I'm Anti-American, dammit! - Letters To America

[Prophet 451]

I must stop reading the Beeb's "Have Your Say" page, it has an awful effect on my (already high) blood pressure.

Today, we had the question of what fuels anti-Americanism? Now, what pissed me off and still does is that the answer from Americans was universally a variation on "jealousy". Often they'd throw in comments about "you're no better". Apparently, the USA is glorious, free, successful, etc and the rest of the world hates you because we're jealous.

What utter bullshit. In psychology, this is known as "deflection". It's a way of avoiding having to ask why people hate you by pretending they're jealous of your perfection. When someone tells you you're being a jerk, it doesn't necessarily mean they're jealous of you. It can just mean you're being a jerk. This is what we describe as "American arrogance" and it's a very big part of why the USA is hated. In the run-up to the Iraq war, the Defence department hired a PR expert to market the US in Arabic nations (I'm told this is now very common). Her approach was emblematic of American arrogance and also contained the key for it's own failure within itself because her approach (or the approach forced on her) was not to listen to what the Arabic world was saying and why it disliked the US, it was to tell the Arabic world how wonderful the USA is. If you want another example of American arrogance, witness how every US president uses "America" to refer to the USA. America is a continent, not a country. Another example is in the question itself. Asking why someone is anti-USA means not having to ask why they should be pro-USA.

Then come the chants of "you're no better". Now, in some sense, that's true. However, the USA currently and for the last thirty or so years has held itself up as the moral standard of the world. If you tell the entire world that you're better than the rest of us on a daily basis (which, through the mass media, you do), don't be too surprised when the defence that we were as bad as you're being doesn't wash. If you hold yourself out as a higher standard then you don't get to defend yourself by saying you're no worse than us.

A lot of the comments made some variation of the "we saved you in WW2" so lets talk about that. First off, yes, you saved us, no argument there. However, the rest of the world had been at war for three years before the US joined in and even then, it's doubtful you would have joined in has Japan not declared war on you at Pearl harbour. Effectively, you were forced into the war, you didn't decide to bail us out of your own kindness. Secondly, that assistance didn't come free. Britain has just finished paying off what it owed the US for American assistance during WW2 (oh, you didn't know that? I'll get to the media later). Thirdly, there is a saying here "the Yanks saved us in WW2 and we've been repaying them ever since". WW2 was sixty years ago and we've backed you up on almost everything ever since. Believe it or not, our gratitude for that one has pretty much run dry after sixty years, several wars (including the current disaster) and any amount of suffering through your cultural domination.

Then there was the argument that anti-Americanism is fueled by a left-wing media that has never forgiven the US for "winning the Cold War". Let's take this one in reverse order: Firstly, you didn't win the Cold War, the USSR lost it. The USSR didn't collapse because of Reagan putting Pershing II missiles into Europe (about the only thing he did, contrary to the right-wing cry that Reagan won the Cold War), it collapsed because the Russian people gave up trying to starve themselves with a system that simply wasn't working. If anyone deserves credit for "winning" the Cold War, it's Mikhail Gorbachev. He was the one that was actually risking his life, he was the one who could well have been killed in a coup (as very nearly happened). Then there's the left-wing media stuff. Now, asking whether the media has a conservative or liberal bias is, as Al Franken put it, like asking if al Queda uses too much oil in their hummous. The problem with al Queda is that they're trying to kill us. The problem with the media isn't that it has a conservative or liberal bias, the problem is that it is corporate. Always somebody will trot out that bloody study that shows reporters tend to have a more liberal position on social issues than most. Fine but that doesn't prove that reporters also slant the news the way they want to present it. It also discounts the other side of the study which proves that reporters, while to the left on social issues, tend to be massively to the right on economic issues. I know it's fashionable in Washington to ignore economic issues but the rest of us don't. The vast majority of American media is owned by just six corporations and the bias follows that. The media is not biased in favour of or against the left or the right, it is heavily biased in favour of corporations and, in recent times, that means in favour of Republicans.

Finally came the cries that the US gives more in humanitarian aid. Now, in terms of raw numbers that might be true (although last I checked, Japan was slightly more) but on a per capita basis, the USA gives the least amount of foreign aid in the civilised world (through it's government anyway, the American people are often very generous as private citizens).

Most of us here in Europe don't hate the USA. We do hate American policies. The strategy of the US has, for about the last fifty years, been not just to benefit itself but to prevent any other nation from getting anywhere close. Castro might have been able to create a socialist paradise in Cuba (I doubt it but it's possible) but we'll never know because the USA, determined to prevent any other social system from achieving equality in the public perception, has spent the entirety of Castro's reign running interference against him. And here is the very heart of the problem: The USA has, for some time now, been attempting to run the world. Recently, with PNAC and Bush this has been militarily but the general attitude has been going on for some time. Prior to the massive rebellion before the Iraq War, the US, via economics, selective use of it's veto and merciless PR had gained near control of the UN (read Kofi Annan's memoirs). The US controls the major economic forums like the World Bank and ITC. Through exporting it's media (and especially, the practice of dumping media into the developing world as vastly below the cost of production), the USA ensures that the rest of the world hears their views of things but strangely, your own media (with the exception of the wonderful Colbert, Stewart and Olberman) barely touches on that outside world. You seem to believe you can be a world leader but not be a part of that world and ignore it's opinions. The USA constantly lectures the rest of the world on the glories of free trade but that glory seems to end once it reaches Ellis Island. Your trade agreements with various African nations demand that they set no tariffs on US imports but sets tariffs on items which Africa can produce cheaply (such as groundnuts, sugar and textiles) which mean African products are unable to compete when imported into the USA. Bush very public ally flip-flopped on steel tariffs and still sees fit to ex toll the virtues of free trade. While the USA-dominated international financial institutions feel free to demand that anyone they help follow their free market capitalism model, that model has failed in virtually every nation it has been tried (most glaringly, modern Iraq) while the third-world nations which have managed to pull themselves out of poverty have usually done so by telling those financial institutions where to stick their advice. The jury is still out on the free market as a principle but the rest of the world has learned that when the US talks about the "free market", it means for US products only.

So, most of us don't hate the USA, we just hate American policies. But as a people, you worry us. We look at reports that show that a majority of your population reject evolution and we worry about a people who are so blind to science. We look at your attitude toward firearms and we worry. This is not to get into the gun control debate but we worry about the fanaticism of those who proclaim that we can have their guns only when we pry them from cold, dead hands. We worry about your massive, totally disproportionate worship of the military and we get worried about where you'll point that thing next. We worry about the "support the troops" rhetoric. To most of us in the rest of the world, troops are professionals doing a job. A dangerous job to be sure and they should be and are credited for that but the near worship of the military in the US worries us. We worry about the anti-intellectual, anti-science attitudes that seem to abound now that the South runs the country. We worry about your eagerness to use the death penalty. Again, this is not to get into the morality of the penalty itself (which I actually support in certain circumstances) but we worry that so many of your people seem eager, almost gleeful in it's use. Most of all though, we worry about the attitude seemingly so prevalent in your population that the USA has not just the ability but the right and the duty to control the entire world. We worry that so many of your population disparage international bodies like the UN and although they often claim it's because of some corruption or scandal, we take a look at the vitriol heaped on France for daring to say "no" and we know it's simply because the UN occasionally doesn't do what it's told.

To ask why people are anti-American is asking the wrong question because the question assumes that we should be pro-American and never tells us why. Why should we be pro-American? Contrary to popular American opinion, the USA isn't the oldest democracy. England, Greece and several others beat you to it. The USA is the oldest continuous democracy with a universal vote (and even that only works if you ignore black people). The Bill of Rights, while a great document, didn't come into existence out of thin air. Many of it's principles were drawn from other nations and other times. The only unique thing about the BoR is bringing all of those rights together in one document and making it binding and even then, it often seems that as a people, you pay more lip service to it's principles than actual obedience. Freedom of speech is all very well on a piece of paper but when the USA has the most conformist culture in the western world, when it's media is owned almost entirely by corporations who think in corporate terms and when you can be verbally strung up or physically assaulted by the Patriotism Police for saying something unflattering about the President, do you really have freedom of speech? When calling for the deaths of public officials (Ann Coulter) is somehow seen as being on the same level as criticising the president's policies (Michael Moore), is free speech lacking or merely critical thought? You apparently have freedom of religion but try being something other than Christian in the USA and you realise that one's a bad joke. You're still liable to be fired, assaulted, denied basic services if you're not Christian (or, to a lesser extent, Jewish). You still have that incredibly hyper-Christian culture where marketing directly to fundamentalists is a viable marketing strategy in itself. Many of your outspoken high priests wanted to give Gibson's Passion the Oscar not because they felt it was a superior piece of art (and I've not seen it so I'm open to discussion on that one) but on the grounds it was a Christian film. Your government is still run by extremist Christians who feel free in invoking religion, who feel free to make laws on religious grounds (anti-gay marriage, banning stem cell research), so really, is that much vaunted freedom of religion actually worth a damn? I'm a Luciferian Satanist and I have never felt as under threat for my beliefs in England (my home so maybe that doesn't count) or Europe as I did in parts of the USA. You still have the 2nd Amendment of course, you do love your guns. Of course, the USA also has one of the highest crime rates in the western world but looking at other countries with high firearms ownership (i.e. Switzerland), I'm inclined to think that's not because you have too many guns but because you have too many loonies. Apparently, you have freedom of expression but since I gather I can still be locked up for walking around naked, that's obviously not complete freedom and since the Feds are now investigating anti-war groups and protesters, it's arguable if you still have it at all.

No, the USA doesn't behead it's criminals (it electrocutes them instead), Yes, you have nominal freedoms in some areas. No, you're not as bad as, say, Saudi Arabia. So what? America, this is a child's game. My partner is infinitely a nicer person than I am but she has her faults. Our cats are nicer than either of us but still claw the sofa. This is a not a zero-sum game, the faults of other nations do not excuse your own faults. This is called the fallacy of the excluded middle. You are taking the most extreme examples and holding them up as average. Yes, the USA is better than Saudi Arabia but that excludes all the nations who are doing things better than yourselves (much of western Europe, England sometimes) and if you held yourself as simply one nation amongst others, no better or worse than most, that would be an acceptable defense. But you don't. You hold yourself as the shining city on the hill, the beacon of democracy, freedom and hope for the world.

Sorry if this outside appraisal pisses you off, America. I could kiss your ass and tell you how wonderful you are and probably many would like me to have done that. I'll probably be accused of anti-Americanism for not doing so but honesty is a precious commodity and if you plan to lead the world, you should know what the world thinks.

[cherokeeprogressive]

1. I'll not accuse you of anti-Americanism. The title of your post admitted it. Where's the need?

You don't have to tell me I'm wonderful, just kiss my ass.

You paint with a kilometer wide brush my friend.

"The South" does not run this country.

My goodness I could go on and on, but I'll start with this: I can get in my car, and drive for 250,000 miles within this country and NEVER be asked for my "papers", passport, or even my fucking DRIVER'S LICENSE if I didn't blatantly break any traffic laws. I can drive my car to downtown Los Angeles and park it on the corner of the busiest intersection. Then I can carry a ladder to the sidewwalk and climb on top of it. I can scream at the top of my lungs, from the ladder placed on the street corner, that George W. Bush is a wife abuser and wears women's clothing, masturbates to child pornography, and sells cocaine and heroin to school children under ten years old from the presidential limousine. The result? I might get my car towed for parking in a no parking zone, with the associated parking fine of course.

I might also get my ass kicked. And maybe deservedly so. See, the First Amendment only protects you from THE GOVERNMENT. It doesn't say that your speech shouldn't have consequences within your community, nor that you should be protected from same. You can be boycotted, as is the favored treatment nowadays for offenders of our sensibilities, or you can get your ass kicked. The perpetrator of your ass kicking will likely be prosecuted, but then, it's your choice. The First Amendment effectively protects you from GOVERNMENTAL regulation of what you can say or not. Piss off the guy next to you at the soccer match, and the fat lip you might walk away with is YOUR reward for speaking freely. Frankly, I love this system.

I'm not better than you, and you're not better than me. It's a simple notion really.

Oh, and when I wore my US Naval uniform in Portsmouth, and later in London, I was treated better than I could ever have imagined being treated at HOME in the United States. It's what I'll take to my grave: How well I was treated when I wore the uniform of the United States Navy outside of my own country.

Cheers!

[Prophet 451]

2. "You paint with a kilometer wide brush my friend"

I know. I often do when I'm ranting. Not the most mature habit but there it is. It's just that assumption that the USA is better than everywhere else tends to piss me off in a hurry.

[cherokeeprogressive]

3. The assumption is not mine, I assure you.

And I don't disagree with everything you say, just some.

It's late here on this side of the pond. Maybe we can continue this discourse later.

Have a Wonderful Day.

[Prophet 451]

4. Sleep well n/t

[SammyWinstonJack]

21. That's not my assumption at all. Especially now.

[canetoad]

26. There are times when a broad brush is appropriate

and times when it is not.

Your post was an overview. To take it personally speaks to defensive emotions.

[MedleyMisty]

17. What's your problem with "The South"?

There's ignorant racist assholes in every part of the country. There is institutionalized racism and classism in every part of the country.

You're also painting with a wide brush.

[Prophet 451]

30. Of course there is

But the climate of anti-intellectualism started historically in the South as part of the Populist Party's rhetoric against an out-of-touch Washington.

And of course I'm painting with a broad brush, I was ranting.

[canetoad]

27. You say the first ammendment protects you from governmental regulation

how does the patriot act square with this?

[Greyhound]

29. Try that ladder thing in downtown LA and let me know how it worked out,

after you get out of jail, assuming you survive the LAPD "arrest process".

[Norrin Radd]

5. You should come here for your next vacation.

Everyone I know has been over there and all around the world. It's definately eye-opening to be someplace else. I'm from the South, and I'm hardly anti-intellectual or anti-science, ;) and I've known plenty of Satanists down South who never experienced any problems.

You'd be surprised to discover that Americans (the sort from the United States--mind you, Central and South Americans think of themselves as "American") are more critical of fellow Americans than anyone else.

[Prophet 451]

10. I've been

I've visited the US a few times, mainly the "touristy" areas.

[mr blur]

6. K & R (nt)

[GaYellowDawg]

7. If you don't love America, leave it!!

LOL... just thought I'd inject a little humor (or humour, as you might call it) here.

Yes, this country has an awful tendency to speak of itself as "the shining city on the hill," etc. There are a good number of people in this country who believe that. There are a good number of people in this country who roll their eyes at the rhetoric. There are a good number of people in this country who can't stand it. Over the past couple of decades, the pendulum has swung way too far to the right. In the US, though, it's always swung back, and I am optimistic that it will once again.

Yes, we're very egocentric and ethnocentric. For a short time in the middle of the last century, the US really was the defender of freedom. I doubt any other country could have put the resources into two fronts against two formidable foes like Germany and Japan like we did and actually won. Once you've been anointed the savior (saviour :hi:) of the world, it's a little hard for the ego to put that mantle down, and as a country, that is a problem for us.

When you talk about the Christians and fundamentalists and gun advocates, then frankly, you're mistaking the loudest voices for the only voices. Politicians talk in extreme terms so that they can keep their "base" intact. Unfortunately for us, the idea that maybe those crazy fuckers ought to stay home isn't as important as the idea that the crazy fuckers will help them get elected. I'll say this: even if the politicians pay lip service to those constituencies, they rarely follow through. Bush is the unfortunate exception. And the only reason he was a two term president was because a) 9/11 scared the complete shit out of the country and b) Bush managed to surf that wave of fear to election (please note I did not say re-election). The same lines and campaign "strategery" that worked in 2004 got Republican asses (arses :hi:) kicked in 2006.

Yeah, there are a lot of anti-evolution people out there. Every single time they try to get it out of the public schools, they lose. Or have you not heard of Dover, PA? A caution for you: I recently attended a science ed conference where I was quite startled to learn that there's a growing antievolution movement in parts of England and Ireland (from science ed professionals from there).

Of course you were in more trouble in parts of the US than in Britain. You espouse a religion diametrically opposed to theirs. You'd be in equal trouble in any highly religious community by following beliefs that opposed it. The difference between the US and other places in the world like that is that the law protects you. Someone might say some really mean shit to you, or give you dirty looks, but that's as far as they can take it. You try going into any Muslim country with a t-shirt that says "I worship Shaitan" and see if the law protects you or if you're alive to post about it later.

I'm anti- just about everything you mentioned. Most on this board are. You haven't said a single thing that hasn't been said repeatedly on the DU boards. The place where you ought to direct this is to FreeRepublic.

[Prophet 451]

9. It's a fault of mine

If I have any faults at all (HAH! My other half is compiling a list now), it's a tendancy to generalise when I get on a roll.

I know that there are decent people in the US, I talk to many of them, a few of them I even count as friends and that's really saying something (I am not the kind of person who makes friends easily or often). I work for a US-based company and I like most of the people working there but, by Satan, you do have a lot of loonies and they do make a lot of noise. I wasn't aware that the anti-evolution movement here was any more than a background noise though, that's a worrying development.

"I doubt any other country could have put the resources into two fronts against two formidable foes like Germany and Japan like we did and actually won."

There's a couple. Russia at it's peak could probably manage it, maybe Switzerland (who can mobilise half their population if needs be), possibly China on grounds of sheer numbers but that's about it.

Granted about religion. At least in the US, my murderers would (probably) be prosecuted whereas in, say, Saudi Arabia, they'd be lauded. I'm still just as dead though.

I hope you're right, I really do. Amongst other things, I'm a perfectabilist (that is, I believe that humanity is perfectable). As much as any of my other beliefs have changed over time, that one never has and I hope that when it comes to it, the headlong charge in the wrong direction that BushCo has taken us will be rejected. There are some fine ideals in your constitution. I can't blame the nation for failing to live up to them but it would be nice to see the country try once again.

Thanks for the Britishisms btw, made me smile.

[GaYellowDawg]

23. Good reply, but I disagree on one paragraph.

"I doubt any other country could have put the resources into two fronts against two formidable foes like Germany and Japan like we did and actually won."

There's a couple. Russia at it's peak could probably manage it, maybe Switzerland (who can mobilise half their population if needs be), possibly China on grounds of sheer numbers but that's about it.

Not at the time. The USSR just barely held off Germany, and if they'd had to deal with Japan attacking them on another front, I think they would have gone down. China lost to just Japan from the outset; they were dramatically outmatched by Japan. As for Switzerland, they would simply have been outnumbered.

[Prophet 451]

36. Well, no, not at the time

That's why I said Russia at their peak. China, you're right about. As for Switzerland, I'm not sure if you know but teh Swiss use a citizen militia system which enables them to mobilise every male between 21 and 42 if needs be. That gives them a potnetial militia of just under 2 million. Whether that would be enough is open to question.

[12string]

8. Hating the U.S.

We have earned the hatred of the the world.no one likes a
bully.I,for one, cannot blame anyone but ourselves.I am almost
52 years old and I have never seen the "America" I
was lied to about in school.When I see "liberty and
justice for all" then I will change my opinion.

[Prophet 451]

11. Thank you

It would be nice to see the nation try and live up to those lies though. Where's Tom Joad when you need him?

[depakid]

12. "But as a people, you worry us."

Americans SHOULD worry you.

A large majority of Americans believe that their wasteful, energy intensive "lifestyles" are an entitlement- and not negotiable.

The majority of Americans are also ethnocentric in terms of what happens in other nations- they haven't clue one about how other people actually live, how they think, or what issues that they're dealing with. It's not just that they're not interested- it's that the corporate media rarely EVER exposes them to anything. You'd have a hard time understanding just how pervasive the mental isolationism is, unless you've spent some considerable time in the states. And to top it off, there's a sizable number of xenophobics.

As you mentioned, Americans are also militaristic- and quick to wave the flag and shout "bomb 'em" when their interests are threatened- or sometimes, when they're simply afraid.

In the coming decade(s), as cheap energy and natural resources grow scarcer and scarcer, I have news- America's going to try to take whatever it can from whoever it can- "friend" and foe alike. If people think that that America is going to sign, ratify or abide by international treaties, my suggestion would be to look at the record over the past 12 years.

Frankly, if I were living abroad, I'd be thinking long and hard about all of this.

[Prophet 451]

14. We are, trust me

I've not spent a great deal of times in the states, just a little here and there but, as I mentioned, we get an awful lot of American media over here including news channels and even an edited version of Faux "news" (the unedited version violates our fairness in reporting laws).

Trust me, a good many of us over here are thinking very carefully about the future.

[canetoad]

28. If you lived by the words of the corporate media in any country

You would ultimately be ill-informed, self-absorbed and egocentric.

I saw a segment recently about 'neuro-marketing' for gawds sake. Brain scans to show response to stimuli, the jackpot being an advertisment that could affect certain centres of the brain (can't remember the terminology) and make people all but helpless to resist the message.

I followed very closely your elections of last November, when last minute gut-reaction type ads were rife. I'm not sure that any other country is so damn suceptible to the sound/vision bite; so totally reactive to the dominant message. I'm not saying they don't try it here and in other countries, but no one seems to fall for it as much as Americans do.

[Truthy Nessy]

13. Canadians don't like America's government

I'm American born, Canadian by choice, Came up here as a refugee. I'm not kidding.

Canadians are very aware of their southern neighbor, You will be seeing big news in the future about this North American Union , called the Security and Prosperity Partnership. there is a secret meeting today and tomorrow with officials from Canada, USA and Mexico in Alberta.

The NDP party will be raising the issue about this Partnership covert plan. THey will raise the issue that there is no democratic mandate from the people of Canada. Parliamentary oversight, nor consideration of the profound consequences on Canada's ability to adopt autonomous and sustainable economic social and environmental policies, its existence as a sovereign nation, and that the Canadian government must in the interest of transparency, accountability and democracy, take the appropriate steps to ensure that ongoing discussions and decisions are HALTED until a full legislative review, public debate and vote by Parliament have taken place.

And that is what my MP told me.

Canadians don't want our water or resources to be controlled by America. Heck all America can do is sell weapons and wage war. The education and health systems are failures in America. My little 80 year old mom has to still work in America. She is in dire straits and she is blue collar middle class. America is no longer the super power great country it was once was.

[Prophet 451]

15. I believe you

I've passed along information to a few Americans looking to head here.

I think the ruthless pursuit of lasseiz faire capitalism which was spawned by the Cold War opposition to communism is responsible for many of the USA's problems. A kind of societal version of the excluded middle fallacy. Here, we have socialised healthcare, I gather you do too. I suspect either of us could tell stories about the failings in that. Is it perfect? No. Is it better than the American system? Hell yes.

I think also that the drive to dominate both the region and the globe may well run into trouble in the near future. Although many of these policies have been in operation for many years, Bush is such an offensive, idiotic thug that he's actually served to draw attention to the failings of the American system.

[tavalon]

19. I'm hoping like everything that we can find a way to reign ourselves in

for if we cannot, we will be reigned in by outside forces and frankly, I don't think the US would enjoy that very much. Sadly, though, I think that is just the way it will go and we'll go down kicking and screaming. I just hope we don't try to take the world down with us, goodness knows, we have enough bombs to do it. We as a country are very childish, at best adolescent and we don't handle time outs very well at all.

[sinkingfeeling]

16. I was born in the USA in 1948 and have since lived as an adult in 9 states, in all parts of the

country. I couldn't agree with you more!! I find my country and about 40% of my fellow citizens are on a very big ego trip. They believe that 'We're #1' crap and feel entitled to use and abuse the rest of the world.

I love to travel the world, marveling at its beauty, ancient relics of civilizations past, and meeting the 'common' people who live completely different lives than most in the USA. I'd love to flee to either Scotland or Ireland and had planned to do so in 2010. Now with the US dollar skidding down the slope, I'm beginning to get worried that I can afford the move.

[tavalon]

18. That was so spot on it's scary

I gave up on being proud of the USA a long time ago. She is a demented beast indeed. What you said about religion is so true - it's only okay to be religious in this country if you are part of the dominant religion. In parts (too many parts) of the south they can't tell the difference between Wiccans and Satanists and paint all of us as being "of the devil" and wearing pentacle jewelry can get me assaulted but giant crosses worn on the necks of "Christians" is called bling bling.

Yeah, we are an embarassing lot and I often wonder why I fight so hard to take this country back from the Christofascists and the corporations which by the way, I often can't tell the difference between (making me no better than the southern idiots who can't parse out my religion or don't care to be intellectually curious enough to get it).

So, in short, you didn't piss me off. You impress me with how well you get our absurdity.

[Prophet 451]

31. It's the dream, isn't it?

The dream of the USA, all men created equal and all that is well worth fighting for.

[Lydia Leftcoast]

20. I couldn't agree with you more

Most Americans have never traveled outside their own country and receive a relentless message through their corporate media telling them that they live in "the greatest country on earth."

[MLFerrell]

22. Excellent post... K&R.

Spot on.

[magellan]

24. It's called American Exceptionalism, my friend

I didn't recognize it in myself until I'd lived in the UK for a few years and had inculcated the "world-view" perspective. It was a very humbling revelation.

Try not to blame Americans for it. We live our lives in a size-, power- and media-induced bubble, largely protected from nonsense like world news and how our actions negatively impact other nations on this planet...even if the nation is a next-door neighbor like Mexico or Canada. It's getting easier for us to learn what's going on outside our borders thanks to the internets, but there's not a lot of ingrained curiosity there.

Basically we're taught from birth that this is the best nation on earth in which to live, everyone wants to live here, and everywhere else is at best "a nice place to visit but I wouldn't want to live there". Missing is the obvious notion that anywhere you grow up is home, and so there are always a vast majority of people in the world who have no desire whatsoever to move to the US. (Horror!)

For the record, I agree with the world about America. We've sunk lower than I ever imagined possible. And perhaps that too is a conceit that I need to deal with.

[Prophet 451]

32. I won't blame the people

I learned some time ago that the American people are not generally evil or malicious, just easily distracted.

[magellan]

37. Aren't we all?

If memory serves, we bought Idol from the UK...where it was also an extremely popular diversion. ;)

It's not that we're easily distracted; the problem is our media makes its money distracting us. With few exceptions, learning anything useful from our news is a fool's errand. What they don't omit is compacted into an irresponsible soundbyte flanked by biased pundits and mountains of cheap infotainment. We aren't provided with anywhere near the same quality or amount of information and investigative reporting as other nations.

It's impossible to overstate this. Opinion packaged as "the truth" has superseded fact in American news. You have to know to look elsewhere to truly be informed. Most don't.

Live here, rely on the cable and local stations for your news, or even our "prestigious" newspapers, and then tell me how "easily distracted" we are.

[Prophet 451]

41. I thought Idol was one of yours

I honestly thought we pinched the idea from you guys. Regardless, it's not made here any more (these kind of shows tend to have a short shelf-life in Britain).

I actually see some of your news media. Every time I do, I'm amazed that anyone could still believe the "liberal media" myth. I read the electronic editions of the NY Times and Washington post and sometimes watch CNN, NBC or even Faux (Faux is edited here, the unedited version violates our fairness in reporting laws). Every time, I'm amazed by the lack of division between reporting and analysis, between news and opinion and by the shamelessly pro-American and pro-corporate attitudes (and the corporate these days means pro-Republican). Here, the Beeb is owned by the state and still they try to remain vaguely neutral, criticising the government frequently (some would say too frequently). There, where the press is obstensibly free, reporting seems to amount to a glorified gossip column (Anna Nicole got two mentions here. One when she died, once when custody of her kid was decided, both were less than a minute long and both were gone by the next day).

[magellan]

45. No, Idol was yours first

That's why Simon then came over here. Lucky us. :eyes: (I've never watched Idol, here or there, other than clips. I have absolutely no interest in it.)

So you DO see the obstacles the average American is confronted with in trying to ascertain the truth. Remember too that although we share a common language (kind of), our cultures are different enough that what seems like natural curiosity among Brits in world and political affairs doesn't translate here. The US is big enough geographically that even national news coverage takes time and by then the eyes start to glaze over. And both our tv and print media excel at downplaying or outright censoring important but inconvenient news.

And then there's that exceptionalism thing I started with. We know we're powerful. We're taught from childhood it's used only for good. We definitely resist the idea that we might be the bad guy and dead wrong.

Waking up from that dream has been the most heartrending, protracted process I've ever experienced. I've cried and screamed about what I feel I've lost, trying to understand it was never really there...at least not during my lifetime. I believed what I was told, never imagining how much of it was plain lies.

Others will never admit it to themselves, EVER. Just take a gander at Free Republic. They're the minority now; the truth will always out. But the machinery to fool Americans again is still in place. It's been there for a long time.

[Prophet 451]

46. Apologies then

We should definately apologise for the world for Idol. Then we can all gang up on the Dutch for creating Big Brother :)

If some of America can awake, then there's still hope. Hope is always the last thing to die.

[piedmont]

47. Thank God "Big Brother" never caught on here.

I've heard it's pretty big over there. That must be annoying.

[Prophet 451]

48. Eight smegging years running!

And believe it or not and I don't know how it's possible, it manages to get tackier and more exploitative each time.

[piedmont]

50. Did you just reference my favorite comedy from your country?

[Prophet 451]

51. I did indeed

Boyz from the Dwarf! *does hand shake gesture*

Edit: Although it must be said that Red Dwarf has been so successful and so influential here that words like "smegging", "gimboid" and so on are part of the national vocab now.

[magellan]

53. The Dutch are behind Big Brother?!

Well, that seals it then. The EU is obviously behind American apathy. It's a conspiracy! lol

I think more Americans are awake now than anyone appreciates. Awake and angry. What it will lead to I don't know; that's entirely up to whether the government decides to take notice or not. Knowing my fellow Americans as I do, it'll be a bad look out for them if they don't.

How long has it been since we kicked the last mad King George outta here?.... ;)

[Prophet 451]

54. Yep

It was the Dutch who started it.

I hope you're right, I really do.

[canetoad]

25. Arise, long dead thread, and walk

Very interesting post and not much I would disagree with.

I'm going to pick up the broadest brush in the collection here and give you a (my) general impression of the way the USA projects itself into the world. Remember, there is an implicit disclaimer: I am not going to talk about individual Americans, many of whom I have had long internet friendships with, nor point the finger at anyone. These are overall impressions.

The USA seems to me to be a heaving, roiling, painful mass of personal hurt and emotion, outrage, jingoism and defensiveness, bubbling out into the world. An expanse of raw nerve endings exposed to the elements.

Pretty strong words I know, but bear with me and I'll try to cite some examples of what I mean.

Last year, when Steve Irwin died, a DU member consoled me over my loss. "I'm sorry about the loss of your countryman," were the exact words. Hell, I didn't wish the guy dead, but really..... The whole Irwin drama made me examine the way that total strangers are embraced almost as closely as loved ones are.

I started wondering if these were real words of consolation (please, if the member who wrote this is reading, take no offence as I am trying to illustrate a point) or empty words. Insincere mouthings of formulated expressions of sympathy. Other examples come to mind of an eerie personalization of remote humans. Riverbend - (purported) author of Baghdad Burning, and I say purported because Riverbend raises many warning signals with my Authentic-O-Meter. DU'ers gulping great breaths of relief that she is OK because the blog has been updated.

I'm not criticising genuinely empathetic people, but the outpourings of emotions seem, if not fake, then at least contrived. Get in line here, cos the the empathy prize is being handed out.......

The outrage, without being in command of full facts is another example. Not much needs to be said about this, all I need to mention is Jason Leopold. And as far as I know, the full facts have not been revealed... On and on, plenty of things to be outraged about; guns, sex, religion. Too much casual outrage makes the real thing cheap. Outrage does terrible things to your stress levels, immune system and general well being. Much better to ration outrage, save it up for when it really matters.

The gun debate, in the wake of VTech shootings. American brothers and sisters, you need to understand that this whole debate is entirely alien to many of us. We do not live in a world where any person can own the legal and clinical means to immediately end your life. I often wonder if this fact spawns the insincerity; has it become a national characteristic, grown out of the need to NOT offend a concealed gun nutter?

Someone (and I'm buggered if I remember who) said Americans are very good at understanding themselves but hopeless at understanding the rest of the world. My general impression is of a culture driven by, dependent on and aspiring to the values seen in soap operas. Every so often I catch the last ten minutes of Bold and Beautiful before the early news. Two things strike me; how self-absorbed the characters are, a lot like DU, and secondly how thoroughly unpleasant these vacillating, two faced bastards are. Weak and hypocritical, elevating their own hurts, their delicately offended feelings. CS Lewis, in "The Screwtape Letters" wrote of "the gluttony of delicacy." Taken out of it's original, intended religious context and translated to modern day life, it seems to accurately describe many demonstrated traits of the USA as a whole.

Demonizing is another trait I see often on DU. The vitriolic accusations of being a freeper, an enabler or worse. There is never any shortage of bodies to 'pile on the mill', to gang up, in simple terms. These outbursts I call 'thought terminating cliches'. There is no logical rebuttal, no reasoned response. It's dirty fighting and those who participate should be ashamed, or at least take a few moments to examine their motives before they blindly thump away at the keyboard.

Yet sometimes I see thoughtful, reasonable posts. I'm sometimes motivated enough to message the poster, more often than not, I cringe as they are shouted down, taken out of context and abused. "Hey, thats free speech" you say.

One final point; I have seen countless posts about other countries, people, situations be turned around within the first four or five replies to be all about.....you guessed it. America. I have a gloriously ditzy Canadian friend who jokes, 'It's all about ME ME ME, dontcha know..."

OK, I've said enough. You didn't ask for my opinion, but here it is. Please have the grace, if you wish to flame me, to a)use creative language b)not resort to personal insults.

Have a nice day:)

[Prophet 451]

33. Necro-threads?

I think a lot of this needed to be said. Even if some of it isn't accurate, I think Americans need to know the way their country is percieved from the outside.

[entanglement]

34. Why do you hate America?

:evilgrin:

:hide:

[Prophet 451]

35. Well, gee, I dunno

I must be one of those Hollyweird librul types...

[warren pease]

38. But... but... freedom's on the march...

And America goes to 11...

There isn't a thing you've written that's factually incorrect, with the possible exception of limiting our bumper crop of violent redneck bigots to the South. Unfortunately, they're everywhere. They infest this country like termites gnawing their way through an old barn. And that's the kind of damage they do. They destroy the foundation first, then nibble at the load-bearing walls, and finally bring the whole mess down in an unrecognizable heap. And that's enough of that tired metaphor.

Whether they're fundies, wingnuts, reactionaries, anti-intellectuals, cowboys, strutting machismo pricks, misogynists, armchair mercenaries, racists, imperialists, or just normal guys who happen to enjoy the mass murder of disposable brown people (and often all of the above, and more), we're absolutely saturated with them. Because they're loud, obnoxious boors, they tend to be the most visible part of the population. And since the international community is already predisposed to vilify and/or parody the archetypal American redneck, they get an inordinate amount of play in non-US media.

We do so many things poorly, and so few things well. Our medical system is a national tragedy and an international joke, but people are so beaten down by the corporate masters that they dare not hope for any better. The war budget is king, and our education budget shrinks in direct proportion to that of the Pentagon's and the national security apparatus. We blather on about our treasured freedoms, but every time the ACLU does its period test of American attitudes regarding the Bill of Rights, most respondents think it's some subversive commie pinko manifesto. The ACLU does this by handing out copies of the Bill of Rights translated into modern idiom. So Americans don't even recognize their own constitutional freedoms when they're spelled out for them in unambiguous terms.

This systemic stupidity, along with the murder of critical by PR and advertising, accounts in large part for the Bush administration. Election theft notwithstanding, he did manage to get tens of millions of votes in both 2000 and 2004, when he actually should have been serving a sentence for either insider trading or chronic AWOL, depending on whether the SEC or the military got to him first.

And that's just a small sample of how utterly screwed up we are. After three decades of steady decline in school funding, and correspondingly lower test scores (although the flaws of measuring learning and creativity through testing are best left for another thread), we've created the perfect environment to encourage acceptance of junk science, along with the unquestioning, child-like gullibility necessary for fundamentalism to take root and thrive.

I think it may also be a legacy of the first colonists themselves. By mid-16th century, England, Scotland and Ireland had become infested with religious nuts, much as we are today. Unlike us, however, they had a place to dump them. So they sent them to Virginia and Massachusetts where they could practice their insanity without screwing up the folks back home. And of course they burned or drowned alleged witches, based their faith on a literal interpretation of the bible, and generally destroyed whatever they touched in the name of the vengeful, violent, vindictive murderer they called god. And they're our descendants -- not literally in most cases, but they established a culture of religious intolerance that, against all sanity and reason, thrives in 21st century America.

On the other hand, Australia was settled mostly by convicts sent into exile by the same UK countries. And their society turned out to be open, liberal, good-humored and devoted to beer rather than the alleged blood of the intolerant savior. Howard notwithstanding, Australia has it all over the US in most cultural norms and governmental institutions. Unfortunately, the current drought will probably put an end to Australia as we know it because the Murray/Darling river basin, which is already under severe stress from salinization, will no longer irrigate the country's most productive farmland. And global climate change, which many in the US think is just a doomsday theory concocted by leftist ivory tower academics to take away their SUVs, guarantees that the drought will persist and will eventually turn the Murray/Darling basin into an unarable salt marsh.

I could go on, but you've done most of the work for me. I'm truly sorry that we produce so many right wing idiots, and I think their numbers can only increase as a fundie response to ongoing environmental devastation and peak oil. They won't actually care about environmental destruction as such, but they'll be mightily pissed when the prices on their Karo syrup and pork rinds go through the ceiling. They'll have to blame it on somebody, and since they're blameless by definition, it's going to have to be the goddamn liberals. If only we lefties had a quarter of the power these idiots ascribe to us...


Take care, and don't let the fundies bite.


wp

[Prophet 451]

39. cheers mate

I need to make clear that I'm not confining my complaints to the South. Rather, it seems that the current public occupations of anti-intellectualism and anti-science started in the South around the turn of the 19th century becoming the 20th, mainly as a hangover of the Populists crusade against Washington which was, in turn, a reaction to the Panic of 1837. At that point, parts of the South (Kansas especially) were radical lefties but when you mix together the Populist's championing of anti-intellectualism and anti-Washington, mix in the effect of the Civil Rights Act and you get a climate ripe for the takeover of the Religious Right, notably the SBC (Kevin Phillips American Theocracy does a very good job of matching the growth of fundementalist religion, from it's start in the South, with the rise of the modern Religious Right controlled Republican party).

[piedmont]

40. You're not simply anti-American. You're OBSESSED with America.

Well, whoever keeps the blog is, anyway.

[Prophet 451]

42. Blog?

Do you mean my DU Journal?

Well, there's a few reasons for that. Firstly, this site is mainly devoted to American politics. While I suppose I could blog about my faith (as an example), there are other forums better suited to that with visitors more likely to be interested. My LJ covers a wide range of topics, including my faith, history, book reviews, pro wrestling (my onetime living and current guilty pleasure) and other stuff but when in Rome, set fire to the Ampitheatre. Political sites invite political discussion.

Secondly, the US is the 8oolb brick on the rubber sheet of the world. I don't think, living in the States with it's isolationist media, you realise quite how much what the US does affects the rest of the world. Most vaguely intelligent people here could name your president, VP and the leading contenders in the 2008 election. How many Americans could name a British MP apart from Blair and perhaps Broon? And that's not because there's any noticeable difference in intellectual power, it's because Americans are trained by their media to think of the USA as the only thing that matters. In the last hundred years, discounting both world wars, there have been around eighty US military or covert interventions around the world. Despite having less than 5% of the global population, the US uses up around a quarter (25%) of the world's resources. Now, the US isn't alone in that wasteful lifestyle but it is the worst offender.

What you do affects us. Since I get paid in dollars, it affects me personally very directly but even without that, it would affect me. I laid out some of the ways that works in the original post but if you're interested in learning some others, I could provide you with a reading list.

[piedmont]

43. No, the blog listed in your profile, where this was also posted.

http://letter2america.blogspot.com/

[Prophet 451]

44. I'd forgotten that was in my profile

Still, everything I said stands.

[piedmont]

49. Kinda preaching to the choir here. If you really want a response, post it at freeperville. nt

[treestar]

52. Very good, but aimed at the 33%

The kool-aid drinkers who still support all that shit. IOW, the freepers. At DU we would agree with you but as Americans think our ourselves in the "foreign" category to identify with your piece. As the freepers would have us be.

The people who need to hear that, the 33%, not only wouldn't read it, but couldn't - it's too long. Try reducing it to sound bites.

[Prophet 451]

55. Dammit, this is why I could never enter politics

Same reason that sunk Kerry, the inability to express complicated thoughts in soundbites.