EdWort
Well-Known Member
Just asking: what, in your opinion, constitutes "anti-American"? If it portrays the some aspect of the country in a negative light, is that automatically anti-American to you? The reason I ask is that, as of late, there seems to be the tendency to wield the blunt weapon of "You're being anti-American!" against anything that reports any negative aspects of our country---and believe me, there are negative aspects of America, love it though I may.
For instance, a form of blatant uninformed anti-Americanism, in my opinion, would be the stereotypical European view of us as big, fat, dumb, uncultured blowhards. It's a form of blind anti-nationalism---almost as dangerous, IMHO, as blind nationalism.
On the other hand, an example of a well-thought-out criticism of this great nation would be a story decrying the problems inherent in our massive military-industrial/welfare-warfare complex...however, such a criticism would probably be dismissed as some (Hannity, I'm looking in your general direction) as "anti-american", when it is clearly not.
So the real question to ask, is, does the story back up the cover, or is it just an america hate-piece. I haven't read it yet, but from what many are saying, it's not a hate-piece.
The title of thread points to the cover of Newsweek which is no different than the Time cover a while back insulting WWII soldiers. Both are anti-American and insulting. That's the main crux.
The article in itself still attempts to make the point that other countries are passing us by and we are in a period of decline, all of which I disagree. Those developing countries are successful because of our technology, universities, our monetary aid, our massive accessible market, and our freedoms and liberties (Which are envied around the globe). None of these points are made in the article.