourselves are a tangible enemy, a dark well from which all bad things must flow.

Still, surely it is best to be prepared. Ready. Calm. Well.

There is nothing wrong with having a country that can handle a terrorist attack. But wouldn’t it better to be proactive instead of reactive? Instead of commenting on likely future targets, or praising the execution of Osama bin Laden, or raising the terror alert level because of the date, what if we worked to make what the perpetrators call “freedom fighting” unnecessary?

We can start by ending this ridiculous war on terror. You cannot fight a war against a ghost.

When I was a kid, my parents created “ghost-be-gone” spray to keep the undead away, but fake spray does not work so well against real ghosts. So, we stop bombing people. Then, we start listening to them. I do not mean “giving in to terrorists.” Instead, I suggest listening to the real common people all over the world.

Through global effort, we find out just how to raise standards of living world-wide. We work to end oppression. We come up with a way to make both Israel and Palestine happy, so on and so forth.

Above all, we stop being ridiculous about education – promoting smaller classrooms, better textbooks, more teachers, but fewer education majors.

Sadly, this will not end terror once and for all. There is a theory that terror works in terms of generations – when the youthful perpetrators (actual terrorists tend to be young, the people pulling the strings few in number and greater in years) reach a certain age, terrorist acts are no longer seen as the best solution to their problems. When this “generation” ends, in, say, 2020, the next one will probably be individual terror – for example, the recent horrific attack in Norway.

But we can prevent this, too.

Better education will mean a higher level of understanding of right and wrong, of grey areas and of subtleties in human interaction.

We will realize that violence is never a means to an end; it is an end.

We could use a little more meaningless understanding and kindness in our world. Future terrorist attacks are possible, but Americans (and people of every country in the world) can do real work, right now, to prevent them.

Who’s with me?

Noah Berman is a junior in the College of Arts and Sciences.