How ashamed of ourselves should we be?

[mopaul]

Not to be too preachy on a Sunday morn, but I wonder if anyone besides me thinks we the people should be ashamed of ourselves FOR ALLOWING things to get this bad? It reminds me of the good German people analogy, who worshiped Hitler as a god, but could not see the evil right under their noses. When the carnage was all over, many Germans felt a deep shame, that they had not only allowed it to happen, but participated in it by not stopping it. They felt a collective guilt, as a nation, that they had been so utterly duped by madmen.

Sometimes I think, we get the leaders we deserve. When they stole the election in 2000, I felt shame that we simply accepted it, and didn't take to the streets in righteous rage. Then I felt deep shame when we all realized what an idiot bush is, and shame that the media gave him a free pass on everything. Then more shame, as the neocons began stripping away all or our cherished rights and values right in front of our faces.

How ashamed are you as a Democrat for not screaming louder, being more indignant and outraged at all the rightwing bullshit? Deeply, or not at all? Do we have nothing to be ashamed of, or should we suck it up and admit that we should be doing more to stop these men.
And indeed, they must be stopped, because that's the only way they will go away, is if we physically stop them.

I'm tired of feeling ashamed myself, I want my country back, and I'm ready to rumble. The neocons have shamed us to the whole world, and we share some of that shame for allowing it to get this far, and this screwed up. We should be a little ashamed of ourselves for getting fat and lazy and complacent and apathetic, and ashamed of ourselves for letting bullies roll over us.

When I was a kid, I was confronted by bullies, as most kids have experienced. It was always terrifying and humiliating and I always felt ashamed of myself afterwords. The bullies always beat me down, and I always let them, until one day......it hit me. You have to stand up to a bully, if for no other reason than to feel better about yourself. I said to my young self, "I've got to at least stand up to the bully, even if he kicks my ass, at least I tried, and I can sleep better knowing it".

As it turned out, once I confronted my bully, he never messed with me again, and no other bully has messed with me since then. And in that small triumph, I could feel the opposite of shame, pride.

Do ever feel that you could have done more, and taken more pride in your political status and your nation? Fought a little harder, yelled out in rage a little louder? Stop being ashamed, and stop letting the bullies scare you. Let's just start from the top, and take back our nation, so we can all collectively feel proud again.

[H2O Man]

1. Interesting post.

You make some good points. Very valid. My only disagreement is the part about being ashamed. Shame cripples people. People who feel shame tend to stay on bended knee. Later for that. The important part of your post was to stand up for your rights! Liberation theology! And this on the day that marks 36 years since MKL died. Yes, he was the greatest American voice of liberation theology. Cast off the shackles of shame. In the words of the Marley/Tosh song, Get up, stand up! Stand up for your rights!

[trumad]

2. I give my shame a day off on Sundays

6 days a week is enough........

Peace....

[chillwindblowing]

3. I have said all along it was wrong

I have been saying it all along to everyone who would stand still long enough. Contributed to a politcal candidated for the first time in my life.. I think I might have even lost a job on account of my views and sharing them with everyone.. But Iam only little people here, but I do vote,and we can do this, if we all stand together and do not relent.:donut:

[UnityDem]

4. Excellent Post

I was thinking the same thing today.
I am even starting to have issues with my "liberal" church.
The things they preach about are exactly opposite of what this admin. has done. However, they will say nothing about it publicly and there is no condemnation of this admin or advocacy of its demise...and don't tell me they CAN'T...because of sep of church and state and tax exempt status. They have conceded the territory to the religous right. There is NO MORE SEPERATION OF CHURCH AND STATE....at least not on the right....many of them OPENLY promote the repubs and their issues and candidates....but, on the left....there is no spine.
There are so many reasons for most people to NOT take on this admin.
You are UNPATRIOTIC,a HATER,a LIBERAL,,,,etc.etc...
Maybe airamericaradio is a start to give us all a spine.
Unfortunately, we may eat our own....just doubt that the Naderites, greenies, deanies, clarkies, edwardians,kucinichians, etc...will fully galvanize around Kerry the way the right does around Bush.
Principle is often more important to many of us on the left than "settling" for a less than perfect result. Sigh!
I hope and pray that I'm wrong. The future of our country and the world may just depend upon it.

[Catfight]

5. Not shame, rage

You know, I remember one time I stood up for the workers in my old company to get the right to listen to music instead of muzak, anyway, I actually had everyone sign a petition agreeing on one collective radio station so when the executives countered with, "you'll never agree on one station," I could prove them wrong. When it came time to present it, I did my job, handed the VP all the signatures and he read them. He then asked everyone who agrees with this to raise their hand, a nice little intimidation factor, he wasn't pleased that the majority went against his rule. Most of my co-workers conceded and left me standing there fighting for nothing. I learned, you cannot fight a battle unless you all stand up and fight side by side.
My point is, I have given to Howard Dean, the media and the DNC allowed the RNC to destroy someone who was different, passionate and pissed off. I took up my arms and stroke my checks, to no avail. Now we have Kerry, doing nothing but allowing his character to be defined. We have an ignorant society who doesn't question leaders any longer and news reporters who print what sells, not what is true.

You ask am I ashamed? Do I want to let the bullies win? I want Kerry to fire the leader of the DNC and get someone in there with a vision and who can stand up to the bullies. I will not give a dime to the DNC until I see some sort of vision and someone who stands with the collective group to win this fight for our country. I can always do more, but I can't fight alone, and the DNC is no where to be found.

[seventhson]

6. Very moving, MoPaul. - I believe that our shame should be DEEP shame

we live in the most "prosperous" country in the world and yet BILLIONS are starving and hungry and unsheltered and are oppressed or victimized by OUR COUNTRY and OUR CULTURE.

We are in denial about it.

But I work in the inner city and the courts where I see our own oppression of our OWN poor and oppressed daily. The misery and suffering is immeasurable it is so vast.

I do wat I can but I always feel that I am not doing enough.

We are in a global crisis and yet we are sitting on our asses with our thumbs up there too.

There is redemption, however, in action.

I think we are at least TRYING here at DU.

Shame at not doing all we can is a healthy emotion in my view - as long as it makes us want to do better and do more.

The shame of knowing that we could have stopped some suffering by our action and that our failure to act (out of fear or confusion or sloth or lack of imagination) resulted in the suffering of others SHOULD motivate us to change and to transform the world around us.

But this struggle against global fascism is an intergenerational struggle. It will not end in our lifetimes. It will not end in the lifetimes of our great grandchildren (unless the whole world dies - a very real possibility).

And so my greatest shame is for the unboirn generations of humanity to come. The untold billions who will suffer if we do not act NOW to stop the tide of hate and evil of the BFEE and their corporate Valkyrie plucking the dead from the earth for their booty and plunder and necrophilic desire for the power to mangle, mutilate and destroy humanity for profit, greed, mammon. lucre and surfeit.

Shame is one feeling I feel. I also feel rage. As a pacifist I have to channel that into a response with LOVE for humanity. All humanity.

But that is hard too.


Peace

[rtassi]

7. We should turn guilt into

inspiration to do better; we all can. But it is a huge up hill battle of ideologies, awareness, and self examination,that fuels the desire to create change. It would be naive to believe the other candidate, or party, is going to be significantly better than the last unless we decide to change the way we see ourselves, and then demand more of our leaders. You at least see the problem, and care. That puts you front and center above millions of Americans who haven't yet acknowledged our complicity. Enjoy a Guilt free day. Eat something fattening!

[Rev. Day-Bu]

8. We "allowed" it to happen?

We didn't "allow" it to happen. What other course is there besides what we have done? Taking up guns and shooting people? Absolutely not--no way. We've done what we can, and we continue to do what we can. The flat fact is that there are a lot of damn fools out there; there are millions of people who are eager to be suckered. The Bush adminstration knows this. We've done what we can to prevent it, shy of taking up arms, and we'll continue to do what we can. We can't sit around feeling miserable because people are stupid; that is awaste of our energies. And we certainly can't turn to violence--period!

Let's stop trying to make ourselves feel "ashamed" for not turning to violence. We can fight back without wallowing in shame and guilt. We have nothing whatsoever to be ashamed of. If we are ashamed, other people pick up on that and think we must be doing something wrong if we feel shame.

So let's knock off the indulging in misery, and start kicking ass.

And never ever forget, we've done all we can.

The only people who haven't done what they can are the spineless democratic leadership who, a year ago, were going along with Bush. We didn't go along with Bush. They're the ones who permitted things to worsen and worsen by trying to be "nice." Let the pink tu-tu people feel bad for their complicity. They ought to.

But not us.

So let's drop the shame, and tell the Republicans, the moderates, the undecideds, and the pink-tutu democrats, See? We were right!

Leave the shame for those who have something to be ashamed of.

[bfusco]

9. yes, but

I will confess to being complacent for too long. Sure I kept up with the news, voted, wrote an occasional letter to the paper but it didn't go much beyond that. Things changed around the summer of 2002 when I saw terrorism was now Bush's political ally and he blind sided the Dems. Of course they laid down and let Shrub/Rove walk all over them. That was when I started attending protests, getting involved with grass roots activities in my community and have contributed to Dean and now Kerry in order to get this buffoon out of the White House. I'm appalled at how there are many Americans that don't see reality and are not outraged about the mess that Bush has created but I can't feel ashamed for their complacency and apathy. I just do my part to show the rest of the world that our un-elected idiot president doesn't represent me.

[jimshoes]

10. As you say in your post

should we have seen the similarities between what happened in 1930's & 40's Germany and what has and is happening to us as we speak, the answer is YES. But how can we turn it around? As you say we must stand up to the bullies and if we must, we must not be afraid to take our lumps in the process. I have had all I intend to take from the bullies. The real problem is that some of the people who fall into the bully category are really decent people that have drunk the patriotic Kool-Aid. They really do believe that we are right to decimate Iraq because.... Well they can't really tell you why but there must be a good reason because Rush said so. These people I want to pull the veil away from their eyes so as to let them see the error of their Faux watching ways and bring them back into the family of human compassion. (not the conservative kind though) Then there are the jackbooted thug assholes who parrot the party line while holding a flag in one hand and a baseball bat in the other telling you to get out of "their" country. These folks need to be stood up to forcefully and with no remorse. Kinda like what Randi did to Ralph. I suppose things could take an ugly turn if one is arguing politics but I refuse to back down ever again and if that means getting a bloody nose or worse, so be it.

[Mari333]

11. well, I took to the streets at the fake Bush inaugaration in DC

and then I got on here. and then I marched 3 times against these idiots. I put a lot of the blame on the bigwig Dems, who sat on their hands after the stolen election. and yes, I should have been more vehement about making sure they moved their asses on it.
In the meantime, hindsight helps foresight, so eternal vigilance will be required for the Kerry admin. when it gets in.
and
bring the troops home NOW.

[radwriter0555]

12. I've been screaming my head off. In public, among business associates,

on my car, online, among friends, in restaurants, in stores. At every single opportunity I spread the word that this administration is evil incarnate, criminal and nefarious.

You're either with us, or against us.

[G_j]

13. I feel I did almost everything

I could do short of being arrested (although I came close)
to prevent the invasion of Iraq. Countless phone calls and letters standing outside Senator Edwards office, helping to organize local protests, trying to get our city to support a resolution against the invasion, going to DC, writing the members of the UN security council, letters to the editor, petitions, on line activism..........


This is one thing that makes it hard to take the "get over it" approach of Kerry and others, though despite this I will support Kerry (right now I am also a DK supporter)
I feel disgusted and disgruntled but not necessarily ashamed.

But I am ashamed of America in general. Last nights news carried a segment about gas prices and SUVs. The sale of SUVs has actually gone UP 18% in the last three months while smaller car sales have gone down. These people don't seem to make the connection or they don't care that their gas guzzling comes at the expense of human life and the environment. I'm starting to wonder if main stream America isn't beyond the point of ever getting it together.

If Bush weasels his way into office again, I'm wondering if everyone
who cares would be brave enough to withhold their taxes. A tax revolt of a few million people might make some serious waves. But frankly it's hard to imagine enough people having the fortitude to do it. :shrug:

[Mika]

14. Who's streets? OUR streets.

After getting my ass busted up by police jackboots at a 2000 recount rally in Miami-Dade (I had the temerity to exercise my free speech rights and have a sign that was a Buch/Cheney poster with "Republicans FOR a Recount" on the back side) in front of cheering crowds of repugs AND Dems who all enjoyed seeing me and my friends get illegally pounded and illegally arrested in front of them .. yes I do feel shame. Shame for being duped into thinking that a majority of Americans were "freedom loving".

Sorry for the negativism - but I am gut wrenched today, from ALL of it. :puke:

[rock]

15. Selection 2000

actually changed my opion about the Germans under Hitler's rule. I am ashamed that I blamed them as much as I did. Now that the shoe is on the other foot, I sympathize with them.