America’s image in the rest of the world
Tomorrow, it will have been seven years since the attacks on the World Trade Center and Washington. So much has happened in the world since that time. Before the planes hit the buildings, Americans were living in a world that they thought saw the United States as a role model, a land of freedom and opportunity. We thought everyone in the world wanted to come here, work hard and live like we do.
That’s the main reason why the attacks came as such a shock. We could not imagine why anyone would want to attack us, the first front of freedom, democracy and justice. The attackers, we were certain, must hate freedom and democracy and must be evil, pathetic and small. We could defeat them easily and be completely justified in our actions.
In the series of events that have taken place since then, that illusion has been quietly unraveling. America has been invading countries and killing civilians with motives that look suspiciously similar to oil company interests.
Our government has been spying on citizens, impeding freedom of the press while flouting the Constitution, federal law and our own sense of morality. We’ve blatantly ignored the health care of our veterans and rescue workers. Our government and business leaders have been lying and exploiting the public for their own self-serving interests. Our soldiers have been sexually abusing and torturing prisoners of war on a level that surpasses that of our most despised enemies.
Where is the America we sing about in anthems and learn about in school, the noble, hard-working people who are just trying to fulfill the American dream? You cannot find any traces of it in recent history. It’s hard to find that version of the U.S. in any part of our history, actually.
The America we learn and sing about is an ideal; a bar of excellence that we have never really met. Our mission statement and our values are noble, unique and inspiring for a good reason.
America represents hope, freedom and justice, and is the first unlikely “experiment” in letting citizens rule, not monarchs or dictators. Unquestionably, America has fought for just causes in the past. The problem is, we haven’t truly lived up to our own expectations. We haven’t fulfilled the promise that our country represents. The country we sing about is an amazing, wonderful thing to aspire to be a part of, but it’s not the country we neither are, nor ever really have been. We’ve come close, on occasion, but we’ve never been able to overcome the taint of American-style business and politics, which breeds corruption, greed and apathy.
The rest of the world watched and hoped. Surely the richest nation in the world, with the freest citizens, the most privileged workforce and the most access to information would be able to maintain a power structure that goes against human nature. Not only has the world been disappointed, but it has been frequently confronted with our refusal to acknowledge this failure. We’ve fallen short, but we act like we’ve surpassed every goal with flying colors. Americans have notoriously short memories. It’s infuriating to be constantly condescended to, especially when the country in question is so far from perfect.
Largely because of our response to the events of 9/11, the world’s once positive opinion of us has deteriorated. Now, when the rest of the world looks at America, it sees warmongers, ignorance, apathy, selfishness and hypocrisy. It sees leaders who took an undeniable national tragedy and warped it for their own ends, and the public who enables and encourages them.
Sept. 11 was an opportunity to unite the world and improve America’s image. We used that opportunity to invade two countries and protect our oil interests, killing thousands of soldiers and hundreds of thousands of civilians in the process - not to mention the atrocities committed in the name of “intelligence gathering.” If it were any other country, we would call its perpetrators despicable, evil and selfish opportunists. Now those labels apply to us.
And yet again, we have a choice. We can choose to continue denying that label, and pretending we really are on the unquestionable side of righteousness and liberty while undermining those things abroad - or we can choose to acknowledge our abysmal failure and work to make our lives and politics match our rhetoric.
It’s our choice. And what we do with it says a lot about what the world should think of us.
This column no longer exists in The Daily Aztec’s online archives. However, you can read an interesting discussion between me and another student who’s husband is in the military here.
