Thoughts on Anti-americanism

This is a discussion board post, but thought I'd put it here as well because I think it accurately reflects why I can be so critical of our nation, not just the policy makers. Anyway, here is my post.

Quoted from another post:

But I get tired of hearing about America being a big bad imperialistic, selfish capitalistic nation. If anyone doesn't want us to be that - then DON'T be that! The country is what it's people are.

Criticize the policies. Criticize the President. But to use statements like American Imperialism (when we all were taught how EVIL imperialism was and is) is to make a really negative comment about our country in general - not this administration.

If we take a good look at our country's policies, you begin to notice a trend - imperialism. And imperialism has been the foundation for our policies since our country was founded. Just look at how we handled the conquest of the American continent. And our policies in interacting with our neighbors, and oil producing companies, and developing countries. While the imperialism isn't one of annexing those nations to the US, it is more one of making them adhere to policies that benefit the US at their own cost.

Does this make the US evil? That's something you have to decide for yourself. Do I think our policies are consistent with our supposed ethic of democracy, liberty and equality for all? Absolutely not. Now, as you know, consistency is one of the most important things to me. All I personally want is for the American people to recognize that our policies, while contributing nicely to our high standard of living, do not promote the same high standards around the world, and, in fact, tend to squash local movements that are heading in that direction.

Now, if Americans are fine with it, then I need to figure out how I feel about living in a country that does things that I completely disagree with. However, and I might be incredibly naive, I believe that Americans, if they were shown the truth of other's situations around the world, then we as a country would have a change of heart.

In his book, On the Justice of Roosting Chickens, Ward Churchill argues that Americans already have the tools they need to know the truth of the situation, we just choose to bury our heads in the sand and pretend to not be aware of it. He argues that all adverse actions that we are experiencing today are deserved and should be met not with violence, but with sincere attempts to make amends.

I'm not sure I agree with him completely, but he does have a point. It seems that Americans would rather not know where their products/energy/etc come from so long as it is cheap and accessible. I do think this is changing. Slowly. But changing, nonetheless. But change never would have happened if people didn't speak up and force others to look at the way things really are. Change doesn't happen if you don't get out of your comfortable place and go see, truly see, what is going on in the slums, the ghettos, the orphanages, the hospitals, the nursing homes, the third world. It won't happen if you don't acknowledge your part in maintaining the status quo that keeps them there. And it won't happen if you go back to your cozy home and forget about what you saw and felt.

One of my favorite (well favorite is not exactly the right word) parts of the spanish mass is when the priest is walking the congregation through Jesus' death. He talks about Jesus' suffering on the cross and the congregation repeats "Por mi culpa, por mi culpa, por mi culpa" while pointing their finger at themselves. Por mi culpa best translates "for my fault", "all my fault", or "the blame is mine". This is the part of the mass where the congregation accepts the blame for Jesus' death.

It connected me in ways that I had never experienced to Jesus death and suffering. I fet compelled to do that when I saw the Passion of the Christ as well. It has become a sort of mantra for me when I am faced with suffering and injustice. I look at it and say "por mi culpa" and really look and see where I am to blame. Now, this can be overwhelming and can weigh you down if you accept the blame for the world's problems. But, if you take an honest, realistic look at how your actions contribute to the problem, you are able to then decide how to change the situation starting with you. And instead of sitting around talking about it, you have started to change your own habits. You are now starting to live your life conscientiously instead of living just because that's what they tell you to do.

And when you start to do that, you want other people to join you in this. So you talk about it. You bring things up. You want to do whatever it takes to open their eyes to the truth, because you realize that you can't change the world yourself you need others to help you. And here I stand bringing up the issue of American imperialism because I can see how my living (and especially buying) habits are contributing to the problem. So, yes, it IS a negative comment about our country. But I am doing everything I can to change it.

My sadness

My sadness looks like me being all alone in a huge building and I can't find my way out. Everyone has left me, no one cares that I'm lost in the ugly building, I can't connect with the fresh air, the sun, the stars, the greenness of it all. It is cold. All I can think about is how damn cold it is and how no one is even looking for me. I've been wandering around trying to find the door that goes outside for hours, days, months and I'm feeling like this is what my life is going to be for the rest of my days. Opening doors, solving puzzles, only to find myself more stuck in the cold, dingy labyrinth. I call people, email them, seek them out for conversations and then find that I can't speak to them about it. It is as if the me that is stuck is shouting out for someone to hear, but the me in RL is incapable of voicing that need. I want them to notice something is wrong, something is different, so I can deny it, so I can throw up more walls to trap myself in. What would they do if they knew? Ignore it? Use it against me? Hate me for my weakness?

How did I get here? I'm here because I let someone lead me in here. I trusted them and they let me down. I called for help and they just said "oh", or didn't even respond at all. I put out my flowers for them to enjoy and be blessed and they ripped everyone from me and didn't even say thank you. I am here because I have failed. It might be a big failure, it might be a small one. I didn’t meet that goal that I set, I'm not doing what I thought I would be doing, I want so much more out of life, but here I am slaving away for what? I'm wasting myself, my education, my passions on stupid stuff and... I DON'T KNOW HOW TO STOP. Or don't want to go to the effort of trying it. I might fail, I might not be able to be the best, I MIGHT... and I run into another room, without any windows and only more doors to things I don't want to think about. LET ME OUT! I DIDN'T SIGN UP FOR THIS, I DIDN'T...

I feel it in my chest. It feels like huge rocks are dragging me down, keeping me from being able to draw a full breath. I feel trapped, held back, jailed. It feels like I am on the train tracks and I can hear the train rushing at me. "That is the sound of inevitability, Mr. Anderson." And there is not a damn thing I can do about it. I feel like I've been here over and over and over again, but this time, I've gotten myself so stuck, so deep into the matrix, I can't find my way out. Why should I even try to get out? I'll only find that more rocks have piled themselves onto my chest, more ropes are keeping me from running, the room is getting smaller.

And yet, somehow, I find myself in the sunshine. How did I get here? What happened to my loneliness, my failures? They have dissolved around me, one fragment at a time. When I find myself in the smallest, most confined space, I begin picking away at the filaments that make up the walls around me. I find a chip in the wall and start prying away. I find a string, in the tangled mass that enslaves me that I can pull completely out of the mess and set it aside. I examine that thing that has wounded me, enslaved me, and I can see that it serves a purpose. It makes up who I am. I am the one who has used it in the wrong way, this can be used for a blanket not a web. And I can see a little bit of light, I can feel a warm breeze on my finger, I can breathe a little bit easier. And now I can pull another string out of the mess, take a bigger chunk out of that wall, examine it for what it is... sharp and ugly, but useful, in some weird way, and I add it to the growing pile of useful bits of my life. I start to realize that I can take all these raw materials here and start building a dream, my life. This is BEAUTIFUL, not cold, ugly, and restraining. I can start to see patterns in the wreck around me, and the chaos that has been drowning me suddenly becomes ordered and useful. My prison has dissolved into nothing around me. I never even had to move to get out.

My pile of useful bits doesn't always make it into my new blanket, my new arbor. If I leave them too long, wasting away in a corner of my life, they start to form walls around me. It happens so subtly, I don't even notice that I can only see three sides around me, then two, then one, then none. And the cycle begins again. Will I have the strength to stop panicking and start to look for the one crack, the loose string? Will I be able to pull it out? Can I bring myself to look at that lonely ugly piece and examine it closely to find that beauty in it? Will I be able to find a way to integrate it into the blanket of my life? Or will I sit, curled up into a ball on the floor of my cold, cell beating against the cement walls of my prison, hoping, praying that someone will come along to give me a pickaxe to help me demolish this beast?