ne thing I find interesting about "patriotism" is how often and quickly it can be turned around. People claim to love America, love what this nation stands for, and yet instantly turn on anyone who objects to something the government is doing, especially something military. As if dissent and freedom of speech/expression aren't among the very most American traits of all? And as if the generally-conservative types who scream "love it or leave it" aren't the loudest voices of criticism if some president they didn't vote for wants to engage in some military adventure they don't approve of.

This page collects various blog items about so-called anti-Americanism in all its forms.

More recent updates are added on top.

April 12, 2003

Enlightening article about CBS firing the producer of their upcoming miniseries about Hitler.

The executive producer of a CBS miniseries about Adolf Hitler's rise to power has been fired after giving an interview in which he compared the current mood of Americans to that of the Germans who helped Hitler rise to power.

"It basically boils down to an entire nation gripped by fear, who ultimately chose to give up their civil rights and plunged the whole nation into war," Gernon said in the interview. "I can't think of a better time to examine this history than now."

So um, what did he say that's not true, in addition to being thought-provoking? Or is "thought-provoking" a bad thing in American these days, unless the thoughts being provoked are about how much you love the troops and Dubya and how the US of A is the bestest and most God-loved nation ever anywhere?

I mean Jesus, we certainly can't give anyone any reason to think things over, or cast any introspection on their actions and historical precedent.  Why they might actually have to turn off the jingoistic war coverage and think for a moment or two and make up their own minds about something.  And we can't have that.

(Ahh yes, sweet sarcasm.  How I've missed your gentle embrace.)

April 6, 2003

Interesting blog that appears to be almost entirely stories of "pro-war" protesters attacking or threatening or trying to drown out anti-war protesters. It's an odd phenomena, with the majority of people in the US clearly supporting the war, at least from the uniformed PoV the media has put them in. So why are various redneck types so infuriated by people who are against war and violence?  Why does it piss them off so much?  Why do they even take notice when clearly the policies of the current US leadership are very pro war, and small batches of anti-war protesters here and there won't have any real effect at all?

The easiest reply is that the pro war types are violent rednecks and of course they support blowing up Iraqis, since their own conflict resolution skills lean heavily towards the use of baseball bats with nails driven through them. They don't have the intelligence or cognitive abilities to understand the whole "oppose the war but support our troops" mentality. And they probably are in the 50% or greater amount of US citizens who have somehow come to the conclusion that Iraq was heavily involved in the 9/11 terrorism. Knowing what the hell you are talking about is never any sort of requirement for violence, after all.

So they are just basically idiots, and get angry when people believe things they don't understand or agree with?  It's a very simplistic view of people with a simplistic view, so my inclination is to reject it, since I don't like simple answers, but it might well be correct

A more complicated (and probably incorrect) psychological profile angle is to ponder if the pro-war types are really that insecure in their beliefs.  When people are unsure in what they believe in, especially when they think they should be secure about it, they tend to get violent and angry and bitter as a sort of overcompensation.  Are the various pointing and shouting rednecks really that insecure in their "kill them all and let God sort them out" PoV?

I don't think so, they aren't intelligent or nuanced enough to exist on that many levels at the same time.

I've been thinking about this some recently, and it pains me to say it, but I'm really considering that the majority of Americans are simply too stupid to be allowed an opinion on the direction the country should proceed in.

That the % of people who believe Iraq was involved in 9/11 has been steadily increasing despite constant news reports to the contrary, and Bush isn't even trying to lie about it anymore is just shocking to me.  It's such obvious evidence of a sort of dis-ease with the Iraq Attack, and that people aren't feeling like we have enough reason to be blowing up Baghdad and getting US soldiers killed in Iraq, and therefore convincing themselves that this is revenge for 9/11, or a way to make the world safer from those who back terrorists, etc.  All bullshit, but the sort of belief Bush encourages.  And as is now clear, he has a damn good point in doing so, since it's working. People aren't just believing the lies, they are elaborating on them.

And the major media is in a sort of "who can be the most jingoistic" competition, spurred on by the FOX News/Propaganda reports, and guess what? They work.  They get the highest ratings, despite having the least truth or objectivity.  It turns out that telling the people what (lies) they want to hear makes good business sense.

Other evidence was in NOW, a news magazine show I saw a few days ago on PBS. They were interviewing some media critics, non-partisan guys from major media magazines, and it was shockingly depressing.  One example they talked about was USA Today, which is far from a real newspaper and is quite pro-war/America.  USA Today had run some photos of dead Iraqi troops on the front page, and inside they had some PR photo op type pic of various Iraqi civilians waving happily at the US invading forces.

Based on that, USA Today got something like 1500 emails and letters and calls protesting, saying that they should have presented the happy fun photo on the main page, and the picture of the reality of war on the inside, or not at all. And that was a shot of dead Iraqi troops, not some babies who were killed by an errant cruise missile.  Soldiers!  I mean the whole point in the war is to kill the Iraqi Army, and people aren't even comfortable seeing that, while they "support the troops". So they are basically asking to be lied to, or at least to have the truth concealed, since it's icky.

Of course I guess I have to consider the possibility that the pro-war types who are attacking anti-war protesters are really patriotic and don't have any subterfuge to them, and they just can't understand that anyone could feel differently than they do.  It really is right vs. wrong for them, like how parents would feel if they saw a pro-pedophile group marching on the streets.  I just can't really emphasize with that PoV, since anti-war is not anywhere near the same as pro-pedophilia, other than in the mind of some very stupid people.

There were other examples given of various newspapers and TV news programs showing dead Iraqi civilians, and getting tons of angry mails and calls of the "How dare you! You are supporting the terrorists!" type. And from real people, no matter how insane their opinions might be.

I guess this sort of hypocrisy isn't real surprising, I mean it's just a human/international version of the old "Don't go to a slaughter house if you want to keep enjoying hamburgers." but I see it as a responsibility, even a requirement, to know exactly what is happening to the troops you are supporting, and to know what they are doing in the wars we send them off to fight.  If you can't take the sight and knowledge of the people they are killing, then you should really re-evaluate your PoV.

I actually suspect that the people writing those angry letters were predominantly pro-war types who think that they can take the pictures, but are worried that the average person, or the fence-sitters, will see actual blood and grow queasy in their support for this war, and the others planned for Syria, Iran, Libya, etc after this.

I've also been wondering what this will lead to; if reporting the news with a slanted "we are great" perspective is so popular and financially sound, how long until all the networks are doing it, now that news is about ratings and money, rather than being a public service for the country or local community?  And why stop with just skewing reality to conform to your preconceived point of view? Why not just make stuff up?  And I don't mean minor details, like making the good guys a bit better and the bad guys a bit worse (which the media does now).  I mean inventing outright lies and fictions, of the sort that certain people want to hear? News is now entertainment, not information, with celebrity fluff pieces becoming ever more popular, and the more honest and realistic and objective the news reporting is, the lower the ratings it gets.

Anyway, I'm too tired to think this through any more tonight, but it's seeming very Orwellian/1984ish, and worse than that, it's not being imposed on the people by some central evil bureaucracy... it's being demanded by the people to keep them from unhappy thoughts.

There's more on this the next day, with reader emails.

Rrelatively ridiculous news, a baggage screener at the Seattle Airport has some curious notions of what "Anti-American" means.

And isn't afraid to share them with people he/she encounters while doing his/her job.

Seth Goldberg says that when he opened his suitcase in San Diego after a flight from Seattle this month, the two "No Iraq War" signs he'd picked up at the Pike Place Market were still nestled among his clothes.

But there was a third sign, he said, that shocked him. Tucked in his luggage was a card from the Transportation Security Administration notifying him that his bags had been opened and inspected at Seattle-Tacoma International Airport. Handwritten on the side of the card was a note, "Don't appreciate your anti-American attitude!"

"I found it chilling and a little Orwellian to have received this message," said Goldberg, 41, a New Jersey resident who was in Seattle visiting longtime friend Davis Oldham, a University of Washington instructor.

To their credit, the higher ups at the airport are saying all the right things.

Goldberg says that when he took his suitcase off the airplane in San Diego, the zipper pulls were sealed with nylon straps, which indicated TSA had inspected the luggage. It would be hard, he said, for anyone else to have gotten inside his bags.

TSA officials say they are looking into the incident. "We do not condone our employees making any kind of political comments or personal comments to any travelers," TSA spokeswoman Heather Rosenker told Reuters. "That is not acceptable."

I post this not because I really give a damn, but because it illustrates a point I find interesting. Why are the people who are so quick to claim patriotism, and to impugn the motives/patriotism of people who disagree with them, so profoundly anti-American?  Anti-American in terms of being opposed to many of the greatest principles of freedom and democracy that were founded in America.  Things like freedom of speech, democracy, freedom to debate a difference of opinion, etc?

What on earth is "anti-American" about signs opposing the war in Iraq?  People lump some sort of "support our troops" concept in with "support whatever foreign adventure the military might get into, no matter how unjustified or foolish it may be". And they aren't able to differentiate the two.  The real irony is that you need look back only 2 or 3 years to find these says pro-Iraq Attack types opposing the use of US troops in places like Haiti or Somalia or Yugoslavia, since then they were being used for Clintonian things like peace keeping and preventing ethnic cleansing.  Rather than Bushian things like um... well I'm not exactly sure what people think is good about the Iraq Attack. Aside from the ones who have somehow confused 9/11 with Iraq.  It's just a sort of general idiot principles thing, where there is a clearly-defined bad guy (Saddam) and by God, we're gonna get 'em!

Or something.

On the topic of misguided Anti-Americanism, how 'bout them Dixie Chicks?

They are apparently a #1 country act, three pretty women who sing or something.  I've never heard a song and doubt I ever will.  Anyway, they're been doing a long European tour (since when is Country Music popular outside of the US?) and before a recent concert in London, one of them gave voice to a sentiment that 97% of the world is in complete agreement with.

In a concert in London, England, this week, Maines told the crowd: "Just so you know, we're ashamed the president of the United States is from Texas."

Perhaps unsurprisingly, this didn't go over well with a lot of the ignorant red necks who enjoy country music (and who probably didn't like the Dixie Chicks' crossover pop style Country much in the first place). There have been numerous angry phone calls to various hick radio stations, and lots of local stations in godforsaken places like Talladega, Alabama have been pulling them from the play list.

In Talladega, Ala., WTDR-FM dropped the group Friday morning after more than 250 listeners called in a two-hour period complaining about Maines' comments.

"The emotion of the callers telling us about their fathers and sons and brothers who are overseas now and who fought in previous wars was very specific," said station president Jim Jacobs. "They were just outraged is all we can say. Most them called just to say, `Dump the Chicks.' So that's what we are doing."

The Chicks have issued various apologies, but it's not helping and now the nation's largest and most hated radio chain, Clear Channel Broadcasting, has pulled them from the playlists on their hundreds of Country stations across the country.

My main comment on this is that I still have no idea what the Dixie Chick was saying, or why it upsets anyone. The band is from Texas themselves, which I think ties into things:

"Just so you know, we're ashamed the president of the United States is from Texas."

So is she saying that she's ashamed, as a Texan, that such a terrible president is also from Texas? Or is it a more general "Texans are idiots" comment, and any president from that state would be an idiot?  Or something else?

As I said, her meaning isn't clear, at least not to me.

In any event, what on earth does that have to do with anything else? Why are people calling in to radio stations, angry about it in relation to the US troops who are overseas, or who are veterans? She didn't say anything about the US Armed Forces, or the Iraq Attack in particular.  And what if she had said "No war with Iraq!"  So what?  You can totally disagree with what the troops are being used for while still supporting them.

And anyway, who requires that their musical artists agree with their political point of view? I know nothing about the political leanings of most musicians I like to listen to, and that's fine with me.  I'm sure a lot of them are idiots.  Being as they are rock stars, isn't that sort of expected? Would you buy a political book by a rock star? Would you read an article by a rock star? Do you go to concerts for their lively and intelligent on-stage banter? Somehow I doubt it.

Then why do you care what they say in a song?  Enjoy their voice like another instrument, and if they are able to get through three verses and a chorus without saying something completely stupid, that's a bonus. I have no idea what any Dixie Chicks songs are about, but as they are very popular and sell a lot of records, I have to assume they are pretty much all banality and "love me baby" type stuff.  At least nothing political or controversial.

So one of them thinks (with several mountains of evidence) that the president is an idiot.  Or that Texans are idiots. I guess if you're in Texas you have a right to be offended by that, especially if you are an idiot (which is a relatively safe bet, based on my two years living in Dallas in the 80's) but I don't understand the way people feel a need to try to get them taken off the air.

I try to avoid movies by Scientologists or other religious kooks (a list I guess I'll have to add Mel Gibson to now) just since I don't want to support their kookery.  But I don't see any reason to try and get others to boycott them.  Perhaps it's just a sign of weakness in my resolve, but I think it's a personal choice, and what other people do or watch or listen to should be up to them.  All of which are major reasons I'm not a Conservative.  Or angry about whatever some Dixie Chick said before a concert in London.

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