"Anti-Americanism"...what is this critter?

BLatham, it would not do great violence to the truth to suggest that about one third of the population of the colonies supported rebellion, about one third opposed it, and about one third waited to see which way the wind was blowing. Thomas Paine's Common Sense very effectively polarized the issues then. The inhabitants did not see themselves as "Americans" yet, however. The story of Paul Revere riding through the night (ignoring poor John Dawes) shouting "The British are coming, the British are coming!" is nonsense, because the inhabitants saw themselves as British, and those supporting rebellion believed they were fighting to protect their ancient British liberties. Americans only began to see themselves as such, and uneasily then, after the defeat of Cornwallis, when Clinton "holed-up" in New York, and it was apparent that independence was only a matter of time. If you were "Tory" and resided in "Rebel" territory, you would certainly have had a hard row to hoe, but would not necessarily have been seen as "anti-American." BTW, most of those Tories ended up starving in the Maritimes, or breaking their backs in Upper Canada--when you drive the 401 from Toronto to Kingston, there are "Loyalist" signs of all descriptions on the road, and the same is true of Route 2, which follows the lake shore.

Setanta

Do you find my question here impermissable in some manner, or perhaps doomed to failure from some lack of discerned historical complexity? Do you suspect I'm simply manifesting anti-Americanism myself. I truly don't get why your back seems up here.

Actually, no, Boss--but i do often have such a discussion with Canadians who sugar-coat the social ills of their nation, because they are eager to vent their frustrations with the US. I don't underrate your intelligence Boss, i've just become accustomed to Canadians being very disingenuous on these topics. I got beat up pretty well for a while during Christmas dinner in Toronto, although the particpants suddently realized how "Un-Canadian" they were being, and became quite embarrassed. By the way, i usually spell that word "sheesh"--but each to his own.



That may be true on debate fora, but it doesn't raise a breeze which will ripple that flag among the population in general, which is why i described politicians as trying to get cozy with reactionaries when they raise the issue. I'd hazard the guess the the proportion of those vehemently angry about "flag desecration" in the US is about the same as those in Canada who become irate when i joke about the Queen. When i refer to the Queen Elizabeth Way (the route i take from the border to Lovey's house) as the "Queenie," i've more than once been informed in a pleasant but stern manner that: "We don't say that, we say the Queen E." There are a lot of nuances to be considered here, Boss.

Well, my back is a up somewhat, Boss, but not much. I've had this discussion with other nationalities, and in every case, i find that the intent is to show a special brand of fanaticism among Americans, which is intended to imply that such does not exist among the population of the interlocutors homeland. I believe this is arrived at by concentrating attention on the fanatics in the American population, while taking a wider view of attitudes among the population of one's own nation. My experience of both life and history is that human nature--quirky, unpredictable, unreliable, hard to pin down--is the one constant of all populations at all times in all nations. I rather suspect that the Romans would have faced the same sort of thing, had they not had the charming habit of responding to all criticism with immediate crucifixion.

I believe it's not just those who have the gold make the rules but there's a message that whoever has the biggest gun tries to make the rules. Rules that suit them and their cronies or constituents. They try to cloak this in a nationalistic, get the boogeyman agenda and have shown too many of their cards in advance (except the ones that are important like proof of WMD in Iraq). Certainly not much chance for a bluff and the administration has managed to make the rest of the world at least suspicious of our agenda. It's the constant political rhetoric that gets into the worldwide media and can be fairly or unfairly interpreted depending on how we as Americans look at it. I've said this perhaps too many times, but our government are just lousy salespeople. We are using the hard close without any introspection that every good salesperson would use -- would anyone buy anything from me? A good salesperson sells themselves, not just the product. Our product is capitalism first, democracy second. With the bad news of corporate scandal, capitalism doesn't look so good to the rest of the world. This also can be characterized as unfair but one is only in denial if they believe that everyone whould see we have all good intentions.
Now Dubya comes on TV saying he's "sick and tired." That's quite an admission. Did it ever occur to him that the rest of the world may becoming sick and tired of us?

Setanta

It may perhaps be that certain cultural differences exist between the old midlands of my country and here on the west coast of which I am dimly if at all aware. What you speak of has no corollary here, other than some clean negative sentiment about the US (stronger now). Partly, I think, this is a function of 'border town' sentiment (some 70% of us live within 20 miles of the border). I married an American girl from just over the border and the anti-canadian jokes were hot and heavy. In Vancouver now, by the way, 4 of 10 citizens are of a 'visible minority'. So I may well be missing some nuances you are aware of, I confess it.

I am trying to get at something perhaps quite murky and general, but I think no less real for that, just harder to get one's hands around. I don't think I'm doing something comparable to, for example, making some claim about the character of the japanese or another sort of derogation about, as in another older example, the 'german mind'.

The Hofstadter quote earlier does speak to something related to America's understanding of itself. And he does present a compelling case in 'Anti-Intellectualism...." on the influence of the evangelical movements on America's notions of her role in the world.

I read 3 pages and will say this:

Anti-Americanism probably emerged from the 1960s when so many people, all at once it seemed, noticed that every single person was not living in a country which could be called "the land of the free" since some had naught (that's none) freedoms. Neither did they have "liberty and justice."

As for the rest of the world, well, they are only taking sides (or taking advantage) with the various arguing factions here in the US. It's unfair to say that we (America) pushed its ways onto other countries. Why, they wanted what we had - fashions, foods, hotels. Now, they're all doing rather well and maybe don't need to take our lead.

You'd have to remember what (at least) Europe was like after WWII. It is nowhere etched in stone that America is the leader of the free world, king-of-the-hill.

As the world's greatest superpower, IMO, the United States has sometimes been guilty of a bit of ethnocentrism.

I nominate Phoenix for the first annual, gold-plated, no-prize award for understement.

And the rest of you commie pinkos need to shut your America-hatin' mouths.

It would be between Phoenix and snood for understatements -- a
"bit" of ethnocentrism? Then again, there are so many ethnicities
in the U.S. Our political construction, however, is hardly a balanced representation of ethnicity and at the top...stupid white guys.

I'll give you that, Boss--but i would only contend that "anti-intellectualism" and evangelism probably exist in proportionate amounts among the Canadian population. You've gone right to the heart of nuance in taking note of how much of the Canadian population lives close to the border. I would emphasize that attitudes in Vancouver or Toronto are likely to be much more cosmopolitan than in Woodstock, Ontario (well over 20 miles from the border) or La Patrie, Quebec (nearest border crossing requires the driver to wake up the customs/duane agent before crossing). I also want to emphasize that i do not see you as derogating America and Americans. One significant difference i see is an emphasis on courtesy and consideration in Canada--i see that as a self-chosen national trait, and it explains why the other Christmas dinner guests eventually got embarrassed for their behavior. You see signs on the subway in Toronto encouraging "old hands" to offer help to new immigrants--you'd never see anything like that here. I think the phenomenon to which you refer arises from the recent pandering to the religious right which has been made a part of, and a very disgusting part of, the political landscape. When O'Hare challenged prayer in school in the early 1960's, there was public outrage, but only among those with a religious agenda--the Supremes had already disposed of the issue in the 1940's in a case brought by West Virginia. But that has all changed now--Robertson has shown that it is possible to "lock-up" a large voting block by appeals to religious prejudice, and it might be this to which you refer. Tending, as i do, to take a long-term view, generations and centuries rather than just until the next mid-term election, i don't find this to be much more than the latest attempt to find the winning electoral formula. I can well understand why this is troubling to outsiders, and other Americans as well.

Whoooooaaa fellas....

What I'm talking about here is different. For example, Joe McCarthy's fun in the fifties....house on un-American activities. Can anyone think of a comparable body or mission in another state?

Setanta

We must allow, I think, for real differences group to group or state to state or culture to culture no matter how foggy this is to pin down and how susceptible to good/bad cliches this can be.

Our early history here is marked by some similar movements (like the New Light Movement) and evangelism is still present here though it has so far failed to make any substantial gains as a political force except at the very local level (school boards, hospital boards). But Hofstadter portrays a particular picture (which as I said I find very compelling) of a confluence between evangelical values (the old world church had become encrusted with ritual and false symbols, but here in America the new church had gotten back to the REAL fundamental Jesus and it was a moral responsibility to spread this gospel) and the new American polity with its improved (perhaps unimprovable) constitutional makeup.

And one should not leave out how these two factors or dynamics align happily with capitalism.

You know, BLatham, HUAC really got off the ground because the Mounties brought in an NKVD cipher clerk who wanted to defect (don't recall the name, although i'm willing to go check on it if anyone protests) who had all sorts of information about operatives in Canada and the US. Nonetheless, the importance of HUAC has been overrated by commentators of the last fifty years. When the members of the Press mentioned HUAC to Truman, he responded that he never wanted them to mention "that little son-of-a-bitch Nixon" to him again. When Tail-gunner Joe took on an Army dentist in the "Army-McCarthy" hearings, it proved his downfall (the Army has never interferred in the operation of the government, and don't take kindly to having their personnel operations questioned by political demagogues). I do think you're doing a little dancing here now, Boss, because you mentioned anti-intellectualism and evangelicals before, but now you've brought up McCarthy and HUAC (btw, HUAC is the House, McCarthy was in the Senate).

I dance divinely, and you ought to consider yourself blessed to see it when it happens, but today's not the day.

I only mentioned 'anti-intellectualism' as the first word of the title of Hofstadter's book to which I'm referring.

How influential or important McCarthy's mission was is to skirt the point, I think. Do we know of such an event elsewhere? And this is really the same question as I offered up at the beginning....why is it that we don't hear comparable terms (with attendant meanings) such as "un-Swiss" or "anti-Belgianism"?

Let's go for the gusto here. Chompsky, everyone's favorite mild-mannered linguist, would offer up (has offered up) that such notions, which push towards uniformity of belief and value, are to be found mainly within totalitarian organizations (church perhaps, or state).

Any merit to this one?

In the 1930's in Canada and the US, socialism was very popular. My aunt once told me, rather confidentially-but it's now been long enough, that it was fashionable to be socialist, or, even (gasp, shudder) bolshevik on university campuses in the 1920's and -30's. This is borne out by the Kim Philby saga-he recruited Burgess and McLean at Cambridge, having been recruited in like manner himself. Huey Long, "The Kingfisher," Governor of Louisiana, was assassinated by a young divinity student who saw him as a "godless commie." Saskatchewan elected the first "socialist" government in North America, i believe in 1938, when the NDP took power (the New Democrats may not look socialist now, but it was a shocker for a lot of people then).

Then, after the Second World War, the complexion of politics in North America changed a good deal. The Russians were no longer trusted allies, and the Canadian Navy expanded their anti-submarine role from WWII to meet the new threat-Canada moved from the Commonwealth "umbrella" militarily to that of the US. Americans became alarmed that the Russians would sneak attack from across the pole, and the DEW line was established, no comment on the willingness of Canadians to accommodate the plan. Then the Mounties brought in Gushenko (remembered his name), the NKVD cipher clerk (the NKVD was the precursor to the KGB). He implicated a lot of people in high places. Burgess and McLean had already been recalled from Washington because of high-profile homosexual hijinks there (homosexuality was still frowned upon in the West in those days), but Gushenko's revelations landed them in prison. Kim Philby had been sent as a liaison to Washington, but the ever-suspicious J. E. Hoover didn't want him, and he went back to London, where he was nonetheless given the American desk (just incredible). The climate began to sour, and the Congress was now full of veterans (who got a better deal than any other generation of American veterans, thanks to the appointment of George Marshall to run the Veterans Administration)-such as Joe McCarthy and Richard Nixon. In Canada, John Diefenbaker was able to capitalize on this new fear and suspicion to break the decades-long dominance of the NDP, and the Tories (sorry, the Progressive Conservatives) were able to win in a province where they previously had needed all their efforts to elect a dog-catcher. It still came somewhat as a surprise to Canadians when he won the Federal elections.

However, most of this was political smoke and mirrors. What Gushenko revealed proved very important in hunting down "spies," but most of what he had to offer of value was ignored or misinterpreted, and people like Kim Philby continued to operate, while people like Dalton Trumbo of the "Hollywood Seven" were hounded into obscurity and poverty. The hysteria didn't last long, about as long as Diefenbaker's national reign in Canada.

I really don't think this is a legacy which now affects American politics, and certainly not one which affects Canadian politics-but i did want to give some background on the issue.

Your mild-mannered linguist is offering to extreme an analysis, i'd say. It ignores things such as DeGaulles rise to power through the manipulation of Gallic pride and xenophobia, and that despite his rapid move to crush OAS (Secret Army Organization)--the ultimate right-wing group in France. Germany as it existed under the crushing weight of the Versaille treaty is another good example--Ernest Rohm and his brown shirts were in business long before the enfeeblement of the Weimar Republic and the rise of Hitler. Moussolini exploited Italian patriotism and resentment to create a facist state, rather than this having arisen as a result of totalitarianism. I would say this is definitely a tool of the totalitarian state, which is not at all the same as saying that it only arises in totalitarian states.

Setanta

As always, or almost always, it is a pleasure to have your historical breadth and depth to go along with your fine taste in ladyfriends.

Here is an item I just bumped into from Dowd's column today....note the term 'un-American'...

If I can get a word in edgewise,

National chauvinism is, I think, more common than not. That which a people regard as threatening to the survival of their group evokes powerful emotions. There, those are the two sides of the coin. The belief that "we" are the best, the superior, the Chosen, The People, can be seen in every group I'm aware of. The Greeks of Alexander's hosts were uneasy when it looked as if he might have been "conquered" the effete notions of Persia and India. Romans and the Han regarded themselves as the sole seat of civilization. Treason has always been in every part of the globe regarded as at least as evil as murder, or violation of the local sexual taboos. England, the parent of our being, used to draw and quarter its enemies. The Inquisition was a tool for enforcing uniformity of religious belief as the cornerstone of many European Reformation Era nations.

Most of the world's nations are more homogenous than America. We are a nation made up of a more cultures and values than can easily be counted. We may be a "melting pot", but that doesn't mean that all are fully integrated into some single set of ideas, values, or even language. We, or our parents, or our grandparents parents, retain something of the values that existed before the Idea of America was born. Unlike the Swiss or Japanese, Americans constantly struggle to balance and reconcile cultural elements that would more naturally be in conflict. In their homeland, a Frenchman and a German might live with nothing in their entire live to challenge their perceptions of the other. Here where Jacques lives next door to Hans, the two must deal with their differences every day. We are a people who are contentious, and yet who value consensus. We are a nation of contradictions, and we are not easy to understand. We don't even understand ourselves, because we differ so much in our unity.

We grow up expecting to challenge authority, where the children of other nations learn to conform. The great "emptiness" of America encouraged the land hungry of the Eastern seaboard and Europe to fill up the landscape. Alone on the Prairies, men and women learned self-reliance, and to cherish a neighbor no matter how strange or "foreign". We believe in an individualism that makes it possible for one person to become unbelievably wealthy, and for another to sink to the lowest levels of poverty. At the same time we are horrified and repulsed by the too frequent result of such unbridled Capitalism. We hate the notion of governmental interference in the private affairs of our citizens, yet demand that the government prevent anyone from prospering too much or failing too badly. The resulting dissonance keeps the political pot a boiling. We are a nation founded upon a great ideal, an ideal that has been instrumental in bringing the United States to preeminence. However that ideal, like all other ideals, is an abstract thing difficult if not impossible to realize.

We are certainly different in our national character, than most. Our Constitution was a life raft meant to rescue a failing democracy. Our very differences, probably few then than now, were tearing the country apart. Privilege against the mob, and States against central government, the smart money was bet that the newly independent colonies would be crawling back to Mama before the end of the 18th century. The Constitution and the Federalists led by Washington turned the situation around. The currency stabilized so that the economy reversed itself and began to grow; the central government began to bring credibility to the United States. Jefferson's Democratic-Republicans felt the Revolution betrayed and in the "Revolution of 1800" began an effort to decentralize political power. The contest between the two conceptions of how the nation should best be structured has endured to this day, even though the Federalist Party ceased to exist in "Mr. Madison's War". From the very birth of this country we have been engaged in one long political struggle over what the nation is, or should be. The Right to dissent and even hate the opposition is a central feature of the United States. I think that's very hard for most of the world to understand. Dictators like Hitler, Stalin, and the current crop of bullyboys seem especially incapable of understanding the American political landscape. Others often see us as divided, as indecisive and vulnerable. We seem without control or clear direction in contrast to the control and singleness of purpose that characterizes dictatorships of whatever stripe. Those who love liberty and individualism are often just as confused by the seeming chaos of our politics. What is our policy? Hell, we don't know and have never known. Our policies vary depending on which party, which individual is currently in office. Our policies vary by the state of the economy and the emotional temperature of a widely diverse people. Sometimes we are isolationist, and other times we favor expansion.

Underlying all of that, and perhaps even more important is that our chief export is an idea of what live might be like if only one had unlimited resources. Americans are almost unbelievably rich compared to third world, or emerging nations. In America even our poor are richer than the middle-classes of many nations in Africa or Asia. In America we have the luxury of not having to struggle everyday for mere survival. Our films and television reflect our national interests, and they in turn find vast audiences in the most unlikely places. The starving man can hardly believe that stores overflowing with an abundance of food are not mobbed. A goat herd dreams of driving along endless freeways in a red sports car, with a buxom blonde hanging on his neck. Women smile behind their veils at the idea of owning lingerie from Victoria's Secret and lipstick from Revlon. These people look around and know that they will never have even a tiny portion of what Americans throw away every day. The elites of those countries have the same dreams and they pursue them relentlessly, and that further estranges them from the discontent of the masses. Saddam and Kim are doing their best to live the American Dream, even though it means the death and suffering of their peoples. The Mullahs and archconservatives play upon the cultural conflicts to retain their own privileges. There aren't enough resources in the world to provide even a shadow of the standard of living in the United States to the entire world. Imagine over a billion more automobiles in China alone. Imagine the cost of providing the infrastructure associated with those automobiles. This is but one small example of the impossibility of exporting our way of life.

Can we ever make the world love us? We want to be loved, but I don't think that is within the realm of possibility. Will American's willingly scale back their standard of living so that a peasant in Afghanistan, or sub-Saharan Africa might have a less difficult time surviving? "Eat everything on your plate son, mind the starving children of India".