Todd Gitlin's essay

[Jon Ford]

I'll leave  it to Roger to dissect Gitlin's essay. Todd took a turn from the 
left to the right a few years ago and moved from Berkeley to New York. Maybe 
being in New York has fired up his patriotism a bit too highly recently.It's 
true in New York the flag currently is an expression of solidarity and 
concern with the dead of Sep 11 (who may be  relatives or friends),but it 
has rather negative connotations in large parts of the world, and some of 
the flag-carrying pick-up drivers of our fair land have recently been 
involved in hate crimes against Muslim-Americans, to say nothing of the 
Aghani civilians killed in the bombing of Afghanistan. I don't interpret 
Said's critical remarks about America as negatively as Gitlin does, nor do I 
see Roy's comments, although admittedly a bit prone to simplistic  and 
emotional metaphors, to be so bad-- these are people of intellectual 
substance speaking out sincerely about America's attitudes toward the rest 
of the world, and they are entitled to a bit more respect than Gitlin is 
giving them here. I think it is important to listen to all the voices on 
this issue--even Gitlin's.  However, it is unfortunate that Gitlin, a 
scholar and university professor, sees things so one-sidedly.  I do think he 
is speaking his mind rather than spouting the rhetoric of Bush and Co., but 
he doesn't come off too well to me. He seems to be saying that , although he 
admits the general corruption of most of our past foreign policy in the 
Middle East (except for the Oslo accords and saving Kuwait), that Third 
World characters (even so-called intellectuals, as well as "nihilists"like 
Bin Laden) have no grounds to criticize us because we are sincere and full 
of righteous wrath in our desire to root out the evils of terrorism. Please 
Mr. Gitlin--think before you roar.

Jon

Jon

>
>"Soft anti-Americans and blowback"
>
>http://www.opendemocracy.net/forum/document_details.asp?CatID=98&DocID=723
>
>
>10 October 2001
>
>The ordinariness of American feelings
>Todd Gitlin
>


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