PDA

View Full Version : Varieties Of Anti-Americanism



thedrifter
08-04-03, 12:06 PM
Varieties Of Anti-Americanism

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Commentary by Daniel G. Jennings



Aug 4, 2003


Lately a lot of us have been trying to understand the phenomenon known as Anti-Americanism, the widespread - often organized - hatred of the United States, its government, ideology, people and values by people throughout the world. The best way to analyze and understand anti-Americanism is to categorize it. There are at least three main categories of Anti-Americanism in the world today. Categories that can best be defined by the basis of each kind of Anti-Americanism. By learning how and why each kind of Anti-Americanism evolved we can understand Anti-Americanism in general.

The first kind of Anti-Americanism and the easiest to understand is rooted in the political reality most of humanity lives in. Outside the United States, Europe, Japan, Australia and other democratic nations, most of the world's governments are still run by elites, that is classes of people who run governments like family businesses - for their own good and profit. Sometimes these elites are the residues of various pre-industrial aristocracies such as the rulers of the Arab world. In other cases these elites are composed of the remains of revolutionary movements such as the Communist parties in China and Vietnam. Occasionally, these elites are composed of wealthy families and landowners. And sometimes they are the descendants of the native functionaries of various colonial empires.

During the Cold War many of these elites were willing to tolerate the United States and its freedom because they needed us to defend them from a competing brand of oligarchy namely Communism…or at least to play us off against the Russians to further their own agendas. Now that Communism is history, the elites no longer need or want us but they still fear us. These elitists hate America because America, with its free society, democratic government and capitalist economy is a threat to them. American freedom and the American way of life threaten every elite and oligarchy on the planet. Even a whiff of American-style freedom can bring down a moth-eaten oligarchy, as the fate of the Soviet Union proved. The world's oligarchs and elitists - and the intellectuals whose paychecks they sign - are scared to death of us. In typical fashion they hate what they fear, namely us.

The second variety of Anti-Americanism is that of the world's traditionalists, that is people who love their traditional cultures and histories. These people rightly see America as the source of the modern world they hate and fear, the modern world that is slowing replacing the traditional ways of life they love.

America, like it or not, is the source of the modern world. This includes the modern political system of a constitutional democracy (or a constitutional republic) as well as the modern economic system (capitalism), mass entertainment, mass communications, modern industry, most modern science, and most modern technology. These are essentially American creations. The modern world of technological progress, cultural and social upheaval, political and cultural freedom, equality of the races and sexes, popular culture and popular taste began in America. The essential inventions of the modern world, mass production, television, movies, automobiles, light bulbs, airplanes, the atomic bomb, were American inventions. Traditionalists, of course, are threatened by this and fear America as the source of the modern world. A world they neither like nor understand. They fear that America is changing and remaking the face of the globe in its own image and that they have no choice in the matter.

The third variety of Anti-Americanism is all manner of “intellectuals” and leftists. These people hate America because American has proven that capitalism works. Our combination of democracy, popular culture, and mass communications disproves most of the theories they believe in: Marxism, Socialism, Communism, Fascism, and Racism etc. These people hate America because our political and economic systems work and theirs do not. America is despised because our real-life success story makes their utopian dreams, for which they are willing to sacrifice everything, to be nothing but hollow mockeries. They loathe us because the average people of the world are too busy watching Baywatch, playing video games and listening to “Emminem” to listen to their glorious plans for revolution and utopia. They are jealous because average people want - and for the most part have - pickup trucks and TV sets instead of Communism and the Islamic Paradise.

There are other varieties of Anti-Americanism out there but these are the three most popular and widespread variations of this particular evil. Perhaps now that we acknowledge the roots of Anti-Americanism we can begin to understand it.


--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Daniel G. Jennings is a freelance writer and journalist who lives and works in Denver, CO. He has worked as a reporter and editor for daily and weekly newspapers in five states.

http://www.washingtondispatch.com/article_6288.shtmlSempers,

Roger
:marine:

Devildogg4ever
08-05-03, 04:00 AM
I believe as long as these 3 varieties of Anti-Americanism are there, then America will always be, the country all have heard and dream of living in, and or becoming a part of!