COMMENTS FROM A READER -- "WHEN THE BRITISH SPEAK, EUROPE CRINGES!"

COMMENTS FROM A READER ON --- “WHEN THE BRITISH SPEAK, EUROPE CRINGES!”

James R. Fisher, Jr., Ph.D.
© January 19, 2009

“Learning makes a man fit company for himself.”

Edward Young (1683 – 1765), English poet

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A READER WRITES:

Hello Jim,

Thanks for forwarding the article. As an FYI, Peter is Christopher's younger (2 years) brother. As with many siblings, they fall out and reconcile. I was surprised by your reference to Christopher as far left. I have read his columns reacting with satisfaction and disgust. While he labels himself a democratic socialist, I think the description democratic antagonist would fit better. He seems to attack any line of thought that appears to be gaining popularity. A recent column resurfaced his long-held dislike of the Clintons. He doesn't like organized religion, welfare and many other things. He did seem to praise Obama in one column. Although, now I wonder if that was a tweak to his brother.

I hope the title of Peter Hitchens' column was sincere and he is waving goodbye content to no longer pile on snide criticism of our culture and behavior. Revolution, a concept unknown to the country of pampered royalty and a house of peerage, is necessary for dramatic change. There is no easy path to overthrowing pomposity and arrogance. It requires a slap in the face and maybe even a bloody nose. The election was a slap in the face for the status quo. "The People" have been emboldened to treat all vestiges of power - CEOs, Unions, corrupt politicians (Stevens, Blago, et the invetable al), with a new you-are-us-so-act-like-it attitude.

I am aware that hereditary membership in the House of Lords was partially eliminated (save 90 or so Lords) in 1999. Polite, ineffective revolution. How British. 40 million pounds to have a queen. 176 million to sustain a monarchy. Change you can relieve on. Now, we have our own "....hip, skinny and youthful replacement for God." At least he will work for us.

There is something bothersome about the hoopla over this election. I voted for Obama because he was not Bush, McCain or any other puppet of the New World Order that the Republicans could have thrown at us. Plus, he had a sincere concern for America's success as opposed to a desire to protect the oil profits of Middle East elites and the petro-corpocracy. The man, if he is misleading us, is walking a loose high wire. I believe we are entering a period of palpable impatience for leaders who mislead. I appreciate and understand the exuberance of black Americans. The confluence of the inauguration with the MLK holiday heightens our reflection on the journey that brings us to this point. What is important to remember is that it was not only black people who made this journey. The cost of the journey, suffering through segregation, bias, discrimination, misrepresentation, and outright hate, far exceeded that of those from the dominant white culture who actively joined in the ideological and sometimes physical battle for racial equality. One would think, from the media treatment of this event, that whites had nothing invested in the decades-long transition. Nor do their impressions of this historic event matter.

Maybe I am missing the larger point. Cook County is not a microcosm of America. Over 900 sq. mi., with 5.3 million people it is second to Los Angeles County in population. 1.4 million are black, proportionately twice the US proportion, and the largest African-American voting bloc in any county in the US. This is reflected in Chicago and Cook County government. Here, color and ethnicity are ho-hum criteria. What is the significance of Obama's election to liberal white America? And, who is reporting that? I know what I read on the neo-con websites. Those people don't hate him because he's black. They hate his liberalism. What is the political source of our enthusiasm? This may be the real source of Mr. Hitchens' angst over the future of America. Will we stop proudly looking in the mirror, admiring the moral maturity of our recent decision? Will we recognize that self-improvement, if not used to create a better world, is reduced to smugness? I believe the answer is yes and it fills me with excitement and anticipation.

Peace and wonder,

Michael

DR. FISHER RESPONDS:

It is such a delight to read you. I always learn something new and important, something that improves my perspective, and relieves me somewhat of my angst. This is such an occasion.

I would hope, however, that the “White Nation” of Americans would endeavor to understand how incredibly significant the election of President Barak Obama is to little black boys and little black girls across not only the United States of America, but throughout the world.

The perspective of South Africa, and the experience of apartheid, where I witnessed a great society built on the backs of brown and black people, including indentured workers from India, introduced me to myself. It was there, you may recall, that Mohandas Ghandhi launched his civil rights movement of ahimsa, or total non-violence in quest for India’s independence from tyrannical Great Britain.

Today, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. is honored, the man who led the American Negro Civil Rights Movement with what he had learned from Ghandi. It is not mere rhetoric to suggest tomorrow is the beginning of the answer to Dr. King’s “I have a dream.”

When I was a young impressionistic student at the University of Iowa more than fifty years ago, I read Joseph Conrad’s “Heart of Darkness.” It gave me chills reading it, then, not knowing that I would one day experience the world of Mr. Kurtz, the manager of the Inner Station of the Belgian Congo, as an executive for Nalco Chemical Company of Chicago, Illinois, operating out of Johannesburg.

It was as a university student, still a teenager, that I was introduced to the power of culture to strip a man of his false pride and ideals and expose him to the reality of his ways and the world in which he lived. That introduction took on reality when I was assigned to South Africa. The naïve idealist with ambition beyond measure was never the same after South Africa.

When I took my first college psychology courses, as a chemistry major, and as electives not as my major, I learned of experiments where students in simulated studies exacted simulated torture on people not knowing they were exposing their primordial instincts. Erich Fromm wrote insightfully of this in “The Anatomy of Human Destructiveness” (1973).

Michael, we live in a cruel and violent world, a world in which people of the pen have a responsibility to enlighten not enrage, to educate not egg us on to our basic instincts.

Yes, a lot of people are hurting today with the subprime meltdown, yet according to 2007 figures, 1.9 percent of American households earn $250,000 or more; 20 percent $100,000 or more; the median income per household is $50,223; and 96 percent of Americans (now 93 percent, 2008 figures) are gainfully employed. In Florida, because of the large retirement population, the median income per household is $46,142. Against this reality, President Barak Obama has to deal with the $1.35 trillion tax cut of president Bush, which expires in 2011. God only knows what his stimulus package will add to this.

We have done something right against many things wrong to grow to such economic strength. We cannot rest on our laurels nor should we panic. Will their be genuine change? History tells us “no,” but we have not been where we are now since the Civil War. We are still a young and upstart nation that refuges to grow up. Perhaps that is one of our strengths, which of course is the antithesis of my argument. We shall see.

What I don’t like about the Hitchens, whom I now know are a pair, is their bottom feeding. Christopher Hitchens attacked one of my philosophical heroes, Isaiah Berlin, and for that I’ve never forgiven him. He took several cheap shots saying he should have done more for Israel, when a philosopher is a thinker, not a doer. Speaking of which, I may be a provocateur but I don’t see myself as a polemicist, which is how I see the Hitchens. I’m sorry, Michael, they bring out my worst, while you bring out my best.

Thank you for educating me.

And always be well,

Jim