Look who is all grown up!
Posted by | Posted in Uncategorized | Posted on 08-03-2003
At a Friday after-work protest at Stephansplatz in Vienna I had a short “discussion” with a few protesters. Two (at different times) asked me outright if I am American, and I happily said “yes” to both, though, of course, I knew their feelings about such a nationality.
The first looked at me with hate and said “Get the FUCK out of here” (in English, though the original question and answer were auf Deutsch.) We had a little exchange which, obviously, led to nowhere.
The second protester, when I said “yes” to being an American, said “schäm dich” (shame on you), to which I replied (not as calmly as I would have liked!) “o nein nein, schäm DICH, dass du das gesagt hast” (no, no, shame on YOU for saying that.) That’s entirely fruitless, I realize.
Anyway a third guy was listening and announced to me — holding his hand low as if measuring a child’s height — that “war is for kids” (in German). Others around him nodded their heads in earnest agreement.
Before responding, I was saved by a mobile call from my wife. I say “saved” because I realized even then how entirely useless the situation was. Had I spent five hours there arguing, I would have accomplished nothing. You can’t really argue with active protesters in the middle of a protest. It just isn’t the venue for such things. They have staked out the space and the time for one purpose: to tell their story. I’m not even criticizing them for that (though I have plenty of criticisms of their views). They have a plan: to go to the venue, set up their tables, line up their speakers, put up their banners and attract as many listeners and readers as possible from the “general” population, particularly those who have not made up their mind on things.
So I meandered away during my convenient phone call and walked the rest of the way home from work. As I reflected on it, the thing that I remembered first and most was the comment about wars and kids. And I realized that Europeans generally believe this. It’s all part of their attitude about the United States bullying like a child on a playground at lunch time. But could there ever be a more facile and vacuous opinion of threat and the use of force?
Coincidentally, that very evening (daytime in New York) Jack Straw argued strongly against the French position during the speeches that followed Hans Blix’s and Mohammed al-Baradei’s presentations at the UN. He pointed out that the French foreign minister — whom he (oddly, I thought) referred to as “Dominique” rather than “Mr. de Villepin” or “my esteemed French colleague” — said that there was a single choice: between war and peace. Mr. Straw pointed out how facile that argument was, saying that if it were true, we would all simply vote for peace and go home.
The surprise is not that Mr. de Villepin would use such an argument to thwart the US’s and UK’s goals, but rather that — judging from my experience at Stephansplatz — people actually believe this about war and peace. It is an outrageously simplistic viewpoint from an intellectual community that prides itself on being keener and more thoughtful than, specifically, Americans.
But what really gets me is how incredibly self-righteous the attitude is. “We (Europe) are all grown up now, we got over the silly kids games that you (US) are still playing.” Wow! What a short puberty Europe enjoyed! They have gone from their cradles — the rubble and ruins of the late 1940s — to their desks at Brussels in a mere 60 years, all without a major war. They, with their wisdom, have guided themselves — all alone, right? — through the longest stretch of peace in their history. And they did it all by ignoring adolescent American attitudes and by concentrating on a post-national paradise.
Who needs war? Well, that would be a great question if everybody’s world view was a peaceful, non-combative one. I know many will jump all over that statement and point out that it’s the US that has the non-peaceful, combative world view. I guess it comes down to this: we believe that we — and you — face significant and deadly threats. You believe that you — and we — face no such thing. We are surprised that you could possibly think this after September 11, and you are shocked that we take September 11 as a call to war.
Those are all fine and good misunderstandings and objections. But it’s the more radical of you who take the self-righteous line that anybody who ever believes that war is an option is giving in to juvenile attitudes. And if you point to the last 60 years of Western European history as evidence of this, you completely remove the substantial force that the United States threatened against the Soviet Union from any considerations of causes and effects. This is hardly a show of good, grown-up honesty and logic.
In fact, to hold that view is to be as dishonest as an American supporting the facile view that the United States troop and missile presence in Europe was the only reason that Europe remained peaceful during the Cold War: an argument which wrongly dismisses the hard work and determination that the people of Western Europe showed in their conviction not to find themselves behind the Iron Curtain.
I ask those of you who are really entertaining this attitude about the United States and the childishness of war to ask yourselves how it could possibly be that Europe, with the strong support of the United States, went through this magical transformation while the United States itself did not. What accounts for this dramatic and tragic difference between our developmental processes? How did the United States fall so far behind you in sophistication of world affairs?
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