Something that I have noticed over the past few months is, I believe a misguided contempt of Europe and Europeans on the American 'blogosphere'.
I can understand it quite well, our leaders are contemptable snivelling cowards, but are American leaders any better?
European economies are slow growing or shrinking, quite true, socialism has been ingrained into Europe's economy, retarding it's growth! But, forgive me for pointing out that America, although growing faster then Europe on the whole is not growing as fast as Ireland, Switzerland or some East European economies, the reason for the 'low' growth of the 'European economy' is France, Italy and Germany, take them out, we are growing as fast as America, if not faster!
There are many sneering references to out of control immigration to Europe, quite true, immigration is out of control, our treasonous leaders have ensured this! But America has accepted more immigrants in the past decade then all of Europe combined! And America has 300 million people, Europe has 800 million! Also, Europeans, from what I have deduced from talking with them do not accept these people as French or Italian or English or Irish or Spanish etc... Americans seem to conclude that if someone (no matter how despicable or criminal they are) stays in America for a number of years, then they are American! You see it matters not if an Arab or an African has a French or British passport, they will never be French or British. If those same people go to America, they are as American as the descendants of the Pilgrims, or the Scotch-Irish or the Germans or Huguenots! That is not something to be proud of!
The European Union, is contemptible, invented by atheists who hate the 'true Europe', they wish to see the end of Europe and the European peoples. But they are not 'us', they are 'our' enemies! I certainly would love to see the end of the EU, it could be replaced by a free trade zone, something most Europeans would support.
Although there is much anti-Americanism, something I find childish in it's blatant but unrecognised jealousy, not all people want to be American! Some American bloggers write as if it is unthinkable that any right thinking person would not wish to be American. As much as I admire America and its constitution, it tradition of decency etc... I also do not wish to be American! I am part of a different tradition, if I was to immigrate it would be to Australia or Canada or New Zealand, nations with similar and shared histories, from their settlements to today... I understand the desire of the Italians and the French and the Germans to maintain their separateness, after all they also have great civilisations, they don't need to learn English or be just like us, if they did the world would become a greyer place.
Most Europeans that I have met on my many travels throughout the continent are decent, educated and civilised people. Opposed to the waves of immigration as much as any other sensible person. There is of course anti-Americanism, I assure you I have argued against them many times, but there are also people who, although are not anti-American do actively dislike McDonald's, Starbucks and the other chain stores from over the pond, this may seem anti-Capitalist to some, but when you are standing in the Piazza da San Marco in Venice or the ramparts of Alghero in Sardinia, or before the Grossmunster in Zurich or standing on one of Lisbon's seven hills taking in the view, you can kinda see their point! The idea of some chain store does seem like vandalism! It may be ok in a city 100 years old, but these places are mellenia old, they are living places not some discardable throw away thing, or some plastic Disney World castle, these is the real things!
I know that there is an ideology of American exceptionalism, America is a great nation, it is not exceptional, it is not immune to the currents of history or reality. The myth of the enrichment of immigration is an especially dangerous one that is part of the American narrative, one that both the right and left accept and harp on about. Anti-Immigration just does not work, because you think anyone and everyone is potentially American, this is so untrue as to be something I believe may end America as a great power, you cannot ever throw many races together and think they will become one, or that they will accept the morals and standards of the Pilgrims or the 'founding fathers', they wont! On this I believe Europe is stronger, our nations are based on an ethnic identity, immigration for us is very obviously an attack on us, as 'us' is determined by our shared ethnicity and history.
It is strange that Australia, another great immigrant society does not have as part of its national ideology, the idea that all immigration is great! But then Australia had until 30 years ago the unofficial 'White Australia policy', which originally would only allow Britons and Nordic types in. This was extended after 1945 to allow Italians, Greeks, Portuguese and Slavs. This attitude seems healthier to me, it keeps the nation relatively homogeneous. To much difference can be a danger.
I digress! Simply put, I appeal to our American cousins to realise that we are generally quite a sensible bunch, we have our weirdos like you, we also have our challenges like you! But we are not suddenly less then you, because we are not you!
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3 comments:
The neocon right that wants the US to divorce itself culturally and socially from Europe vastly overestimates the US as somehow impervious to dysgenic demography, an aged population, and an economy of consumption funded by mortgaging the future. If we don't stick together, I fear we'll hang separately.
At the same time, I take exception to the US' self-sacrificing maintenance of guaranteed European protection through NATO and the sorts of missle defense and radar detection equipment we want to set up in the Czech Republic and Poland.
Regarding the American idea that biology doesn't matter, nor does culture, so long as one accepts 'American' ideals of self-determination and liberty (what I refer to as "Propositionalism") is at odds with reality.
This fourth immigration wave comes primarily from the third world with hostilities towards the US, with citizenry that are staggeringly uneducated and with IQs ten points below the US average.
This wave is unlike the others in that the US has now adopted a European-style entitlement culture. No longer do only the best and brightest succeed while the others either sink or go home--quite the opposite. Get one in here on a low value-adding job subsidized by the net US taxpayer for the benefit of some MNC, and then bring in the whole family to be educated at $10,000 a kid per year. And the need for menial labor is shrinking, not growing as it was during previous migration waves.
Your point is well taken; there is a lot of knee-jerk Europhobia which is noticeable on some American blogs (but not mine!) and the 'conservative' forums where the commenters are mostly party loyalists who think our President is infallible, and who stereotype Europeans, especially the French.
I think the reason for much of the animosity on BOTH sides, because we encounter much anti-American sentiment too, is the nature of our mass media; I think that your media are very leftist just as in America, and they fuel the flames of division and mistrust. I think there is an effort to divide the West against itself, and it's working.
I may take issue with the leftist elites in Europe and with those who buy the leftist propaganda, but I try to remember that the average people on your side of the Atlantic are not like the image that is presented to us by the MSM, and I hope that our cousins on your side of the Atlantic know that we Americans are not all Europhobes.
As for the false idea that America is a melting pot, and that being 'American' is not a matter of ethnicity or culture, but only a matter of believing in 'freedom and liberty', that notion is something manufactured by the liberals/neocons; the traditional America I grew up in did not believe that, and many of us do not believe it now. The real America is derived from mostly Anglo-Protestant origins, and the later waves of immigrants have been more and more incompatible with the original American people.
There are still many like me, who are descended from the earliest colonists, and who are aware of our origins.
We are not the amorphous, mixed-multitude that the media propagandists portray us to be.
I take your point too. However, Although Europe is not as bad an one might think looking at it through the MSM, I'm afraid that Europe is more doomed than the 'new world', due to the naivety and inability of Europeans to see the world how it (and by definition their place in it) really is.
I belive that this and morale decay will without a doubt spell the end of these once great civilisations long before the demise of the American one.
The European peoples just don't seem to be willing to fight for anything any more.
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