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My take on the topics raised - US innocence, hostility towards the US, patriotism, nationalism... my take is that these are changes in prevailing opinions and n

My take on the topics raised - US innocence, hostility towards the US, patriotism, nationalism... my take is that these are changes in prevailing opinions and notions. The cumulative of subjective opinions. I'm not American, btw. There are a few big reasons for what the author is observing and commenting on, that get too little attention IMO. One is the end of the cold war, and the wars preceding it. The cold war was cold, but the psychology was regular war psychology. Fear, demonisation, rallying around your side... Relative evaluation of conduct and goals, rather than idealistic evaluation. In the corld-war-world, the US represented democracy, personal liberty and its associated human rights, and (very importantly) culturally icons. US and western police forces behaved well relative to Soviet police forces. US Movies & Music were better. Press was more honest. The comparison was not made relative to an idealised concept of democracy or human rights (or music). It was made relative to the Soviet Union associated states. It was also mostly made in Eastern Europe, where the divide was arbitrary, non-national and highly visible. That dichotomy world is gone. These days, I think people evaluate these things in a more abstract way, relative to abstract idealizations. A second effect is US politics' global viewership. This is a product of globalized media, the dramatic merits of US political theater, the genuine impacts of big US decisions and other reasons. This is huge. I live in Ireland. The majority of people are more knowledgeable, vested and opinionated about US politics than local politics. They have a strong opinion on US health policies, but not Irish ones. This is a recipe for insanity. US politicians are pandering to US opinions, not Danish or Georgian or Irish opinions. Of course they feel unrepresented. When one side loses a heated election, large numbers always feel alienated and angry at the country. It passes, a normal part of democracy. Many Danes (and everyone) were involved enough emotionally to get the same feeling but being non-americans aren't as affected by the normalizing effects that bring everything together in the end. When Europeans express a frustrated criticism of US politics, they are doing it as insiders. They are criticising it the same way they would criticize a local party coming to power, one which they don't like. Imagine how angry Americans would get at the Danish or Mexican parliament if they were following it like this. A third issue is the "someone must be driving" fallacy. In this sense being angry at the US is like the constant anger at one's own government. There is so much wrong with everything and it has to be someone's fault. The US has been having a bad run in foreign policy. Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya, Syria, even N. Korea, ... The US is (rightly or wrongly) held responsible as the guy in charge. Politics rarely rewards successes. The failures are just more visible. Who do you get angry at for the Syrian civil war? Who's to blame? The UN?

cantremember12 9y ago
Thank you for this comment. I'm an American but have lived abroad for most of the last 13 years in various countries and articles like this drive me nuts. Yes, the US has made a lot of terrible mistakes in our foreign policy, but we have also paid for and ensured (basically unilaterally) the security of free trade (securing shipping routes, underwriting NATO, projecting force against anyone that tried to disrupt international trade). We did this readily during the Cold War because markets were our strongest weapon against the Soviet Union. Now that there is no equal existential threat, we no longer have much motivation for ensuring global security. When I read shallow reflections like this article, I think, here's a person that judges the wartime decisions of the past in the peace of the present, and submits to the vapid criticism every government levels against the world's boogieman.
- dalbasal 9y ago
  A appreciate it. But, I don't really think the writer of this article is all that bad. He's obviously writing from a personal perspective. Basically narrating his "disilusionment," for lack of a better term. It's actually a fairly poor term. We always start from simpler idea, less knowledge and grow from there. The reality is that there is no such things as patriotism. It's a made up concept to describe how we feel about our country (another made up concept). There is no True narrative of Turkey's political saga. These are all opinions and narratives, subjective by nature. Facts play a roles, but they are intermingles with a lot of stuff that isn't factual in nature. That doesn't make it shallow. The problem is that we're all playing a losing game. You can't read an article like this, and just fish for stuff that supports are weakens your own position in some meta-trial conducted in the minds of the whole world.
  - tome 9y ago
    > He's obviously writing from a personal perspective. He?
stillhere 9y ago
The cold war was not cold. In Africa it was red hot. We see the results there today of communism's spread.

cantremember12 9y ago

Thank you for this comment. I'm an American but have lived abroad for most of the last 13 years in various countries and articles like this drive me nuts. Yes, the US has made a lot of terrible mistakes in our foreign policy, but we have also paid for and ensured (basically unilaterally) the security of free trade (securing shipping routes, underwriting NATO, projecting force against anyone that tried to disrupt international trade). We did this readily during the Cold War because markets were our strongest weapon against the Soviet Union. Now that there is no equal existential threat, we no longer have much motivation for ensuring global security. When I read shallow reflections like this article, I think, here's a person that judges the wartime decisions of the past in the peace of the present, and submits to the vapid criticism every government levels against the world's boogieman.

dalbasal 9y ago
A appreciate it. But, I don't really think the writer of this article is all that bad. He's obviously writing from a personal perspective. Basically narrating his "disilusionment," for lack of a better term. It's actually a fairly poor term. We always start from simpler idea, less knowledge and grow from there. The reality is that there is no such things as patriotism. It's a made up concept to describe how we feel about our country (another made up concept). There is no True narrative of Turkey's political saga. These are all opinions and narratives, subjective by nature. Facts play a roles, but they are intermingles with a lot of stuff that isn't factual in nature. That doesn't make it shallow. The problem is that we're all playing a losing game. You can't read an article like this, and just fish for stuff that supports are weakens your own position in some meta-trial conducted in the minds of the whole world.
- tome 9y ago
  > He's obviously writing from a personal perspective. He?

stillhere 9y ago

The cold war was not cold. In Africa it was red hot. We see the results there today of communism's spread.