>From: Doug Henwood <dhenwood at panix.com>
>Reply-To: lbo-talk at lists.panix.com
>To: lbo-talk at lists.panix.com
>Subject: Re: cultural imperialism
>Date: Wed, 14 Nov 2001 16:48:16 -0500
>
>Mina Kumar wrote:
>
>>>From: Doug Henwood <dhenwood at panix.com>
>>>Reply-To: lbo-talk at lists.panix.com
>>>To: lbo-talk at lists.panix.com
>>>Subject: Re: cultural imperialism
>>>Date: Wed, 14 Nov 2001 09:14:15 -0500
>>
>>>I'm curious, though. You're from someone else, and are here. Other
>>>folks on this list who are full of criticism of the U.S. were born
>>>elsewhere and are here. Why? Mainly for economic reasons? Family
>>>reasons? School reasons? Or is there something else that attracts you
>>>(plural) about U.S. society?
>>
>>Ah, the old "if you don't like the US, why are you here" question.
>
>Which, of course, isn't worthy of an answer once you rephrase it that
>way. Only a provincial ignoramus would even ask.
To find it an appropriate question to ask in the context of a discussion of criticisms of the US, rather than dealing with the substance of those criticisms, seems to indicate the want of an argument wrt those criticisms. The implication of the question is that the criticisms can't be all that legitimate if the speaker has chosen to live in the US; the assumption is that the speaker's criticisms are rooted in his own convenience.
>Well that's something. Not the taxes part, but the less white. One of the
>more admirable things about this place is that people from all over the
>world come here
It's this kind of comment that eggs me on to a caustic response. I mean, if it admitted any of the none-too-admirable reasons that America is more non-white than Germany, maybe I wouldn't feel the knee jerk desire to say something like "yeah, three cheers for slavery, capitalism and imperialist adventures". Not to mention something like the CIA involvement in the Seaga/Manley elections, and the role that this played in the emigration of yardies to the US.
Anyway, I think that the admirable things about the US are easier to remember when one isn't around Americans. I feel the same way about the WTC attack: the company of braying Americans and their ugly comments about people like me makes it so difficult to feel the sadness that I do feel when I'm just walking down the street by myself and I smell the burning.
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