In which Den gets political.

[den]

re this article linked to by bearblue

I'm really disappointed in the casual dismissal of the deaths of 15,000 people, most of whom were old or very young. It had NOTHING with them being French, or the Government being on holiday, or "the sun being out a little longer than usual," and EVERYTHING to do with a protracted, unseasonal spell of above-average temperatures that European architecture was never designed to repel.

I hate casual dismissals like that. How would people feel about "200 dead in Detroit due to a blizzard, because it got a little colder than usual and Government did nothing, but it's all right because they were AMERICANS." That attitude is wriong, wrong, wrong, and has no place in an article if the writer wants to be taken seriously.

"The World" doesn't hate Americans and the US. They DON'T like "Who gives a fuck." Other countries are not America. We usually do things and think differently from you. But who gives a fuck?

Well, WE do.

The Australian way of doing things has become buried in Americana. Oh, little bits show through in places but it has mostly become US culture. We're a little more relaxed about things, and we talk funny and drive on the wrong side of the road and we certainly don't call the Opposition party "traitors," but it's mostly the same.

And we don't like that much, but we Aussies are a bunch of surrender monkeys and won't complain about that. Much.

Because who gives a fuck?

Comments

[hafoc.livejournal.com]

I give a fuck, for one.

The idea of the whole world toeing the American line, no matter which of the recent series of incompetent buffoons happens to be ruling in Washington... the idea of nothing but American fast food in all the great capitals of the World... the idea of nothing but American television, movies, and music, pasturized megacorporation style... makes me feel unutterably weary and sad.

And by the way, I'm American.

I think I need to go get drunk now. I don't know WHY I should get drunk exactly.. just why this little comment of yours made me feel like such a pile of dogshit, when I'm not even the President from Exxon or the Senator from McDonalds, when nobody I know is either of those things.. but I think I need to go get drunk.

[dewhitton.livejournal.com]

I didn't want to make you feel that way, but I think you feel like that for the same reason I feel like that when the Australian Government talks about its policy on Refugees. Sorry... "Illegal Immigrants."

[hafoc.livejournal.com]

I know you didn't, especially when you made that point that the world doesn't hate America. Although certainly enough people do; sometimes we earn that hate, sometimes we don't. Gods help us, we're on top of Things As They Are just now, and that means anybody who wants Things As They Could Be sees us as the perfect symbol of what they hate.

Did you know that in the 60s, in one African nation, they attacked the American Embassy because of BAD WEATHER? S'truth. That shows rather touching faith in American power, but as the guy said at his own lynching, all the attention is flattering but I'd just as soon decline the honor.

I think your comment drove me to the bottle (it's a very good bottle by the way) because of the political spew you pointed to. That is how you see us now. And I don't even have the luxury of saying that isn't us. It isn't, actually; that spew you pointed to is just the gibberings of a bunch of dung-flinging monkeys on the extreme right. Problem being that even though most of the people in the country are like me, somewhere in the middle, those dung-flinging monkeys are going to end up running the country again. And if it's not them, it will be the dung-flinging monkeys on the left, who are every bit as screechy, every bit as brainless, every bit guilty of the ultimate intellectual crime: Allowing your preconceptions to blind you to any fact you don't want to acknowledge.

These two bunches of shit-flinging extremists have, between them, got the whole political system sewn up. Anybody with a brain or a sense of decency gets shouted down. There's nobody for the people in the middle to vote for. Worse, THERE IS NOTHING I CAN DO TO STOP IT. And THAT, and the fact that this is how you see my country, and the fact that the ugly image might as well be true, since the effect is going to be as if it WERE true, is why I'm getting drunk. Rapidly.

[dewhitton.livejournal.com]

Extreme Left/Extreme Right. Liberal/Labor. New Labour/Tories. Democrats/Republicans. Coke/Pepsi. Macdonalds/Burger King.

Different labels, same product.

[hopeforyou.livejournal.com]

Time for some Oporto chook and a bottle of Bundy.

I've had enough, too. Can't we form the Sensible Party?

[targaff.livejournal.com]

The thing that drives me nuts about the sort of person posting on that thing is that they genuinely think jealousy and envy are the driving forces behind the hatred and alleged "lack of understanding" from other countries, when really it's the refusal to try and understand where other people are coming from - precisely the same lack of understanding that causes someone to write something as ignorant as that piece - that causes others to hate.