It’s not even that he was disinvited. It’s the exceptionally rude and contemptuous tone of the letter that’s shocking. Americans don’t talk to each other like this in professional settings. These are students who are addressing a much older, very accomplished gentleman. It’s not normal that they speak to him in this pissy, hectoring tone.
Leaving aside the political aspect of the conflict altogether, this is a collapse of all norms of sociability. It’s the sociophobia that Spanish sociologist César Rendueles warned us about a decade ago. Adult people are incapable of exercising age-appropriate social skills and are unaware of how horrid they look.
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Maybe this is a cultural thing, or maybe you don’t get the earnestness of the letter – because the tone of the letter seems quite measured to me, given that they’re basically saying, we think you are supporting deeply immoral activities and we do not welcome you to our campus.
If they were saying he’s a bloodstained ghoul and an accomplice of eco-vandalism – even then, if that’s what they believe, I think it would be appropriate for them to say it. But they don’t go for that kind of rhetoric. I suppose the part where they say he should reflect on his shortcomings is amusingly audacious, and shows a great deal of faith in their own virtue.
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Maybe it’s cultural. If somebody – and I’m not even saying 20-year-old pissants with zero accomplishments but anybody – addressed you in that way, that would be normal? This is an acceptable level of discourse among people where you are? Because here it’s like emitting gas loudly and in public. It’s considered embarrassing to take yourself this seriously and be so pompous. People go for self-deprecation and understatement.
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In my opinion, for young activists to write earnest letters full of moral urgency is not unusual. I think it happens in every modern society.
It’s a broad genre, it encompasses everything from open letters by the best of a generation, protesting genuine moral horrors, to manipulative grifters trying to shake down a vulnerable target, to works by ideological fanatics or genuinely deluded individuals.
In the case of the Berkeley students, they are trying to shame the progressive councilman for complicity with eco-imperialism, either in the hope that he will come over to their side, or at least in order to maintain their own moral purity.
If you want an analogy for this sort of thing, maybe one could be found in the world of competing Christian denominations. Some are ecumenical and forgiving, others are fanatical and suspicious, always keeping the devil at bay.
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The rot runs deep. For example, you may not like Kissinger or James Baker, you must acknowledge that they were serious people. When they visited foreign countries and met with their counterparts, what they communicated carried power and projected strength. Now you have state department people posting snarky memes on twitter.
I think James Baker was the last serious secretary of state. Blinken goes to Saudi Arabia and is made to wait outside MBS’s office for hours and then gets told the meeting is cancelled. Deservedly so.
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American vision of its global leadership role is that of apologetic guilt on the Left and resentful avoidance on the Right. Nobody has the balls to say, “Yes, we are big and powerful. And you’ll do what we say and then say thank you.” No, it’s all avoidance not only if responsibility but of reality. A constant search for somebody to be subservient to.
How did these people survive the Cold War without disintegrating into a heap of apologetic, terrified little pieces?
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The US stopped buying oil from Saudi, so threats like sanctions don’t work anymore. The Saudis will just laugh and sell to China and India.
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This comment may be inappropriate as its conflating the personal with the political but I’ll comment anyway:
“Yes, we are big and powerful, and you’ll do as we say and then say thank you” Is precisely the attitude my mother has towards people in her family, as far as I can tell.
This morphed into trying to manipulate her children into emotional service of her parents. This caused and continues to cause all sorts of problems for me personally, that I’m dealing with, for better or worse. I don’t think it’s unreasonable for me to be uncomfortable with an authority taking this position.
I’m sure I agree with you on world politics way more than I disagree
“Yes, we are big and powerful. And you’ll do what we say and then say thank you” also seems to be Russia’s position on it’s politics. My ex-soviet grandparents came to hate Stalin after his abuses were uncovered, but they always seemed pretty comfortable with Soviet imperialism.
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Russia isn’t a global superpower, though. It’s a country where 25% of the population doesn’t have indoor plumbing and people line up in -30°C outside for hours to buy eggs.
The example of your mother is actually quite appropriate. If, let’s say, you want her to help pay your bills and solve your problems, of course, you’d have to do what she says. Since you don’t have her pay your way or manage your life (I assume), then she’s not really powerful in your life. She’s behaving like she is but that’s not grounded in reality.
I’ve had this problem with my mother and it will take serious boundarying up on your part. It helps to spend some time imagining an actual physical boundary surrounding you before every conversation. I spend a lot of time imagining myself in a tunnel. It works.
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So yes, I agree, if I want her to pay my bills then I need to do as she wants. Even if what she wants is unreasonable and destructive to me. It’s up to me to solve my problems and get out of the destructive environment as best I can. And then to deal with the damage. And if I fail to make it in the larger world and get destroyed, oh well, I’m just one person, doesn’t really matter in any grand scheme of things.
So extending this metaphor, I think if my mother were a global superpower (or, to make it more plausible, a community leader of some sort) it would be reasonable for there to be some mechanisms of holding her accountable for what she demands of people who depend on her.
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What on earth has that got to do with ecology?
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From what I understand, if you are against Hamas, you are bad for the ecology. It’s probably the “indigenous form of knowledge” that our Western heteropatriarchal belief in logic can’t comprehend.
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Ah, right. You can tell by looking at satellite of gaza vs. surrounding areas, how exquisitely careful hamas is of the local ecology.
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I mean, they did kill people. That’s battling overpopulation right there.
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It is like the Haiti/Dominican Republic border, only worse. Like, you look at hispaniola, satellite picture, in many places you can tell even without any lines on the map, almost exactly where the border is, because it’s a completely different color. And it’s not like the DR is some kind of eco paradise or anything. But they still have trees. And far less erosion.
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“But they still have trees. And far less erosion.”
And governance, and some sort of functional justice system, and a state infrastructure. And yet Haiti is celebrated everywhere in Leftist and liberal circle as THE great example of a slave population that rose up against its colonial masters to establish a wonderful free and democratic republic.
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I actually saw somebody on social media last week trying to argue that Haiti was more oppressed because its population is “blacker” than the DR. This is
a) untrue
and
b) the exact same argument used by the Dominican dictator Trujillo to justify genocide of Haitians in the DR. It’s curious how these anti-racists always end up mouthing genocidal slogans.
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BTW, the best argument that shall be marshalled in favour of a well armed citizenry: Trujillo and his people might still be around if the US Marine guards at the US Embassy didn’t leave their service rifles behind when they packed out and left.
You might not have been aware of that story.
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