Of course, when I wrote a post about how my students thought that Europe was invaded in year 711 by the United States, everybody laughed. Ha, ha, how ignorant of them. I now entertain people at parties with this story, and everybody is always in stitches. It’s funny, though, how often the very people who find this anecdote to be hilarious are guilty of the same kind of attitude.
To give you an example, look at the following post that makes a very convoluted argument trying to persuade the readers that if a fringe extremist militia in Somalia is not letting humanitarian aid to the starving, it must be the Americans’ fault. And also that the rise of the Khmer Rouge is the Americans’ fault:
The hostility of al-Shabaab to western aid is in all the media reports on the famine. It plays easily into stereotypes of senseless and cruel violence in obscure African conflicts. But what is often omitted is any explanation of why al-Shabaab are so hostile to westerners – one honourable exception is the US journalist Jeremy Scahill, who uncovered CIA sites in Mogadishu. His reports trace how al-Shabaab’s suspicion is rooted in the experience of a decade of devious US manipulation. Somalia has been the war on terror’s sideshow – and I choose the word deliberately: think of Cambodia and its bombing by the US during the Vietnam war.
The United States created the conditions for the starvation in Somalia, just as its illegal bombing raids in Cambodia led to the rise of the Khmer Rouge.
Let’s leave aside the clumsy turn of phrase about the “illegal bombing raids” (as if there were such a thing as legally bombing anybody) for the moment and consider the following. Both the author of the article and the blogger who quoted it must surely think of themselves as extremely progressive. Their constant public self-flagellation over the sins of their fellow Americans manages to conceal from them, however, how obnoxious this “nobody-in-the-world-can-as-much-as-fart-without-us” attitude is.
When I was an undergrad, I was once telling a classmate about the Holodomor, the organized famine in Ukraine that claimed the lives of millions of people in 1931.
“This is horrible!” my compassionate classmate exclaimed. “You know, I often feel ashamed of being an American.”
“Why are you ashamed about this?” I asked her.
“Well, look what we did to your people,” she explained.
Obviously, the idea that the Ukrainians could have suffered at the hands of anybody other than the Americans didn’t even occur to her. When I told her what really happened, she kind of lost interest in the entire story. Who cares about a famine or a genocide when they offer no excuse to indulge in the ever so sweet process of self-castigation?
It is undeniable that the United States have been in the habit of invading other countries and interfering with other nations’ business for a very long time now. However, things are never as simple as peaceful, nice barbarians living among flowers in the state of eternal innocence and then the bad, mean and horrible United States invading this paradise and destroying it with its presence.
The US manipulates and bullies governments of other countries. There are also always forces withing those other countries that manipulate the US and use them for their purposes. If your Liberal heart can’t take the idea of anybody manipulating the all-powerful US, then you’ve got to ask yourself about how Liberal you really are. If you are emotionally attached to the idea of humongously powerful, all-conquering United States (whether to praise it or criticize it), that’s a sign that you’ve been infected by the disease of unthinking, blind patriotism.
So let me tell you, people: ultimately, the vector of your patriotism is not all that important. Whether you think the US is the origin of every great thing that has happened to this planet or that it is the source of every evil, you are still proceeding from a profound contempt for every other culture under the sun. If you look at an event taking place on another continent, and the first thing that occurs to you is to look at how the US might have caused it, you are a fanatical patriot whose disrespect for other cultures is nothing but annoying.
Clarissa's Blog 
you mean the world doesn’t revolve around the U.S.?
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You know? It kind if might not. 🙂 🙂
And Galileo didn’t exist solely to provide the US Republicans with anti-climate change talking points. 🙂
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I’m still trying to figure out how being suspicious of the United States leads to starvation conditions–I mean, I am no Somalia expert, but surely these conditions are a result of something more than the lack of Western aid?
Your more general point though, is something that has always bothered me. I mean, even when the U.S. screws royally with a country, the country has more important attributes than the fact that the U.S. has messed with it, but the U.S. aspect is what some people concentrate on.
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That’s what I’m saying. People get so fixated on how events in any given country fit in with the ever-fascinating story of the US that anything which can’t be directly tied to the US immediately gets overlooked. It’s like talking to a narcissist who always turns the conversation back to themselves no matter what is being discussed.
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What are you talking about this is Planet America you don’t like it go back to the Moon (soon to be United States of the Moon).
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hhmm here’s the thing, kids growing up in the U.S. are taught that we are omnipotent, and I suppose the flip side of that, is that the thinking-ish ones come to believe that then we are omni-responsible for things (i mean as opposed to the ones who think, wow aren’t other countries SO LUCKY we decided to help them out as they’d never be able to figure sh1t out on their own….). It is a symptom of the hugely provincial nature of people in the States, who even when they travel abroad, can find other people who speak their language and know all about their country.
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It is annoying, and it creeps into movies and popular culture–“Hotel Rwanda,” for example.
In primary and secondary school, kids only learn about wars in which the U.S. was an active belligerent–and sometimes not even all of those. I realize that class time is limited, but still…
A question: Is it worse in the U.S. than in other countries? In particular, how does the patriotic narcassism of Americans compare to, say, that in some of the former Soviet republics?
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Good question. The Russians have been on a patriotic wave of insane proportions lately. So it’s as bad as in the US in that respect but a lot more hilarious. Because whereas the US is a huge player on the world arena, Russia hasn’t really been. So it looks really funny to see, say, an international conflict portrayed in film that is centered around a lone Russian who somehow mysteriously appeared in the area.
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Hmmm .. maybe I will disagree for a bit of conversational sake: This seems pretty obvious. I mean there are black dictators who repress black people right? So, it is not all white racism and such. (No sarcasm intended here; just want to make sure given the medium.)
But, what good is it if I run around criticizing them (a lot)? How about, as an American, I criticize US for arming them and such? And I am not really sure how it is that other countries “manipulate” US in the sense that it is like: “Oops! Really!?? They took that money and bought arms and are repressing their own people?”
Hopefully you do not mind correcting me.
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I think it’s less about criticizing and more about recognizing the complexity of the issue. I don’t think there can be any genuine solution to any issue if we take such a one-sided approach.
“And I am not really sure how it is that other countries “manipulate” US in the sense that it is like: “Oops! Really!?? They took that money and bought arms and are repressing their own people?””
-The whole history of the post-1991 relations between Russia and the US is just such a history of manipulation. And not by the US.
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Ok, I am quite cool w/ recognizing complexity.
Is there a resource for your comment on Russia/US relation? I mean, are you saying Russia came to the US as said something like: “Yay! We are a democracy now! Give us some money.” And then the US thought: “We won the Cold War! And everything is golden there now, so sure here is a bunch.” And then Russia did: “Thanks, let’s create a plutocracy.” And the US went: “Wait!? What?? No no, that’s not what we meant! We were manipulated: How could we have know that there would be who want wealth and power?”
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Geez! Sorry about my writing: “We were manipulated: How could we have known that there would be people who want wealth and power?”
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This is a fairly correct rendering of events, except for the last part when the US finally got it. That hasn’t yet happened. 🙂
A good beginning for the exploration of this issue is the part on Russia in Naomi Klein’s http://www.amazon.com/Shock-Doctrine-Rise-Disaster-Capitalism/dp/0312427999/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1315939829&sr=1-1
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There’s also another related tendency which is to hand wring about how one may have said something by a photo one had taken that was not politically adept or authentic. That is truly bizarre. For instance, this medical student volunteers abroad and then for whatever reason has her photo taken with some local kids. She later comes back to the US and laments in an exceedingly grandiose style that her picture might have sent the wrong message and that she was truly up herself when she had had that original picture taken with some black kids.
I guess there are all sorts of ways to milk oneself for publicity, but some people want to benefit by looking at themselves from all angles.
Heres is a similar critique to the article I read originally.
http://www.abc.net.au/radionational/programs/encounter/5341384
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The whole thing is beyond bizarre. The practice itself is weird but the hand-wringing is even worse.
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I’m not sure what the practice even is. I know that when I wanted to get a special inroad into Zimbabwean society, I decided to do something that satisfied my interests and at the same time gave me a chance to actually enter the culture almost as a native to that culture. So I did some kind of NGO thing, although it wasn’t really successful and perhaps was never intended to be. But people actually did tangibly benefit, especially me.
See:
https://www.youtube.com/my_videos?o=U&sq=mutare
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Let me try this instead for my link:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FZjpQM13j0s&list=PL29_tjgLoT1T3ygC4rlULgjZxRsFgE6fC
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