← Autodidact Archive · Original Dissent · Okiereddust
Thread ID: 7944 | Posts: 6 | Started: 2003-07-07
2003-07-07 07:29 | User Profile
[url=http://www.chroniclesmagazine.org]Chronicles[/url]
The events of September 11, 2001, have profoundly changed Americans' vision of the world, especially on security matters. The government has even created a new Cabinet-level position to deal with the matter. While this concern is legitimate, it contains an irrational streak.
In airports, even nail clippers and metal combs can be confiscated. Leaving Dunes International Airport outside Washington, D.C., in October right after the attacks, I was surprised to see members of the National Guard standing at the ready with rifles practically pointing at the passengers. On the plane, it was announced that no one would be allowed to stand or go to the bathrooms for 30 minutes. Apparently, the worry was that a terrorist could take advantage of the plane's location above the capital and engage in a suicidal hijacking. No one elaborated on what the lot would be of the unlucky passenger who was unable to wait and dared to approach the restrooms. Presumably, some plainclothes agent would do what Vladimir Putin has promised to do to the Chechen terrorists: "bomb them even when they're in the toilet."
These actions reflect more than a fear of a terrorist attack. They are a manifestation of a deeper subconscious fear in Americans-the fear of instability and economic decline and foreign competition. In Europe, these subconscious fears have taken a different form. The uncontrolled globalization of capitalism and the end of the Cold War have led to changes in the way Europeans see the United States. These new images of America are interesting not only in themselves but because they inform us about the peculiar way in which both Eastern and Western Europeans reject America's predominance in the world in general and in Europe in particular.
For centuries, Europeans viewed America as the embodiment of individualism and, since World War II, as the country of crass materialism and sexual promiscuity. Americans were uninhibited, and this trait was related to the country's capitalist individualism. America was also a society of uprooted emigres whose behavior was not restrained by layers of historical tradition. At the end of the 19th century and the beginning of the 20th, most Europeans viewed these traits, real or imaginary, as negative. In the post-World War II era, however, these images of the United States were favorably contrasted with the totalitarian images of the Soviet Union. This changed vision of the Unit-d States was an essential aspect of the country's allure for Eastern Europeans and Soviet citizens.
Recently, the image of the country has begun to change. Many Europeans are coming to see the United States as a country whose citizens are under strict control and whose sexual lives are minutely regulated. In fact, according to them, America has become an Orwellian society, a carbon copy of the vanquished Soviet Union. This image of the United States is rapidly spreading through post-Soviet Russia, as well as through both Eastern and Western Europe.
I first became aware of this during a recent visit to Russia. Some of my friends there, including those who had lived for a time in America, stated that they could not stay in America because of a lack of freedom. They sounded like those people of my father's and my generation who fled the Soviet Union almost a quarter of a century ago. Many of these people had proclaimed that what they most hated about Brezhnev's Soviet Union was not so much the standard of living (many of them had comfortable lives there) but the lack of freedom. Today, this century-long paradigm-"Free America" and "Un-free Russia"-has been recast. America is now seen as a place where people who are used to living in a free society cannot endure. At least this was the message of a Russian friend of mine. A painter, he was in the underground during Soviet rule. Under Gorbachev, however, he enjoyed a real popularity in the West. The reason was simple. During Gorbachev's reign, the West became fascinated with every-thing Russian, and underground art was in great demand. So my friend made a great deal of money. The problem was that he was inexperienced in financial matters (or unlucky), and he started to build a mansion in the Crimea. When the Soviet Union collapsed, his half-finished mansion was now in a foreign country, Ukraine.
Later, he came up with a new scheme that would make him rich overnight. An interest in previously banned books marked the beginning of the post-Soviet era. One such book was the collected works of Berdyayev, the emigre philosopher. Berdyayev emphasized the mysterious-ness of the "Russian soul," which supposedly dreaded the materialistic cravings of the West. At the same time, Berdyayev believed this soul was "feminine and in search of a groom from the West." My friend bought several hundred copies of Berdyayev's book, in which this vision of the mysterious Russian soul was elaborated, expecting to resell them at a handsome profit. My friend's Berdyayev project did not work, as the fascination with forbidden fruit did not last long, and Berdyayev was of no great interest to the public anyway. He had to sell the books as scrap paper. He was later told that Berdyayev had been transformed into rolls of toilet paper.
Now, my friend earns his living as a decorator of fashionable restaurants. One of his major clients was the restaurant Rasputin, whose major attraction is 300 topless girls. On a recent trip to Moscow, I visited my friend there while he was decorating the walls, in Michelangelo fashion, with erotic frescos. Several men were cleaning the premises and moving the furnishings around. Most of them were in their late 40's and early 50's. All wore shabby clothes and had the look of beasts of burden whose only enjoyment in life is a little food and rest. Upon finishing their chores, they received their re-ward-a big jar of brew that they devoured with gusto. It turned out that all of them had Ph.D.'s in various fields. While they were not formally among the unemployed, the meager wages, if any, of $30 to $40 that they received for their scientific labors were insufficient to buy their daily bread. So, the work in Rasputin was necessary to their survival. The topless girls evoked little interest among them-not only be-cause they were used to their presence but because their thoughts were on a more important matter: food.
My friend took a break from his labors, and we sat and chatted for a while over a glass of vodka and some salami. He had lived for a considerable time in America. "Dmitry," he said, "you have lived in the United States for more than 20 years. This is amazing-you should receive a medal for endurance. But it's not surprising that you have grayed considerably. I couldn't stay, at least not forever." When asked what the problem was, he paused for a moment to look at the dancing girls. His eyes held the gaze of a cat watching a succulent mouse cross his path. "You know, I was amazed at how the America of my dreams was so different from that of real life."
"What shook your belief in America?" I asked. "The competition for jobs?"
"Yes, but not only that. America is not a free society. All of that political correctness. If you even look at a girl you are accused of being sexist. Those idiots, the Americans, believe they live in a free country. Idiocy, absolute idiocy. They live in a prison, a concentration camp. They live in a Stalinist society."
When I told my friend that he might be exaggerating a bit, he replied, "Not at all. You remember what was most hated in the U.S.S.R.? I don't have to tell you that it was informers. Everybody hated them. It was the Soviet authorities that caused Russians to be informers. And what do you see in America? They inform absolutely voluntarily. Everybody spies on you, on your private life. Your neighbors, your schoolmates, even the children are taught to inform on their parents, if they have done something wrong."
He took a sip of his drink and broke off a piece of salami before continuing. "And there is no sex in the country. This business of sexual harassment was always perplexing and amusing to me. Watching this stuff, I sometimes wondered how Americans managed to procreate. I suppose they leave the country for a while, engage in sex somewhere outside the country, and bring their babies back to the U.S.A."
I told him that his image of the United States exactly fit Foucault's theory that the punishing, controlling aspects of the modern West have led to the desexualization of Western civilization. He responded that, while he had never heard of Foucault, he fully supported his view with one amendment: He did not think the theory could be applied to all of Europe. "We Russians are Europeans, too," he said proudly.
My friend's image of America is widespread throughout Europe, as I discovered while attending an academic conference there. The conference was quite different from most of those I have gone to in the United States. The gathering, though organized by NATO, had a joyful frivolity that is sadly missing from such affairs in America. After finishing a discussion on the security implications of the recent changes in Russia, our host served us an excellent dinner and some fine wines. At my table, one of the participants remarked that it was "good wine, but it's not quite doing the job. I've heard there are some good pubs about. Maybe we can find some real booze in one." Here, there was no disagreement. Both sides of the Atlantic were now unified, as in the good old days when "Atlantic civilization" had boldly faced the Eurasian/ Russian/Soviet threat.
While we were talking, a girl from one of the Eastern European nations had joined our table. She had spent considerable time in the United States and declared that she could not live in a country where romance was dead. She said that all of the talk of sexual harassment had killed romance in America. I assured her that she was exaggerating. She replied that I was rather naive, and then she changed the topic somewhat. "How awful American men act. And American women should be blamed for it-definitely!" I asked for examples. "When I was in Washington," she said, "I was asked to dinner by an American man. We decided to dine in a good restaurant. And you know what happened after the meal? He asked me to share the cost!"
Before I could reply that, in America, this could only mean one of two things-that either the man was young and dumb or he did not find her attractive-the host of our party, a chap from Croatia, looked up from his plate, took a sip of his wine, and added, "We are definitely different from Americans. We are not-and will not be-politically correct." Everybody agreed that, for this reason, Eastern and Western Europeans had more in common with each other than with Americans.
They all agreed that Russia and Western Europe have the same approach to sexual matters and share a deep-seated dislike of America, viewing it as a totalitarian country. And whether these reasons are real or imaginary does not matter. It was not surprising, then, that, after I told them that many Russians believed that the United States is a sexually repressive country, quite a few delegates took delight in the fact. I added that Russians see this sexual prudery as a clear example of the general repressiveness in American culture. Here, many people at the table remarked that Russians seemed to have some solid ideas, at least when it came to their perception of America.
I paused to remind everyone about the remarks a presenter from Norway had made during his talk. His premise had been that Russian women were sexual predators who married Norwegian men for visas and then became a drain on the country's social services. He added that uninhibited sexuality reigned supreme all over most of the former "evil empire." Perhaps our next conference should be held there, I said with a grin. The idea met with hearty approval. In fact, one American officer at our table was all for arranging a conference somewhere in Russia or perhaps Ukraine, which was to be the subject of future NATO expansion. This would be an affirmation, he said, of the common traditions of Western and Eastern Europe and their essential difference from America. This officer-one of those Americans given to self-flagellation when discussing his own country-had spent 20 years or so in Europe and was horrified at the prospect of having to return to the United States after the end of his service. His dread seemed remarkably similar to that of the Soviet diplomats of Stalin's era who had shuddered at the thought of having to return to Moscow where they would be, to paraphrase the title of Foucault's book, "controlled and punished."
All of these anecdotes indicate a more serious problem, one that could well affect the configuration of future alliances. Europeans' vision of American sexual culture and their image of the United States as a totalitarian hell, an archetype of Foucault's circular prison, can sound ridiculous and amusing. Yet it would be a mistake to ignore the remarks, since they have surprising structural similarities from Moscow to Paris, from Zagreb to Berlin. This new anti-Americanism, which curiously combines the statements of 19th-century liberals such as Tocqueville with post World War II radicals such as Foucault, indicates the mood of a considerable number of Europeans, including those who are part of NATO or wish to be. The views of these people could well have an impact on the configuration of NATO in the future, especially if America, because of profound geopolitical and technological changes, starts to lose its fascination with Europe as it's geopolitical alter ego. Of course, we cannot predict the future, but it would be naive to assume that the love affair between America and Europe will continue in the same way.
Dmitry Shlapentokh teaches history at the University of Indiana, South Bend. The author thanks Ron Johnson for editing the work.
2003-07-08 18:08 | User Profile
The first step in our downfall was "sexual liberation," 60's style - that is, sexual liberation combined with radical feminism. When they discovered that the social restraints and customs were there for a reason, they immediately set out to create NEW restraints, far more onerous than the ones we suffered under during those awful pre-60's Dark Ages.
2003-07-08 19:26 | User Profile
It's all too easy (and lame) to blame women for today's society. Women couldn't have done any of these things had men not consented to it. I call this attitude diversionary misogyny.
The degeneration of the USA coincided with its alliance with Zionists. Ultimately, it was you men dropped the ball. Men need to start behaving like men again and instead of blaming everything on everyone else (culture of victimhood) they need to take responsibility for their actions and the ramifications of...
2003-07-08 19:27 | User Profile
There is no doubt that the Europeans are correct about the situation in United States today. The United States sucks. Who created the Soviet Union?? Who is creating totalitarianism in the United States? Why are the similiarities so easy to see for Europeans?
2003-07-08 20:04 | User Profile
Friedan, Steinem, Wolff, Faludi - they're certainly all Jews (though I'm not sure whether, strictly speaking, all or any of them are Zionists). But they wouldn't have been able to sell their brand of feminism if they were men, and they found a receptive audience in Gentile women.
2003-07-08 20:42 | User Profile
**It's all too easy (and lame) to blame women for today's society. Women couldn't have done any of these things had men not consented to it. I call this attitude diversionary misogyny. **
It's everybody's fault. You don't get to the kind of an impasse we're at without lots of dirty hands of either gender.
You can't blame men when women cry they're more than 'mere' sex objects - while they primp themselves to use their bodies as lures for men to facilitate their own security, their own career advancement and their own creature comforts.
You can't blame women when men refuse to let go of adolescence because society continues to hard-sell the concept of 'cool', which is built upon the insubstantiality of image - driving the right car, amassing the right toys, sleeping with as many women as possible and denying the realities and responsibilities of aging and adulkthood like kids throwing tantrums.
You can't blame either when the culture surrounding them venerates such behavior when practiced by 'victims'/minorities and furthermore pokes fun at whites' reticence to surrender to the bestial side of their nature as 'uptightness' and 'hypocrisy'...to the point where 'whiteness' itself is now a purely pejorative term denoting an anti-life mania for order. When they are taxed at usury rates to support the societal clean-up duty in the wake of such minority-group irresponsibility. When the law of the land requires them to silently endure watching as 'diversity' (let's make it look good) replaces 'merit' (let's make it BE good).
You can only do your conscientious best, while watching others rewarded for not even pretending to try, for so long .....before inevitably looking in the mirror and asking yourself, "What am I knocking myself out for? Why try harder?"
Why be a white man, or woman, when the world tells you being a Negro or mestizo is just as good or better? Why sacrifice? Why hold to a code of behavior, or honor? Just avenge every 'diss' you receive and let your sex organs do what they will. (The perverse part is that - any time a minority works hard or raises a family or plays by those 'uptight, hypocritical' white-man rules....that same culture goes through a paroxysm of grovelling praise, as though someone had just invented Values and Morality. Funny, innit?)
But how did we get to this point? What evil seed bore such awful fruit as this? What did we do that brought this calamity upon ourselves?
Simple. We "won" World War 2.