Susan Jacoby militates against overreading the event:
This mass murder did not change everything; it changed only some things. And what it did change, it generally changed for the worse. Sacralization and memorialization are not, and should not be, synonyous. Memorialization rightly recalls the names and lives of the individuals who died so senselessly on that day, not because they were all heroes but because they were all human beings worthy of remembrance. Sacralization and mythicization, by contrast, look for some sort of sense and transcendent meaning where there is none.
Linda Holmes asks us to think carefully about what sort of commemorations we choose to consume.
The Dish 