America Rules!!!
This was the sentiment painted on a square of cardboard in the hands of a little boy, maybe five, that I passed on my bike ride today. His friends/ siblings, also about five, took turns waving a huge American flag. Cars honked in support while I waved politely. It was all so American, almost Norman Rockwell-esque.
America is uniting as never before, our often indifferent, often jealous citizens casting aside their differences, buying mass quantities of red, white, and blue, and getting together.
So why do I feel so empty?
The reason has been very clear, but today it clarified even more. In the midst of this huge, cataclysmic tragedy, we've completely lost track of the individual. The abysmal media coverage has focused almost entirely on 1. Shocking, exciting, and explosive footage, 2. The statistics of the acts, almost as if this were a sports event (well, the Terrorists are up 10,321 to nothing - but it's still early, Chip,) and 3. Talks of revenge, widespread and horrid, as if this will somehow make things better.
We are uniting...wonderful. But this is a bloodthirsty, scary unification. Have you noticed the words our government has used? Bush: A quiet, unyielding anger. This was on the night of the fucking attack! (Sorry, Sarah.) We will make them pay! The media: Every time we see Bin Laden, who may or may not have had something to do with the bombings, he is shown in slow motion. If we've learned nothing else from our media, we at least know that only EVIL people ever move in slow motion. There is no clear enemy yet, but this hasn't stopped the talk of war, the talk of retaliation.
Our own citizens, thrown into a frenzy of zealous national pride, have begun taking the law into their own hands. They've taken heed of what our President and his cabinet have said, and taken action. Mosques, those dangerous places of worship, and the even more dreaded Pakistan deli/ restaurant buildings have been the targets of these beer-swilling vigilanties. It stands to reason that if 15 Muslims are bad, they all are right?
God Bless America.
Well, I'm getting on my soapbox right now. Bail if you want to - in fact I give you credit for reading this far. I will not apologize for offending anyone if they read past here. You have been warned.


This was the fault of our government. The regime we have in power is to blame, dating back to the turn of the 20th Century. Thanks, Dubya, thanks Clinton, hell, thanks McKinley.
The Twin Towers of the World Trade Center were perhaps the most visible sign of First World economic oppression in the world. The Pentagon...jeez, where do I start. How many millions of deaths are they responsible for in Afghanistan, IndoChina, Latin America, the Middle East, Eastern Europe, America? Many, many, many millions.
You see, people don't just hate us because they're stupid. (Or, as Dubya said, because we are the biggest beacon for freedom in the world. I am almost drooling with contempt over that one.) We are not a sleeping giant, waking only to help those in need. We have been bombing Afghanistan almost non-stop since Russia let up. 20(?) years of bombing. They've lost a great deal more than the 5,000 projected in New York. We have been bombing Iraq since 1991 (a whole different story.) How many deaths in Nicaragua? 2,000,000? That's a conservative estimate. Afghanistan? We know that toll is gonna rise really quickly here in the near future. What happened in NY is a daily occurence in third world countries, much of which has been at our hands. 1999 - we bombed Afghanistan more severly than at any point in history. That will soon change, I'm afraid.
We call ourselves a Christian nation. I am not a Christian, but I know the basic tenants of the religion. Love thy neighbor (anyone remember that one?) Now, I'm not saying you let this slide if the government of a country had something to do with its planning, funding, or implementation. We've got an empire to keep up here. But thus far there has been no...NO...proof that anyone, other than a handful of fanatics had anything to do with this. And if Afghanistan's government (or Pakistan's of Syria) had anything to do with it, THEY were the ones who were retaliating. It's not 10, 321 to nothing in favor of the Terrorists. It's Millions (and great tracts of Taliban holy land) in favor of the Americans.
Instead of taking an inward look and realizing that they screwed up by playing games with people's lives, our government instead (logically and predictably) put the blame elsewhere, and really talked up the patriotic violence.
Don't misunderstand me. I'm not an advocate of terrorism. I am a pacifist. I am hurt by this as much as anyone.
What finally broke me down was the individualization of it. Once I started crying, I couldn't stop. I cried for those in the towers who lost their lives. I cried for their families, who made flyers and tried to keep up hope. I cried for the rescue workers, those who put thoughts of retribution and murder aside, and tried to do something right. I even cried for the terrorists themselves...how could someone lose track of the spiritual path so completely that they saw no way out other than taking the lives of thousands of innocent people? On an individual level this is heartbreaking.
But our media and our government haven't put it on an individual level. They've flashed the score admist the ticker and the endless footage of the plane hitting the building. They've talked of violence, bombing, and death. They've taken the blame for nothing, responsibility for nothing. It's time for war, and America couldn't be happier.
There has been a war going on for decades; at least now we'll know about it.
There are good people in this world, this beautiful world that can turn ugly and monstrous. Seeing these people are what makes me cry. Seeing people line up to give blood, volunteering in overwhelming numbers to dig through the rubble, praying at vigils.
But there are bad people in this world too. Looking into the eyes of Laden, who thinks he is the Messiah, who is convinced that he is doing the world a favor by attacking the Great Satan of America, gives me chills. But looking into the eyes of Bush and Ashcroft gives me even stronger chills. We are looking into the eyes of evil, charming, homogenized, and handsome though they may be. Are there any good people in power? I've seen none.
That's why I can't be a part of the sweeping tide of nationalism. It's just too misdirected. We aren't uniting to grieve and console, we're uniting to make people pay.
Jesus, wherever he is, has to be hanging his head in shame.
America does rule, but not very benevolently, and we've seen what the implications are if we continue to do things the way we are.

My friend Sarah and her family have been through a whole lot this week. Her dad just had open heart surgery on Friday, so think of them as well.

"Not the torturer will scare me/ Nor the bodies' final fall
Nor the barrels of death's rifles/ Nor the shadows on the wall
Not the night when to the ground the last dim star of pain is hurled
But the blind indifference of a merciless, unfeeling world.
And each small candle lights a corner of the dark."
-Roger Waters

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