Sunday afternoon, I couldn’t have been more excited about the Iowa State-Iowa football game. By Wednesday afternoon, I couldn’t have cared less.

Watching human beings plummet to their death from 100 stories up has a way of making you not care so much about ISU’s running game. Or Iowa’s offensive line.

The current discussion in sports is whether or not to postpone the events scheduled for this weekend. Those events would include the entire NFL and college football slates. The Washington versus top-ranked Miami matchup has already been postponed. I applaud that move.

Everyone has a stance on this issue. There are two arguments.

Argument one: The events of Sept. 11 were horrible, but we should not let these alledged terrorist cowards get the best of us.

We should play football and send a message that America will not be deterred from its normal schedule. This is not the position I support.

In 1963, days after President Kennedy’s assassination, NFL commissioner Peter Rozelle made the decision to play football that weekend.

He has since admitted it was his biggest regret while in the NFL office. A similar move this weekend would be an even bigger gaffe.

In 1963, a president died, which was a horrible and tragic event. In response, all college football games were suspended.

Tuesday afternoon was the worst single day for casualties in American history, and yet the NCAA is considering playing ball.

At this point, without death tolls being announced, this is merely speculation, but it is my opinion that we will not be shocked to see the death toll climb above 10,000.

Prior to this time in history, you would have to go back to the Civil War to find the next highest single-day fatality rate.

According to Professor Charles Dobbs, who teaches military history at Iowa State, the Battle of Antietam was the deadliest day in American history up to this point. That day saw only 5,000 people lose their lives.

Yesterday was a massacre of grave proportions.

With these figures in mind I present argument No.2, which is the one I support.

I argue that to play games this weekend would be incredibly disrespectful, and would show a complete lack of taste to the men, women and children who lost something on Tuesday. Thousands lost their lives. Some lost husbands, others lost children, all lost hope.

I want to see Iowa State take on Iowa more than anyone, but just not this weekend.

Put yourself in the shoes of those who have personally experienced loss this week.

If you take the mutiple number of victims by their family members by their friends, the outreach of this incident is endless.

Everyone is affected.

I firmly believe this weekend should be spent with loved ones and friends. It would be a huge slap in the face to the families who are grieving to go out and whoop it up and celebrate touchdowns, while buildings are still smoldering and families are still waiting.

As I sit writing this column, a decision is approaching dealing with this weekend’s games.

I do not yet know what the fate of the sporting world will be. Whatever the decision is, it will be controversial, it will be questioned and it will be debated.

I truly hope that the right decision will be made in this instance. A patriotic Star Spangled Banner and a lengthy moment of silence is nice and deserved, but it is not enough.

Our nation has just witnessed its deadliest day, and no matter what anyone says, things should not be “business as usual.”

If Iowa State and Iowa don’t take the field Saturday, the lives of Iowans will go on.

Those at the bottom of rubble piles in New York City and Washington, D.C. don’t have a choice.

Marcus Charter is a junior in journalism and mass communication from Ames.