Question 5: Possible reasons for Anti-Americanism after 9/11

(The following piece was written in response to The Columbia Journalism Practice Admissions Test for 2003 [Section 1B, Questioni #5 ] A recent survey of 42 countries showed that Anti-American attitudes have increased significantly since September 11th, and that an initial wave of sympathy following the terrorist attacks has dissipated. A story about the survey reported, ?While many people still admire U.S. technological
achievements and cultural exports, majorities in nearly every country said they disliked the spread of U.S. influence.? Discuss possible reasons for this decline in U.S. favorability and its ramifications for the United States.)

On Sept. 11th, 2001 citizens from around the world expressed their deepest sympathies and commiserated with our loss of over three-thousand lives and one of the most recognizable symbols of modern American success - The World Trade Center. On television, the internet, newspapers, magazines and even personal letters and phone calls, people from the world over shared our shock and outrage at being victimized by a decentralized band of Islamic fundamentalists known as Al Quaida.

But in the two years since that tragedy occurred, sympathies have waned in the face of our, some would say, incongruous response to that crisis. Within hours, The President of The United States swore to find those responsible and bring them to justice, yet shied away from concentrating on the source country of those terrorists, the monarchy of Saudi Arabia. Within days he divided the world, and our allies, into those who were either "with us or against us" and abandoned long-held alliances with meaningful allies in favor of championing the sycophantic "me too's" of NATO hopefuls. Within weeks, Congress had laid the groundwork for laws which would later stress or outright impinge on the rights and freedoms of U.S. citizens, especially if those citizens were of Middle Eastern decent. And within months, our president had fired-up the largest, most technologically proficient military machine the world has ever known and pointed it at Afghanistan, the most destitute and technologically backward nation in the middle east. Our national tragedy, the worst attack on domestic soil in American history, had sparked an reactionary need to lash-out in revenge, to make "them" pay for what "they" had done.

In our haste to punish the enemy, whoever they were, we forgot ourselves, our friends and the importance of their perceptions of our success in the world. Our unheeding actions broadcast a "me first" world view that has isolated and insulated the U.S. from its allies and confirmed their worst fears of our intentions. Like a mortified lover who has witnessed her suitor who's defended her honor with a bloody fist, the first world has slunk away from the U.S. and its conspicuous self-righteousness; spiriting away "enemy combatants" to exotic locales for interrogation at a safe distance from American soil, laws and human rights; using spurious intelligence, tenuous terrorist links, scare tactics and outright lies to rationalize a mideast policy that was penned over a decade before the trade towers fell; allowing the President and Vice President, with more than coincidental ties to oil and energy firms who would greatly benefit from such policies, to bilk the taxpayers for billions and give away non-competitive handouts to their former companies, friends and associates; and conveniently forgetting which government trained Osama Bin Laden to terrorize and supplied Saddam Hussein with WMD in the first place. These facts and more caused our friends to blush for our embarrassment.

Our leaders didn't blush, however. With the benefit of a mostly ill-informed, nearsighted and over-entertained citizenry, our conspicuous faults were cloaked in red, white & blue and the majority proudly marched in lock-step while the world quietly grimaced. Our populace chanted nationalistic slogans, sang patriotic songs and decorated their homes and vehicles with the same, simultaneously fueling the passions of xenophobic reactionaries and Islamic bogeymen alike. The United States preemptively (i.e. offensively) invaded two countries under the guise of fighting terrorism and spreading democracy. Yet, to date, our citizenry is no safer from terrorism and democracy no more secure in the middle east.

What is not in question is our nation's lack of humility in the face of overwhelming dissent from both our allies and our enemies. Like a stubborn child who refuses to heed the wisdom of a parent's greater sense of history, we insist on ignoring world opinion to revisit the quagmires of our short and muddied past. We insist on defending our bad reputation instead of confessing our guilts and searching for truly effective solutions to recurring problems. For a country that professes to champion Christian values, we as a nation have not humbled ourselves before God and asked for His forgiveness. Instead we greedily horde more than our share of the world's resources and perpetuate an unsustainable lifestyle for those privileged few who thumb their noses at Kyoto. We protect pharmaceutical companies who insist on unreasonable profit-margins at home and in third-world countries where entire generations are lost to manageable diseases. We export more good jobs and import more worthless junk and celebrate those short-term gains at our children's peril. We champion the wisdom of our markets while CEO's, CFO's, and other so-called financial "Trustees" embezzle our future for personal gain. We have collectively agreed, with the Supreme Court's blessing, that getting what you can, while you can is the American Way.

As the most cynical, the most shrewd, the most corrupt, the largest and most powerful capital machine the world has ever known, we should not be surprised, even in our post 9/11 grief, that humanity resents us for leading it down a path to oblivion. Quite sanely, I think, the peoples of the world have decided there just has to be another way.

- Sudrakarma