Posted by David Adler on March 14, 2003 at 12:19:05:
In Reply to: What Makes People HATE the U.S.? posted by Siphiwe Moerane, South Africa on March 14, 2003 at 11:56:12:
Dear Siphiwe Moerane of South Africa,
You're absolutely right and absolutely wrong.
If we are waging an admittedly idiotic war to catch one man (and even I, liberal of liberals, know we're not out to catch one guy -- our cowboy leaders needed to talk tough and loved the idea of catching the biggest "bad guy"), then the world is just as idiotic to hate an entire country. There isn't a nation on earth that wouldn't have reacted the same way. Period.
The U.S. is the best and worst of the world in one country. We are not Nazi Germany, which is why your Goering quote, while on point logically, entirely misses it morally. We are no different than anyone else, EXCEPT that a fluke of geography (we're far away from the retarded and dysfunctional "old world") has kept us safe from much of that retardation and dysfunction, while giving us our own, quite unique varieties.
Now, ask your former European colonizers just what the hell they were doing when Yugoslavia went up in flames. They were doing nothing, because they were rendered, and still are in so many ways, entirely incapable by the horrors of WWII.
And what of Rwanda? You can blame us for inaction, but the most important actions were the genocide of one tribe against another, and that speaks to something deeper and more disturbing than anything the U.S. could contribute.
You seem to understand the various "facts" of history, the way power exerts and expands itself in often awful ways, and I agree with you, but you seem to have not a wisp of understanding of the way terrible history warps people and populations psychologically and how long that damage lasts. Think about you. How have you become irrational by growing up in such an irrational country, in such irrational circumstances? Don't you think you'd be apt, certainly justifiably, to be more reactionary and quicker to bitterness? I know that I always have to fight the complacency that freedom and relative comfort bring. But you know what? You have no idea what I mean by "relative".
You don't know a thing about America when it comes down to it, any more than I know about South Africa. Do you have any idea that this white American writing to you has black brothers and sisters? That despite the fact the black man my mother married abused me both physically and mentally, that I managed to avoid the racism so many of your white countrymen suffered from -- and they didn't even have my bad experiences. (Although I can still be a terribly angry, self-hating and self-abusing person because of it).
Could you guess that my father was raised an orthodox Jew in slums as bad as Soweto? That my family sponsored many families of Asian and African refugees, whom I lived with and around when I was a kid? Would you imagine that I live in the most ethnically diverse neighborhood in the U.S., infinitely more diverse than where you live? Ethiopians, Somalis, Eastern Europeans, Vietnamese, Salvadoreans, Eritreans, and dozens more nationalities live here, elbow to elbow. Forty languages are spoken at the elementary school down the street.
Would it occur to you that I hear the police helicopter thundering every night, circling over my neighborhood? That I find used condoms in my front yard from hookers getting their tricks off? And I'm white and college educated! America is what it is, it's nothing you've been told and everything you've seen on T.V.. It's the biggest contradiction in the world, but it's just like you in that sense.
So when you want to justify "Why They Hate the U.S." with the same obvious ammunition, understand you're doing nothing more than justifying a counterproductive cliche, propagated too much of the time by parties much less able to claim any moral legitimacy. It would be like me, prior to apartheid ending (though I realize it hasn't in many ways) having called the ANC just another bunch of communist terrorists. Get it right, in other words.
With the U.S., the military-industrial complex is the problem (hell, Eisenhower warned us half a century ago!) Predatory capitalism is the problem. But so is useless tribalism -- we should all be mutts! Another giant problem is the literal beliefs in obvious metaphor (otherwise known as religious fundamentalism, otherwise known as childishness), which are warping poor people all over the world, as well as too many comfortable people in the West. There isn't a Bible Belt in this country for nothin', my friend.
That said, you're right, you're wrong, so am i, so are we. Easy answers are as possible as waking the dead. America is not the solution to every problem, and by no means is it the cause. Failure to look into the mirror is everyone's problem, wherever you live, whoever you are. And still, with all that, I know something is terribly wrong in my country, and all I can do is my little part. Just like you.
Peace.
David Adler
San Diego, California
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