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Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsThe Decline of the American World
Other countries are used to loathing America, admiring America, and fearing America (sometimes all at once). But pitying America? That one is new.https://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2020/06/america-image-power-trump/613228/
He hated America very deeply, John le Carré wrote of his fictional Soviet mole, Bill Haydon, in Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy. Haydon had just been unmasked as a double agent at the heart of Britains secret service, one whose treachery was motivated by animus, not so much to England but to America. Its an aesthetic judgment as much as anything, Haydon explained, before hastily adding: Partly a moral one, of course. I thought of this as I watched the scenes of protest and violence over the killing of George Floyd spread across the United States and then here in Europe and beyond. The whole thing looked so ugly at firstso full of hate, and violence, and raw, undiluted prejudice against the protesters. The beauty of America seemed to have gone, the optimism and charm and easy informality that entrances so many of us from abroad. At one level, the ugliness of the moment seems a trite observation to make. And yet it gets to the core of the complicated relationship the rest of the world has with America.
In Tinker Tailor, Haydon at first attempts to justify his betrayal with a long political apologia, but, in the end, as he and le Carrés hero, the master spy George Smiley, both know, the politics are just the shell. The real motivation lies underneath: the aesthetic, the instinct. Haydonupper class, educated, cultured, Europeanjust could not stand the sight of America. For Haydon and many others like him in the real world, this visceral loathing proved so great that it blinded them to the horrors of the Soviet Union, ones that went far beyond the aesthetic. Le Carrés reflection on the motivations of anti-Americanismbound up, as they are, with his own ambivalent feelings about the United Statesare as relevant today as they were in 1974, when the novel was first published. Where there was then Richard Nixon, there is now Donald Trump, a caricature of what the Haydons of this world already despise: brash, grasping, rich, and in charge. In the president and first lady, the burning cities and race divides, the police brutality and poverty, an image of America is beamed out, confirming the prejudices that much of the world already havewhile also serving as a useful device to obscure its own injustices, hypocrisies, racism, and ugliness.
It is hard to escape the feeling that this is a uniquely humiliating moment for America. As citizens of the world the United States created, we are accustomed to listening to those who loathe America, admire America, and fear America (sometimes all at the same time). But feeling pity for America? That one is new, even if the schadenfreude is painfully myopic. If its the aesthetic that matters, the U.S. today simply doesnt look like the country that the rest of us should aspire to, envy, or replicate. Even in previous moments of American vulnerability, Washington reigned supreme. Whatever moral or strategic challenge it faced, there was a sense that its political vibrancy matched its economic and military might, that its system and democratic culture were so deeply rooted that it could always regenerate itself. It was as if the very idea of America mattered, an engine driving it on whatever other glitches existed under the hood. Now, something appears to be changing. America seems mired, its very ability to rebound in question. A new power has emerged on the world stage to challenge American supremacyChinawith a weapon the Soviet Union never possessed: mutually assured economic destruction.
China, unlike the Soviet Union, is able to offer a measure of wealth, vibrancy, and technological advancementalbeit not yet to the same level as the United Stateswhile protected by a silk curtain of Western cultural and linguistic incomprehension. In contrast, if America were a family, it would be the Kardashian clan, living its life in the open glare of a gawping, global publicits comings and goings, flaws and contradictions, there for all to see. Today, from the outside, it looks as if this strange, dysfunctional, but highly successful upstart of a family were suffering a sort of full-scale breakdown; what made that family great is apparently no longer enough to prevent its decline. The U.S.uniquely among nationsmust suffer the agony of this existential struggle in the company of the rest of us. Americas drama quickly becomes our drama. Driving to meet a friend here in London as the protests first erupted in the States, I passed a teenager in a basketball jersey with jordan 23 emblazoned on the back; I noticed it because my wife and I had been watching The Last Dance on Netflix, a documentary about an American sports team, on an American streaming platform. The friend told me hed spotted graffiti on his way over: i cant breathe. In the weeks since, protesters have marched in London, Berlin, Paris, Auckland, and elsewhere in support of Black Lives Matter, reflecting the extraordinary cultural hold the United States continues to have over the rest of the Western world.
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The Decline of the American World (Original Post)
Celerity
Jun 2020
OP
It's so embarrassing to become a pariah country because of the current president
kimbutgar
Jun 2020
#1
kimbutgar
(21,188 posts)1. It's so embarrassing to become a pariah country because of the current president
No one wants to visit or emigrate to racist America with an insane president.
Celerity
(43,498 posts)2. Biden et al. will have a monstrous clean-up project, especially if Trump runs riot in the lame duck
session period.
underpants
(182,877 posts)3. "The moment is pregnant," this adviser said. "We just don't know what with."
Wow. Finishing this tomorrow
Buckeye_Democrat
(14,856 posts)4. The only people I can imagine still wanting to come here...
... are people wanting to get even wealthier in our greedy country -- i.e., foreign-born sociopaths.
BigmanPigman
(51,627 posts)5. I am still wondering how much longer people will choose to remain here.
Buckeye_Democrat
(14,856 posts)6. It's been crossing my mind more and more.
I doubt that I'll ever do it. Money is a limiting factor, plus I'd like to remain to see Trump out of office.
BigmanPigman
(51,627 posts)7. The problem now is the fact that we are contaminated
by both Covid and tRump (no sane country wants us).
kimbutgar
(21,188 posts)8. I have this job where we move seniors to assisted living
Someone asked us to pack up her mother so she could move overseas with her family. But it getting harder to find a mover/shipper.
BigmanPigman
(51,627 posts)9. I'm not surprised.
It will be even harder in 4-5 months when the number will be going through the roof.