I know it’s just election year politics. I know it is just name-calling and divisiveness. I know I shouldn’t let it get to me – and mostly I don’t. But the Right-wing, neo-con charge that liberals “hate America first” bugs me. It was all over the RNC last week. It is all over discussions on this blog site. If you are liberal or democrat or basically not “one of us” (“google-gaggle, google-gaggle!”), then you must therefore hate America first.
But let’s think about this charge. The crime is not just that I might hate America, but that I might hate America FIRST. Implicit in the charge are important assumptions of many on the Right. Hating is not a bad thing. In fact, hating is (according to their thinking) a good thing. In fact, I SHOULD hate. Just not America. I should remember to first and foremost hate someone else, presumably some Muslim country. Or, barring that, then hate the French; it’s always okay to hate the French.
It’s all so much easier if you can just figure out whom to hate and then hate them vigorously. You can make that even easier if you can attribute hatred directed at yourself to them, because surely it is okay (maybe even Christian) to hate someone who hates you. Forget what we know about the use of scapegoating in establishing totalitarian regimes. Forget that Jesus’s message was about love and banishing hate from your heart. Forget all that.
So. For the record: I don’t hate America, let alone first. I don’t hate President Bush, although I believe pretty strongly that his administration’s leadership needs to be challenged, needs to be replaced. That’s not hate, though. That is love and faith in the democratic processes of this country.
I am also outspokenly critical of some US policies, whether they come from Bush or are holdovers from Democratic control of the executive branch. See, I believe strongly in an ethic that says privilege should always maintain a vigorous critique of privilege. We live in a country where almost 5% of the world’s population uses something like 40% of the worlds natural resources (different sources tweak these numbers differently, but even more conservative numbers only nuance this privilege). We live in incredible privilege and, although the number of Americans living in poverty is on the rise, poverty in the US is not the same as poverty in sub-Saharan Africa or parts of Asia. That is not to say that US poverty doesn’t “suck,” but just to keep things in perspective.
Right wingers will be quick to say that we live in the greatest country on earth. I tend to agree with them. Where we tend to part company is that Right wingers respond to my criticism of this country and its policies with an invitation for me to leave. But I’m not going anywhere. I believe this country is great because it has always encouraged self-criticism and grown from it.
The US (even now) is a great country, worth its citizens taking pride in it. But excessive pride is called “hubris,” and the ancient Greeks knew hubris was the most tragic of flaws. “Pride goeth before the fall,” so I am told. The more excessive the pride, the more terrible the fall. Maybe that’s because of fate or karma. More likely it’s because pride draws attention to privilege, and gloating over privilege makes other, less fortunate folks angry. Hubris, in part, has led to the downfall of most great empires.
The more the US gives in to excessive pride, the more I fear we are tempting fate. The more we forestall international negotiation and take (practically) unilateral, pre-emptive military action around the world, the more we tempt fate. The more we exempt ourselves from international policies and proceedings (e.g. Kyoto Protocols or The World Court), the more we are tempting fate. The more we simply blame terrorists and ignore our foreign policies that have mobilized their extremism, the more we tempt fate.
I love this country and what it stands for. I want the rest of the world to love the US too, to look to us for advice or for aid or just as a good role model. Precious few in the rest of the world do that anymore. The policies of the current administration have led us away from this ideal. And yes, I hate that.
