They are against us, but maybe they are right

Darrell Ehrlick | Winona Daily News

The most powerful group in the world is they.
We live in a day where politicians use that pronoun often, but never really say who “they” are. It’s always us against them — them being the undefined enemy, powerful and nameless.

They always hate us. They want to take away from us. They are against us.

But did we ever stop to think they might just have a point?

At the risk of emboldening an enemy I am not even sure exists, I think it’s high time we consider why it is those perceived (and maybe real) enemies look at America and don’t like what they see. Quite frankly, I wonder how many of us — when we take a hard, unflinching look — really like what we see.

They don’t hate freedom. I am tired of that jingoistic phrase meant to tug at my patriotic heartstrings. I cannot believe those who despise us hate freedom, equality and justice. How long are we going to accept that sort of rhetoric and be tricked into believing that enemies want a world without freedom or justice? It’s hard to believe a people under the rule of the Taliban or Saddam Hussein would want anything less than that. Maybe, what they detest is an invasion by a people half the world away who impose a new order on their society. Historians have a word for that — colonialism. It’s more than a bit ironic that a nation that was born out of revolt, sabotage and tea parties wouldn’t understand the kind of grassroots resistance we experience when our George sends troops globetrotting with guns.

And when the world looks at America and sees us tsk-tsking Islam for the division between Sunni and Shia, what have we to say about our own split between conservative and liberal Christians? The Sunday morning preachers that talk of hellfire and smell of brimstone seem to hit on every point except for one — the Great Commandment.

It scares me to think how an outsider might view a government that routinely humiliates others on the floor of the United Nations for human and civil rights abuses, yet systematically chips away at the civil rights of its own citizens, all the while slapping names like “patriot” and “freedom” on legislation that masks the real truth. And while we chide the Iraq government for being hapless, helpless and hopeless, at home a party that was elected on the platform of change — the Democrats — have been about as weak as diet white tea. What does it tell the rest of the world when convenience and compromise trumps conviction?

What can we say to the rest of the world when the greatest justification for keeping more troops overseas is by using those who have already paid the ultimate price? The logic baffles me. It seems to go something like this: In order to honor those who’ve died, we need to put more troops in harm’s way, risking their lives as well. Death doesn’t honor troops, peace is the only victory that matters.

When will we have the courage to leave the troops and their sacrifice out of it? When will we demand our politicians take responsibility for a war that has become another Vietnam — another conflict with no graceful exit strategy?

The rest of the world seems to give a sarcastic laugh as we fret over people with different sounding last names, people who speak different languages and people who come from other parts of the world. Yet, America needs to recruit top professionals from other countries as our poorly funded schools continue to fall behind the rest of the world in math and science. We talk about “aliens” and “immigrants” taking jobs that no one else wants, as we search for the lowest price on consumer goods. And we neglect history by failing to acknowledge we are an immigrant nation, where few of our forefathers sought permission to enter.

Maybe our largest and most unfortunate export is our television and entertainment industry. The rest of the world watches pill-poppin’ celebrities use their million-dollar autos like bumper cars as they crash into Hollywood and land in posh rehab facilities. Meanwhile, in the same place, drugs still wrack the city, thousands of children are uninsured. Even our reality television shows pit children against children, or they seem to glorify sexual debauchery that would have made Catullus blush. What can it possibly say about a culture that treats its children as if they were some small actors to be manipulated, rather than humans to be treasured and cared for? What does it say when our reality television emphasizes bizarre promiscuity over the more pressing real problems?

They may not be the enemy.

To borrow a cliché, we have seen the enemy. And, yes indeed, it is us.

Darrell Ehrlick is the editor of the Winona Daily News. You may contact him at darrell.ehrlick@lee.net or (507) 453-3507.

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