From the BBC - "Death To America"

[den]

BBC's Washington correspondent Justin Webb looks at the anti-American movement.

Part 1: "A pattern was emerging and has never seriously been altered. A pattern of willingness to condemn America for the tiniest indiscretion - or to magnify those indiscretions - while leaving the murderers, dictators, and thieves who run other nations oddly untouched."

Part 2: "In other words, in Latin America as elsewhere in the world, is anti-Americanism a smoke screen, a very convenient smoke screen, [to] hide the reality of local failure?"

I think nearly all anti-Americans are hypocrits. On one hand they spout antiUS rhetoric, while with the other hand the take whatever aid, trade and technology the US offers. I'm glad to see someone in the BBC is thinking the same.

Comments

A bemused American...

[swarm32.livejournal.com]

Yet another reason why I usually read the BBC news instead of the American news. :)

[annvole.livejournal.com]

I noticed a difference with Canadians... us Canadians are proud of the fact that we are not Americans but we also rarely put down the Americans. I get the anti-American foreigners showing up in bars and such and they are always cut down for dissing the Americans but praised for making light fun at the self-pride of the Americans. It is like the Allah picture thing in some Scandinavian country... nobody really cared until it could be used to rally angry people and burn embassies. Americans are an easy target like the tortoise and hare story... everyone knows the proud hare is going to get it for his pride. Nobody denies that the hare is superior.

[grinning-fox.livejournal.com]

hey...cheers. =)

[dancinglights.livejournal.com]

Particularly vexing are anti-American Americans who have never left America.

[dewhitton.livejournal.com]

that is very puzzling.

[zibblsnrt.livejournal.com]

us Canadians are proud of the fact that we are not Americans but we also rarely put down the Americans.

Ever been on a university campus? ;)

[acelightning.livejournal.com]

[hafoc.livejournal.com]

It's about as stupid to blame everything on America as it is to blame nothing on America. We've done some things wrong and we've done some things right. The first step to being better is to recognize things as they really are, to know what needs to be corrected-- with everything from yourself on up.

Thus endeth the philosophy lesson for today. :P

[dancinglights.livejournal.com]

From what I can tell, they seem to generally be liberal idealists angry at the current state of affairs and lacking the courage or (self-perceived) means to go anywhere else. They may hate home, but at least it's familiar.

[(Anonymous)]

Tell me who's the real patriots
The Archie Bunker slobs waving flags?
Or the people with the guts to work
For some real change
Rednecks and bombs don't make us strong
We loot the world, yet we can't even feed ourselves
Our real test of strength is caring
Not the toys of war we sell the world
Just carry on, thankful to be farmed like worms
Old glory for a blanket
As you suck on your thumbs

Real freedom scares you
'Cos it means responsibility

So you chicken out and threaten me

Saying, "Love it or leave it"
I'll get beat up if I criticize it
You say you'll fight to the death
To save your worthless flag

If you want a banana republic that bad
Why don't you go move to one
But what can just one of us do?
Against all that money and power
Trying to crush us into roaches?

We won't destroy society in a day
Until we change ourselves first
From the inside out

We can start by not lying so much
And treating other people like dirt
It's easy not to base our lives
On how much we can scam

And you know it feels good to lift that monkey off your back!

- Jello Biafra/Stars and Stripes of Corruption

So is he anti-American, or a good patriot as opposed to a knee jerker?
Am I if I disagree how the country is being run? If I participate in civic duties such as voting, how much power do I really have if the process itself is questionable? I love my country too, I don't want to leave it necessarily. I also listen to/watch the BBC News, as it is probably the last good news source on the planet. The whole fiasco with Abu Graihb shows just how far we can fall. As a nation that supposedly "does not torture", the exposure of the fact that we *do* so after touting our humanitarian stance for all this time, is more than just embarrassing.

[weyrdbird.livejournal.com]

That's me, btw:D
Stupid failure to login (DOH!)

[haggis-bagpipes.livejournal.com]

The first article condemns the french with as little hard evidence to back the claim up. If the French have always hated the US so much, why did they put all that effort into making the Statue of Liberty for them? It is not a balanced article.

The second article actually made me angry. People don't hate America because it's 'a convenient smokescreen for local failure.' There is much more to it than that. Half of the world is living in poverty, are we supposed to believe that this is because all the nations made bad decisions at the same time? Or do unfair western trade laws have something to do with all these countries' economies collapsing at once?

"On the one hand they spout anti-US rhetoric, while on the other hand the take whatever aid, trade and technology the US offers."

The US often offers aid, trade, and technology with strings attached: for example, we'll give you this shipment of food on the condition that, in ten years' time, you give us back twice as much. Or, we'll loan you this large amount of money, but in 10 years' time you have to pay it back with interest. If a country is living in poverty, it will often be in no position to refuse this aid even if accepting it will put them into even worse debt in the long run. It doesn't make them hypocritical if they hate having to suck up to America.

You misspelled hypocrite, by the way.