| Product: |
Attacks on America |
| Date: |
11/09/01 (2200 review reads) |
| Rating: |
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Advantages: unites the country attacked
Disadvantages: innocent people die
I can understand our fury at Arabs over the horrific events that occurred on Tuesday. We should be angry. The whole world should be angry. I don't believe there is ever any justification for the murder of innocent people.
However, while I am horrified, I have to admit that I am not surprised. After all, I've lived in the Middle East.
I have been trying to get a hold of my intense feelings by attempting to put myself in their shoes. It's easy to see from the U.S. perspective; the large majority of the world is looking upon recent events with sorrow, concern, and fear.
But there are two sides to every story. So I have to ask, "Why?" People do things for a reason. An attack of this nature is trying to say something in a big way. Though we may be appalled at the manner of the delivery, shouldn't we still listen?
Outside the United States, North Americans are not exactly the most popular people. Quite a few Europeans, people of the third, and Middle Easterners dislike - even hate - the U.S. Why?
While I am over-generalizing and stating the more extreme negative view, it is not uncommon for Europeans to see Americans as self-centered idiots (with Bush as our moron leader). Most of us are unaware of much that happens outside our own nation (whose fault that is, I'm not sure) - unaware of history, world politics, geography, current events. So when we visit other countries, we can act haughty, rude, and ignorant. Europeans see the decisions of our government and are shocked. They see the U.S., in comparison to themselves, as gun-toting, racist people who like to watch people die (death penalty).
We seem more concerned with our own convenience than the well-being of the other 6 billion people we share the world with (like recently when we decided we wouldn't join an international agreement to reduce pollution and fossil fuel use, because it would cost us too much money
and cause us too big of an inconvenience).
Third-world peoples, however, due to lack of education, are able to verbalize these thoughts. It's more the middle class who voice these complaints, but it is the poor who are most affected by them. Mass media has exposed them to a way of life that often makes them dissatisfied with their own. Globalization has so affected their lifestyles that, in certain cases, they now cannot survive without tourism. They see us first-worlders as we travel around seeing the sights - treating the world like a giant amusement park - our place to command, take advantage of, play with - with little respect or care for their customs or culture. They are slowly becoming the consumers that we are, but the lack of money and opportunity causes frustration.
The Middle East . . . Obviously the conflict basically comes down to religion and land. But some basic facts still stand: There are some two million Palestinians living in Gaza and the West Bank under military rule in poverty worse than the poverty in Honduras or any Latin American country (based on those GDP stats). In the last year of feuding between Israel (there are 8 million Israelis) and the Palestinians, 150 Israelis have died, and 650 Palestinians have died. The only way this is made possible is because the U.S. sends billions of dollars (4 billion of our tax money just last year) in weapons and artillery to Israel to fund their army. Now is the U.S. really so interested in the plight of the Jews? Do they really care that the State of Israel exists? No. It's about power. The U.S. needs allies in order to keep its 'superpower' status. Israel is stategically located in an area of the world where few U.S. allies exist. Without Israel, the U.S. would lose power in Asia, the biggest threat to our world power.
My dad (a Christian author and Bible theologian) sent an email, saying, "This day signals a new phase in the history
of this country and of the world. The US is paying dearly for its support of Israeli aggression. God help us." That is basically the rationale behind these horrible acts - retaliation for Israeli aggression.
From my understanding of things, Palestinians could not have orchestrated a terrorist act such as this, because they are the ones under military rule who make an average of $1400 a year (less than Honduras's average). Radical, infuriated arabs are supposedly the culprits. So why were the Palestinians dancing? Probably because they view the U.S. - and rightly so - as their co-oppressor (along with Israel). To them it is essentially the U.S. that has stolen their land and religious heritage, killed tens of thousands of their people, and oppressed even more. I'm sure they are thinking that now the U.S. will feel the same kind of pain they have been feeling for years.
What buildings did these Arabs attack? The seats of government and finance. I heard that the death list 'looks like a Who's Who of international finance.' I'd assume that they want to stop U.S. funding of Israel and our decision to support them.
Americans should not generalize their feelings of anger to all Palestinians or Arabs. That would be taking the same stance as these radical Arabs. Just as they should not blame and punish innocent Americans, so too we must not blame or punish innocent people from (or with roots in) the Middle East.
I think Bush was being a bit (or very) melodramatic when he talked about a struggle between good (U.S.) and evil (terrorists)? Why is the U.S. always the good one? What most scares me is Bush's statement that there will be revenge. In the news, they are already saying things like, "When this war intensifies — and inevitably gets bloody . . . " Haven't we learned anything? Do two wrongs make a right? Is the answer to death more death? Can't we take a hi
nt (and these acts of violence are hardly hints) and look at what actions of ours can cause this much hate?
A friend of my dad's expressed some great thoughts: "I sure wish we actually had an intelligent president in office right now. I've heard that Newt Gingrich and Oliver North are calling for a declaration of war. While in no way diminishing the horror of the lives lost yesterday, someday I'd like to hear a politician say we need a war on world hunger that claims 40,000 people a day, and that maybe we don't want to become a militarized, paranoid society like Israel." Besides the fact that war would obviously harm our own people, economy, and country as a whole, what about the loss of innocent life on the other side of the globe? Are American lives somehow more important than lives elsewhere in the world? Strange how we only really care when the loss is close to home. . .
Which leads me to my main sentiment that I walk away with after all this: How can we - as people of any kind of faith - turn a blind eye to monstrosities far more grave (in terms of death toll) than this tradegy? The situation in Africa sees this kind of horror - times eight - every single day. We are now feeling - albeit in a very different context - some of the pain that much of the world is suffocated by.
I have no answers. Just ideals. A place where everyone has food and no one hates. We, as Americans, the most privileged people in the world, do have the power to do something about both of these social ills. We have the money to feed the dying and treat the disease. And while we cannot control the feelings or actions of another, we most certainly can control our own. We can stop our own hate. We, who have been given much, are also required to give much.
**adapted from an e-mail conversation with a family friend, Deb Greebon**
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