Where were you on Sept. 11, 2001? It's the question of the decade, and everyone has an answer. For some, the memory is more poignant than for others. But still, everyone knows. Just like everyone in our parents' and grandparents' generations knows where they were when John F. Kennedy was assassinated or when Pearl Harbor was attacked.

Yet 10 years later, it seems like fewer and fewer people are choosing to recall those memories. On Sunday, while those of us who were deeply affected by Sept. 11 grieved, the rest of campus seemed to go on like nothing was amiss.

It disturbed me that so many people seemed to have forgotten what this Sunday symbolized. But, in a small way, I was happy to see that for so many people, the memory of Sept. 11 no longer disrupts their lives. What disturbs me much more is the number of people I have encountered to whom Sept. 11 has become a joke.

In the days leading up to the 10th anniversary, I heard more than a few tasteless jokes about Sept. 11. On one occasion, someone suggested that, as a memorial, we build two towers out of blocks and then throw toy planes at them.

On another occasion, people were speculating as to what the Sept. 11 roll that appears on a local sushi menu might entail. One person suggested that the rolls were stacked and as they were being delivered a toy plane was thrown at them. Another person suggested that they were served on fire.

My visceral response to these jokes is rage. I lived through Sept. 11. I witnessed horrors that I can barely comprehend, and which still affect me to this day. The fact that the events of Sept. 11—which for me are still occurring—have become a joke is more than I can bear.

Worse, I have no recourse. If I were to ask for the jokes to stop, I would be reprimanded as having no sense of humor. If I were to explain what happened to me on that day, I would become a social downer.

Yet, as I think about it more, I begin to understand. Of course some humor, no matter how inappropriate, is the only way of coping with grief. But I think that the problem is more complicated than that.

In the 10 years since the Sept. 11 attacks occurred, the events of that day have ceased being a tragedy in their own right.

Instead, they have become a political platform. For former President George Bush, Sept. 11 was an attack on freedom and democracy, and the perfect reason to go to war in both Afghanistan and Iraq. Regardless of whether or not Bush had other reasons for war, Sept. 11 was his platform, and no one dared argue against retribution.

For President Barack Obama, Sept. 11 has been the underlying reason not only to continue the war in Afghanistan, but also to step it up. And when Osama bin Laden was finally killed in May under Obama's orders and direction, it was the memory of Sept. 11 that caused his poll ratings to rise sharply.

Sept. 11 has also been used to wage some more local battles. In 2010, when a Muslim community center was proposed at a site two blocks from Ground Zero, Sept. 11 was once again at the forefront of the arguments both for, and against it.

When I think about Sept. 11 as the political platform it has become, even I want to joke about it. It's absurd that an event that happened 10 years ago is still coming to bear on things like this war that so many of us are against, and a community center that, had it been built quietly, no one would have even noticed.

What's more absurd is that we are letting our anger, frustration and disenchantment with all these politics obscure our memories about that day. Rather than thinking of tragedy and grief when someone says Sept. 11, we think of politics, war and foreign policy. We need to separate the events of Sept. 11 from the politics that surround it. It sounds impossible, but if we cannot, it will continue to divide us. If we cannot, it is a detriment to the memories of the 3,000 that perished that day and the thousands more that will perish in the coming years from related health issues.

If we cannot separate the harrowing day that was Sept. 11 from the politics, it will be impossible for the survivors to overcome and to heal. If we cannot separate Sept. 11 the day from Sept. 11 the political platform, than the people that committed these atrocities have effectively won.

So now, I beseech you not to stop joking about Sept. 11, but rather to remember it as a tragedy in its own right—not as a foundation upon which to build or break political gains.