From the destruction of Red Indians to the humiliation of the Iraqis. From the enslavement of Africans to the obliteration of the Japanese. From the sponsoring of dictatorships all over the world to the attempted destruction of the voice of native people in the same places. From Israel to Vietnam.
I love the West. Sincerely. It is better than dictatorship. But it is the most hypocritical empire in the history of humanity. I love the West because many points of view can be expressed. But the views of many are controlled by the power of a very few. I love the West because it is as much in my blood as is Islam or Pakistan, if not more so. But the abuse of power in the West is greater than with any empire in history.
There is hope. I am allowed to express this shame. In a repressive, tyrannical (US-sponsored!) Arab regime like Saudi Arabia or Iraq (once allies of America) I wouldn’t be allowed this freedom. It’s the hypocrisy, the holier-than-thou attitude. It pisses me off that Bush gives lectures on the spreading of freedom and free elections while his puppets are re-instated in Iraq and a stooge is in place at Afghanistan.
Inequality is rife. Even without a job, I’m better off here than just about anywhere else in the world. I thank God that I live in my beloved London, which I have served and which has looked after me.
I hope that sanity will prevail. There is hope, hope for the West, but that is a luxury that many people under the cosh of brutal regimes established and sponsored by the West do not have. We really must stop calling people terrorists when we have taken the lives of their entire families and left them homeless, stateless and hopeless. When you are left with nothing to live for, it becomes very easy to die for what might be. Especially when your enemy is committing acts of terrorism on a daily basis and calling it a War on Terror. The appropriation of language is really the biggest crime we’ve committed. It has deprived us of the only tool we have to enable human progress. The Truth.
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de 11.23.04 at 4:03 am
I was just watching an interiew between Jonathon Miller and Daniel Dennet, two of the best known atheists bar Richard Dawkins.
One was saying that attacking religious belief has always been considered as wrong in itself, as nothing is gained by undermining moral beliefs and certainties etc.
But when this belief is used to mobilise End Times I’m no longer so sure. Now that the last mambers of the Bush cabinet who do not believe in rapture have been removed, hoping that Christian fundamentalists will reign themselves in (let alone those who they are oppressing) looks tenuous.
Where the quality of life is based on capital, people are relatively free to go with it or ignore it. You can drink Coca cola, but be a marxist if thats what you want. If your village is poor, you can bring in Nike who will trade the well being of a few expendable peasants for some wealth. Poverty is not a zero sum game, as everyone has something to trade. And if you don’t want to play with the West, life is shorter but just as valid.
Where the quality of life is based on agreeing with doctrine, Im not sure there are many options. Those Iraqis who didn’t like Mr Hussain but don’t want AmeriKKKa are seen as ineffective losers. The guys with belief and guns will go outside and square up, but you can stay inside and knit with your sisters. Ha! Our belief is so strong, we are literally exploding!! You have no say!
The truth on its own is just a set of instantaneous pictures. In fact if you turn on the news, and turn off the sound, there it is. Belief is a somewhat larger download, which you have to maintain over time, for ever. Truth alsways loses out, because you can always make a different image.
If AmeriKKKa only want the Middle Easts oil I couldn’t care less. Its just stuff to trade. If they want to spread “democracy”, “peace” and “freedom” via Disney then good luck. I think Saudi Arabians in shopping Malls look disingenuous, but they seem perfectly happy.
But if the West wants to spread ideas by coercion, by the destruction of the “bad” in favour of the “good”, then its time to put down the keyboard and dust of the AK47.