America Haters

[Flagg]

It’s been quite a long time since there was anything genuinely positive about France or the French in most of the American medias. From outright detestation to plain scorn, tease and racist “jokes,” we’ve had our fill of hatred and vilification. And I’m just thinking of the mainstream media, be it TV, radio and newspapers where clichés and disinformation abound.

I’ve said it before, the way France and the French are spoken of in some quarters often makes me think of Radio Berlin speaking of the Jews in 1943. But this is just the visible part of the French-bashing iceberg in the US.

But there’s another medium where all blows seem to be acceptable, even the most vulgar and wicked of them all: the blogosphere.

Try surfing some blogs dedicated to international politics, and you’re in for a nice little ride through all the best that some sick minds are all too happy to deliver.

Even some threads here at superfrenchie.com are not immune!

For those who wouldn’t have paid attention, here are some of the things that are regularly hurled at the French:

Irrelevant, snooty, weak, coward, unhealthy (they smell), racist, anti-Semitic, ungrateful, a bunch of commies and a lagging economy. Add to that that their military is a joke, they’ve lost every single battle they fought, they resent their loss of prestige and long after their vanished glory (probably the days of old when Louis the 14th or Napoleon were rulers of Europe…), and the prominent moments of their history are Vichy and the four years of German occupation.

And this is just the innocuous part of it…

Oh well… Why do these French-bashers so much hate their own country?

Let me explain.

1. These insults pretty much fall flat as, by and large, the French couldn’t care less: next to nobody in France knows about these bouts of vulgarity. For the most part, it does not reach them, and besides, they have other fishes to fry.

2. By resorting to the most wicked, gross, prejudiced and biased historical facts, twisted racists comments, the authors of these attacks show themselves at their worst: uneducated, crude and boorish! As if that wasn’t already, deplorably, the most worn-out stereotype about Americans. The greatest disservice that can be done to their country is inflicted on it by the very ones who pretend to be righteous Americans, the true American patriots. Totally counter productive if you ask me.

3. By making themselves look so nasty, obnoxious and hateful, these French-bashers pretending to speak in the name of all Americans, while they do absolutely no harm to France and as a matter of fact may even enhance its image in the world, do great and lasting damage to America’s image and goodwill in the world. Regrettably, the amalgam between them and Americans in general is easy to do!

Is this really what they want? I doubt it!

But if so, go ahead! It’s your country you’re hurting, not mine!



Note: the picture is that of “Time and the old women” by Goya (1810/1812), an image that best illustrates envy, wickedness, stupidity, deviousness, cowardice, meanness and generally speaking, everything that makes you feel nauseous. I somehow found that image kind of appropriate to our theme…

http://superfrenchie.com/?p=706#comments

[Igel]

1. That's how I view a lot of the

anti-Americanism I've heard. Some's been based on falsehoods so obvious that I cracked up laughing; sometimes I finally realized the idiot spouting them sincerely believed them. Some of the criticism's been valid, but distinguishing between the valid and invalid seems lost on my interlocutors (and, obviously, on some writers).

Of course, not taking the charges, ludicrous and serious, equally seriously is always assumed to definitively indicate arrogance; sans souciance is not an option for Americans. Indifference and lack of concern is what we call the same attitude on the part of most non-Americans; and if we like the non-Americans, they simply rise above it all.

Obviously, I put anti-Xisms of all sorts in the same boat; they all reflect the same misperceptions and ethnic righteousness on the part of their adherents.