This week, the nation remembers two horrific events. Yesterday, we marked one year since the assassination of Charlie Kirk. Today, we remember the victims and heroes of the September 11 attacks on America.

Those who carried out these attacks took so much from us.

The terrorists who hijacked four airplanes 25 years ago murdered nearly 3,000 people, changed the course of history, and reminded an entire generation just how fragile life can be. In the years since, America has wrestled with the proper response to a world that suddenly felt decidedly less safe.

Too often, that response has involved surrendering essential liberties in exchange for the promise of security. Government surveillance, monitoring, and tracking expanded dramatically after September 11, frequently with the argument that greater scrutiny was simply the price we had to pay to prevent another attack.

A year ago, a lone gunman took Charlie Kirk’s life in a public act of political violence that rattled many Americans who still believed deeply in free and open discourse.

That day remains fresh in my mind. Since then, I have attended several political events and found myself scanning rooftops and office windows for potential threats, particularly when I bring my children with me.

I never did that before the events at Utah Valley University.

The difficult truth is that the world was not safe before September 11, 2001, and it was not safe before Charlie’s assassination. These tragedies did not introduce danger into American life. They reminded us, in the most brutal possible way, that danger has always existed.

The question is what we allow that danger to do to us.

Extremists use violence not simply to kill. They use it to intimidate, to silence, and to frighten people away from public life. Terrorism succeeds when fear changes how a free society behaves. Political violence succeeds when Americans decide that speaking, organizing, supporting a cause, attending an event, or expressing an unpopular opinion is simply not worth the risk.

We cannot promise one another a world without danger. And we should be deeply skeptical of anyone who promises perfect security if only we surrender a little more privacy, anonymity, or freedom.

What we can do is refuse to allow fear to determine the boundaries of American liberty.

I still believe deeply in the American experiment and in the precious rights that protect our ability to speak, associate, organize, support causes, and disagree openly with one another. Those freedoms become more important, not less, in moments of fear and uncertainty.

That conviction is at the heart of the work we do at People United for Privacy Foundation.

A free society requires people willing to participate in it. Americans should not have to choose between engaging in civic life and protecting themselves, their families, their livelihoods, or their privacy. They should be able to support causes, join organizations, and speak their minds without unnecessary government scrutiny or fear of retaliation.

Twenty-five years after September 11, and one year after Charlie Kirk’s assassination, that principle feels especially urgent.

We honor those we have lost not by allowing fear to diminish our freedoms, but by defending the free society those freedoms make possible.