Disaster and Politics: Can Anything Ever Be More Tragic Than 9/11?

In February, the World Wildlife Fund launched a press campaign in Brazil. To illustrate the scale of the loss of life in the 2004 Asian tsunami, a television advertisement used the images of dozens of planes about to crash into New York City.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1IA_H3vYYEs[/youtube]

The campaign provoked criticism for "reducing" a terrorist activity to a comparison with a natural disaster. So WWF Brazil and DDB, the Brazilian ad agency that designed the campaign, have acknowledged that "the comparison should have never been made". The joint statement says:

In no way was it done in bad faith or with disrespect to American suffering. WWF Brazil and DDB Brasil acknowledge that such an ad should never have been made, approved or published.

So is it unacceptable, at any time, to make a comparison with 9/11? Does it stand as a unique moment, because of the loss suffered on that day and/or the connection of that loss with "terrorism"?

A footnote from an interested observer: in the years after 9/11, I would offer the point that the 1984 Union Carbide chemical disaster at Bhopal in India had killed more people but had received far less attention as an example of the criminal taking of life. --- WSL