[weiming]

What me and my family talked about today is that, as immigrants, we are so sad how much the "native born" people of the US hate their own country. They seem to never waste an opportunity to remind others of their disdain and it is more and more visible these days e.g. in big news media or on Twitter.

Makes me sad and I hope this can change.

[hintymad]

Yeah, and so many people of color came to the US with a suite case and less than $1000 dollars, and then became a successful person in a few years. I certainly did. My wife certainly did. My team, my gardener, and my contractor certainly did. Some people who are from the same school as I went to have even become CEOs of big companies, and some have become famous professors or head of prestigious universities. If anything, I got help from people of all colors, and particularly from a great system that generations of people in the US have built.

Is the US perfect? Of course not! But everything in the US is worth hating? You gotta be out of your mind. Is the history of the US perfect? Of course not! That's why it's history! Human learn. Human improve. Human societies evolve from centuries of violence, prejudice, or pure cruelty. If we cancel them, we won't have a history.

In the meantime, the poorest 20% of the US population is probably better than 80% of the population in the world, and this is not great? The protestors can afford protesting full time for weeks, and this is not great? We have NBA who have more than 70% of black athletes. We idolize them. They make millions of a year. And this is not great? A long list of Hollywood stars are black and we love them and LinkedIn is full of Will Smith's inspirational interview, and this is not great? We have a black president in a white-majority country, and this is not great? We have black mayors, council members, senators, congressman and congress woman, and this is not great?

If we look at the US history, we have Charles Drew, we have Rebecca Lee Crumpler, we have Daniel Hale Williams, we have Marie M. Daly, we have Alice Augusta Ball, we have Katherine Johnson, we ave Dorothy Vaughaun, we have Christine Darden. The list can go on. Are they not great?

And if we follow the logic of cancel culture, we should cancel Rome, cancel Greece, cancel renaissance, cancel all religions, cancel Europe, cancel China, cancel India, cancel Africa. They all had their share of slavery, for centuries. They all had their share of atrocity, again for centuries. Then what's left? What's the point? And should we cancel our childhood? Should we cancel ourselves? Most of us, after all, did something stupid or horrible when we were young. Should our parents cancel us?

Some people are just sick.

[yongjik]

Focusing on the "cancel culture" is, IMHO, putting the cart in front of the horse. It is a by-product of a society where a cop can murder an African American in broad daylight and (in most cases) suffer no consequences. If you can't trust the society to not murder you, why would you refrain from tearing down anything you don't like?

When the society doesn't serve justice, people will implement "justice" with their own hands, with often bloody consequences. Thousands lost their heads during the French revolution: I'm sure many of them didn't deserve it. People died and lost their homes during the American Revolution, and during the Civil War: I'm sure many of them didn't deserve it, either.

I'm no big fan of the so-called "cancel culture", but justice is the only way I see that can rein it in.

[AnthonyMouse]

The probability for a black person of being killed by the police in the US is approximately 0.0005%. That's the probability of being killed (most commonly because you pulled a weapon on a cop), not the probability of being murdered, which is at least an order of magnitude lower than that.

There shouldn't be anybody getting murdered by the police. It's totally unreasonable. But it is in actual fact extremely uncommon.

[cookie_monsta]

It might be worth considering that murdered-on-tape-in-broad-daylight is at the extreme end of the spectrum of violence - both direct and indirect - that minorities experience throughout their lives. Otherwise you might end up with the belief that a black person's experience of the USA is only 0.0005% different to that of a white one's.

[darawk]

I think the point is that, though police violence is terrible and should absolutely be corrected, trying to summarize the United States with it is incredibly reductionist.

[cookie_monsta]

Maybe. Or maybe the point is that for some people systemic racism isn't just another abstract problem that doesn't really affect them every single day of their lives.

[filoeleven]

What’s the probability of being killed in a terrorist attack?

It happened a handful of times before in the US, then in 2001 reaction one attack spawned whole new agencies, onerous airport security changes, etc.—not to mention the longest running war in the country’s history. And for the most part, Americans were cheering about it.

Why is 9/11 revered as a national tragedy while ongoing murders by racist police are being downplayed?

[AnthonyMouse]

If you're looking for somebody to argue that the response to 9/11 wasn't an overreaction you're not going to get it from me.

[sdenton4]

The police murders are the most visible, egregious, tip of the iceberg. All the rest is all too common.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_New_Jim_Crow

[pydry]

Imagine a gang running your neighborhood that has a 0.0005% of murdering you (but if they do they'll get away with it) and an even "smaller* chance of protecting you from murder (don't forget that gangs exist for protection as much as power projection) , but is likely to beat, coerce and steal from you with total impunity.

The gang is well stocked with small arms, helicopters, tanks, missiles and even anti aircraft weapons.

They view you as threat to be pacifier although they're unlikely to murder you specifically.

What's to be done with that gang?

[AnthonyMouse]

> an even "smaller* chance of protecting you from murder

Considering how much murder is happening there already, I wouldn't guess that the amount there would be if the police stopped investigating them would be smaller than the existing rate of murders by police.

Also, as already mentioned, 0.0005% is the approximate rate at which the police kill black people, not the rate at which they murder them. What do you propose the cops do when someone draws a weapon on them?

> What's to be done with that gang?

You're talking about the local police, in black neighborhoods, in cities with Democrats already in elected office. They've been able to pass whatever changes they want this whole time, so what's stopping them?

[jessaustin]

Please don't assume that Democrats ever consider the best interests of "black neighborhoods". There's very little evidence that's the case. The most they can really claim is that they are often less overt in their racism than the other face of the status quo party.

[thaumasiotes]

> It is a by-product of a society where a cop can murder an African American in broad daylight and (in most cases) suffer no consequences.

A cop can murder anyone in broad daylight and, in most cases, suffer no consequences; there's nothing specific about African Americans.

[specialist]

I honestly have no idea what "cancel culture" is.

I've been fired, expelled, shushed, shunned, ghosted, excluded, ignored, plagiarized, mocked, insulted, attacked, divorced, blocked. Publicly and privately.

Such is the life of the rebel, the truthsayer.

Every nail that sticks up is gonna get pounded down.

Daring to point out the emperor is naked is an unforgivable offense.

This is normal.

Receiving criticism generally means you're saying something interesting.

I'd hate to be so boring that I'm not even worth criticizing.

FYI, Socrates was "canceled", and we're still talking about him.

Further, society should "cancel" the trolls, heathens, hate mongers. That's what society is for. Filters are important.

--

Edit: Counterpoint's "Canceling" is a much smarter, useful, timely treatise https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OjMPJVmXxV8

[refurb]

Similarly, my wife's family came from an oppressive SE Asia country. One of them escaped on a boat and spent 3 years in a refugee camp in a country that refused to admit them. They eventually made it to the US and survived on nothing but the generosity of Americans.

They are now firmly upper-middle class and consider the US as truly the land of opportunity and are grateful they had the chance to come here.

[EdwardDiego]

When writing this, did you consider that most African Americans are descended from people who didn't get to bring a suitcase? That they were still fighting to be treated as equal citizens a century and a half after no longer being considered property?

And that the fact that they're over-represented in basketball doesn't mean that inequality is solved?

[olivermarks]

@edwardDiego there are sadly currently 9 million+ slaves in Africa and slavery and people trafficking is a huge trade worldwide today.

"According to the U.N.'s International Labor Organization (ILO), there are more than three times as many people in forced servitude today as were captured and sold during the 350-year span of the transatlantic slave trade", Time Magazine March 14, 2019. https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/16152/modern-slavery

The USA is a nation of immigrants. Look at the incredibly diverse people seeking a better life as they came through Ellis Island just over a century ago and where America is today.

https://www.nps.gov/media/photo/gallery.htm?id=6529EB6C-155D....

Also take a look at the great work by Charliebo313 documenting ghetto realities in the US today for black people. https://www.youtube.com/user/CharlieBo313

Even though I feel black north american culture is foundational to the American experience, and a major reason why I emigrated from England to California, the current era of people speaking on behalf of 'BIPOC' people is mildly insulting to those people given the internal dialogs within that culture around who is helping and who is hurting. The reductionism of black and white (sic) simplistic thinking isn't helping anyone.

[tathougies]

Yup. My mom and dad came to this country with nothing. My mom had $30 and a husband, who, she didn't even know, was 'employed' by her brother-in-law but not paid wages. They managed to escape virtual slavery at age 30, have two kids, and achieve the American dream. Mom even went to school again while putting both her kids in private school (didn't live in a great school district).

America's been pretty great to us. Both my brother and I married outside our race. My brother and I are all American. My daughter and my nieces and nephews are literally the most american story you can make. Their existence is only made possible by a place such as America. The melting pot still exists, and it's amazing.

Cancel culture seeks to destroy that which makes America great. Is it perfect, no... of course not. Don't let perfect be the enemy of good. For all their failures, the various figure in American history often also have views and attitudes worth remembering, and that's what they're idolized for. And good for them... their ideals are better than the alternative. Without these imperfect individuals holding on to their -- sometimes even hypocritical -- ideals, stories like my parent's, my wife's parents, and my sister-in-law's parents would never happen.

Happy Independence Day!

[rayiner]

We cancelled the melting pot: https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/volokh-conspiracy/wp/201...

[tathougies]

Yeah I'm familiar. Was told i was white by my history professor because I believed in american ideals. Academia is the source of the worst ideas

[vinay427]

This seems like a rather extreme conclusion to draw from your anecdote. Academia is not a single entity, and it is far from "the" source of bad ideas.

[tptacek]

Where by "we" you appear to mean "The University of California" and by "cancel" you mean "didn't cancel".

From the same article, in its update:

Contrary to what has been reported, no one at the University of California is prohibited from making statements such as “America is a melting pot,”

[tathougies]

> Contrary to what has been reported, no one at the University of California is prohibited from making statements such as “America is a melting pot,”

Simply being discouraged from saying something is scary enough. Look at the UCLA professor who didn't give his students extra time on the tests and received death threats. The silencing is deafening. Maybe you should try to hear it.

This is what I refer to: https://nypost.com/2020/06/10/ucla-suspends-professor-for-re...

[geofft]

This is attacking a straw man. There is no (serious) argument to "cancel" America wholesale (well, apart from the anarchists, but they'd agree with you about all those other countries too). There is a serious argument for holding America accountable for the things she has done wrong. You only hold people accountable whom you believe are actually trying to do good and whom you actually think can do better. People talk about the world's dictatorships and ongoing crimes against humanity with a tone of resignation because nobody really expects them to decide to be better; they talk about America with a tone of correction because they believe America can improve. Your parents didn't "cancel" you for each childhood mistake, but I certainly hope they asked you to demonstrate that you understood what you did wrong and asked you to make amends if possible - that's how you grow.

That's what Popehat's story is about, I think. The story is poignant specifically because America broke a promise to these soldiers - and finally acknowledged and remedied it. The author makes it clear that these soldiers had every right to be hurt, but they loved America anyway - which is very different from ignoring the mistake. The author calls it a "stain on out honor" because we have honor.

It wasn't their responsibility to criticize America for failing them - but that means it was someone else's responsibility. Part of what makes the nation great is that in 1990 people did care enough to grant then citizenship, finally.

"America! America! God mend thine every flaw! Confirm thy soul in self-control, thy liberty in law!"

[rayiner]

There is a serious attempt to cancel America, that goes beyond holding America responsible for its past wrongs. Someone posted a link to this tweet elsewhere in this thread: https://mobile.twitter.com/arlenparsa/status/116818940954980...

I think this is not an uncommon opinion and it’s becoming more and more mainstream. And that sort of thinking is an attempt to cancel America. It’s not just saying that America has done certain bad things and we need to fix them. It’s saying that the founders were bad so we get to relitigate everything. America can always be improved, but you can’t just slap the label “America” on whatever grab-bag of ideas you want. America is an opinionated nation (in the sense of “opinionated software”). And there is an ongoing movement to cancel those opinions.

[lm28469]

> There is a serious attempt to cancel America

_links to a random post on twitter_

See, this, right there, is the root of the majority of our problems. The world isn't twitter.

Twitter is majoritarily left leaning, middle class, white, US male, millennials [0] stop making it sound like the world is out to cancel the US. It's a tiny minority of the world on a big website, a big fish in a small pond. Don't shape your view of the world through twitter.

It's like going to a KKK rally and being upset everyone is racist.

[0] https://www.omnicoreagency.com/twitter-statistics/

[tptacek]

Can you see how a reasonable person might read this as catastrophizing? The tweet you linked to is pretty banal, and appears factual. I'm having trouble even connecting the dots from "many of the founders were slaveowners" to "let's cancel America". The nuns taught me the same thing in 1980s Catholic grammar school.

[rayiner]

It would be a perfectly fine observation if that was all. But it goes further and says that “the next time someone says we can’t question their judgment on guns or whatever, show them this image.” That logic—or lack thereof, it’s an ad hominem—can be used to put all of our founding principles on the chopping block. It’s an attempt to delegitimize the animating principles of our country.

[tptacek]

I'm having trouble with this, because it implies pretty directly that Lincoln betrayed the founding principles of the country when he abolished slavery. Obviously, you don't mean that. But how does your argument square with it? Or with women's suffrage? Is it just that Lincoln was nicer to the founding fathers?

[geofft]

It is an attention to argue that the founding principles of this country are open to legitimate debate and that people who love America can hold that some of them were simply wrong without loving America any less.

What I don't get is this newfound attempt to argue that what we once called the Great Experiment is immune from criticism, to portray the success of America as an inevitable result of the holy prophets who gave us the Constitution on stone tablets and not the work of men who made mistakes and learned from them.

[jariel]

Colin Kaepernick Tweeted today that 'July 4th is a Celebration of White Supremacy'.

This is an existential attack on the nation by a popular figure defended and support by most of the press and major international corporations.

I don't have the reference, but yesterday, in response to an arguably racist Tweet about a white person doing something within the range of normal, but being interpreted as negative, the top Tweet response from a Black woman with over 10K likes was simply 'White people are a disease'. Nobody though to take this down as 'hate speech it seems'. This is definitely an 'existential' statement about the system, not just the narrower BLM ideal of rectifying police injustice etc..

There is a legit movement to rectify past wrongs obviously, but there are definitely existential aspects to this that cannot be ignored.

So those are very populist examples, but there are definitely more foundational intellectual movements afoot as well.

'Cancel America' is sadly, a thing, mixed in with all the other things.

[1] https://twitter.com/Kaepernick7/status/1279463720318570497

[tptacek]

I'll debate existential attacks with people who know what the word "existential" means, but not with people who think the term could apply to a Colin Kaepernick tweet.

[thinkingemote]

The terms are getting diluted to meaninglessness.

For many, just recently "White Supremacy" now equates to "Western Supremacy" which is left to the readers imagination. I suspect that, for example, advocating for democracy, defending the idea of innocent until proven guilty, criticism of repressive regimes, promoting free enterprise or espousing about the sanctity of the individual, or perhaps just Christianity could be seen as promotion of western standards and therefore a supremacist. Where before a white supremacist was just literally a neo nazi, now they might or might not be any politician from 30 years ago.

No one knows anymore.

[jrmg]

The questioning of opinions in the service of building a nation in which everyone has equal opportunity is one of the most American opinions there is.

If that’s gone then all is lost.

[Edit: and I don’t believe it’s gone!]

[geofft]

Like software, America is not the set of opinions it happens to have today but the process for changing those opinions. A healthy software development project has leadership that feels comfortable changing the software as they learn more about how people are using it. If, say, Kubernetes adds support for adding containers to an already-running Pod, that's not an attempt to "cancel" Kubernetes, it's an attempt to improve it.

The founders were, in fact, people who made serious errors of moral judgment, in the way the tweet you link points out. That's a reason we shouldn't, in fact, trust every opinion they had. We can still follow their opinions on process and principles - we can believe that all men were created equal, and take it to the logical conclusion that they didn't. We can believe in a representative democracy with certain features. We can believe in the various branches of government. We can believe, as they did, that people with their facilities of reason can govern better than any king with divine right.

If you really think that admitting that the founders owned slaves is an attack on the heart of America and that you cannot love America without agreeing with the founding fathers about slavery, well, that's the first good argument I've heard for canceling America - but you're the one making it.

[rayiner]

> The founders were, in fact, people who made serious errors of moral judgment, in the way the tweet you link points out. That's a reason we shouldn't, in fact, trust every opinion they had. We can still follow their opinions on process and principles - we can believe that all men were created equal, and take it to the logical conclusion that they didn't. We can believe in a representative democracy with certain features. We can believe in the various branches of government. We can believe, as they did, that people with their facilities of reason can govern better than any king with divine right.

Agreed. Add to that separation of powers, federalism, limited government, protection of private property, gun rights, free speech, religious freedom, etc. Because those are also principles that the country is built upon.

> A healthy software development project has leadership that feels comfortable changing the software as they learn more about how people are using it.

Your software analogy is very good, but it supports my point, not yours. Software, like our country, is built on structural principles. Kubernetes is built on containerization. UNIX is based on exposing everything as a file. L4 is based on various principles associated with microkernels. Those principles transcend any specific features. For example, you can argue against systemd on the basis that it contradicts the UNIX principle of having small, independent programs that each do one thing. We shouldn't be able to attack those principles through ad hominem attacks on the people who articulated them.

> If you really think that admitting that the founders owned slaves is an attack on the heart of America

That's not what the tweet is doing. Read the whole thing. The tweet is invoking that fact to attack one of the founding principles, specifically gun rights.

Apply your software analogy to the logic of the tweet, say in the context of ReiserFS: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ReiserFS. ReiserFS has a design principle that various kinds of metadata are stored in a "single, combined B+ tree keyed by a universal object ID." That principle permeates the structure of the whole file system. Is it proper to attack that principle by saying "Hans Reiser murdered his wife?" That's exactly the sort of reasoning in the tweet.

[tptacek]

Agreed. Add to that separation of powers, federalism, limited government, protection of private property, gun rights, free speech, religious freedom, etc. Because those are also principles that the country is built upon.

The framers didn't believe in limited government. They didn't even incorporate their own bill of rights into the states! Their successors had to do it for them! The framers were concerned about limiting the federal government. And the people concerned about making sure the Constitution affirmatively protected religion? Yeah, those'd be the antifederalists. The only thing the Constitution says about religion is that the government should be kept the hell away from it.

These are nitpicks, but I think they're important, because the argument you're constructing uses terms that are used by American conservatives, and in that context they mean very different things. The American right seeks to limit all government, laboratories of democracy be damned. Would the framers wouldn't have batted an eyelash at the idea that a state constitution might impinge on the second amendment? Was it unusual for locales to prohibit firearms at the time?

[camgunz]

Gun rights aren’t a founding principle; the second amendment only applied to militias. Previous drafts of it, as well as the Federalist papers make this clear.

[lm28469]

Your argument reads as a convoluted form of "I have a black friend so I can't be racist". I've never seen so many straw men in a single post.

The US has problems that are nowhere as bad in other first world countries and people seem to not even be able to acknowledge that. They're 2 steps ahead on some aspects and 10 steps behind on many more. Yes some people have it real good in the US, but many other have it real bad too, and the ones who have it bad have it worse than in most first world countries. That you and your friends are successful doesn't change that fact.

When people go in the streets, weeks after weeks, risking to get maimed or killed, you have to ask yourself why. If you stop at "Uh I don't like that", "they're just thugs" you haven't done your job as a citizen. Talking of history, people going in the streets and making things change is a pretty big part of almost any countries' history. If anything they're writing history right now.

> And if we follow the logic of cancel culture, we should cancel Rome, cancel Greece, cancel renaissance, cancel all religions, cancel Europe, cancel China, cancel India, cancel Africa. They all had their share of slavery, for centuries. They all had their share of atrocity, again for centuries. Then what's left? What's the point? And should we cancel our childhood? Should we cancel ourselves? Most of us, after all, did something stupid or horrible when we were young. Should our parents cancel us?

What logic ? Come on, stop playing dumb, no one ever made these points, ever. Go outside, out of your echo chambers, in the real world, talk to people. What you're describing doesn't exist outside of twitter fringe communities.

> That's why it's history! Human learn. Human improve.

And that's exactly what people are trying to do when they tell you to stop flying the confederate flag and having statues of people with dubious past in front of their town hall.

> We have NBA who have more than 70% of black athletes. We idolize them.

Right, "shut up and dribble". https://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2018/02/19/587097707... also https://youtu.be/DMUVeMmyFxk?t=115. Racism in sport has always been there, it's painfully obvious as soon as you start digging.

[hintymad]

> you have to ask yourself why. If you stop at "Uh I don't like that", "they're just thugs" you haven't done your job as a citizen. Talking of history, people going in the streets and making things change is a pretty big part of almost any countries' history. If anything they're writing history right now.

What kind of straw man is this? In which part of the comment did I complain about peaceful protesting? Huh? In which part of the comment did I say US does not have flaws? And in which part of the comment did I say "they are just thugs"? Since you're talking about it, let's be specific: those who tear down statues without city's permission are thugs. Those who burned down buildings are thugs. Those who shoot innocent people are thugs. Those who spray graffiti on private properties are thugs. Those who carry out the plan of "if we don't what we deserve, we will burn the system down" are thugs. Those who looted business are thugs. Those who shot people in CHAZ are thugs. And let's be clear, any one, be it left or right or moderate, does any of the above is a thug. Oh, and the reporters who told audience that "the protest is largely peaceful" while standing right in front of a burning building while thugs were looting? They are thugs too because they are willing to sacrifice other people's rights to advance their own political ideal.

> What logic ? Come on, stop playing dumb, no one ever made these points, ever. Go outside, out of your echo chambers, in the real world, talk to people. What you're describing doesn't exist outside of twitter fringe communities.

I'm not sure who's playing dumb here, and who's in an echo chamber. Are you saying "cancel culture" does not exist? 'Cause I was specifically criticizing the cancel culture and particularly the support it gets from MSM like WaPo and NYT. Are you saying WaPo or NYT didn't publish articles that support "cancellation" of Mount Rushmore just because its lead sculptor was a racist? Are you saying WaPo didn't publish another article that argues "It is time to reconsider the global legacy of July 4, 1776", which argues that "American independence helped further colonialism and white supremacy"? Are you saying the congress didn't condone the cancel culture? Are you saying that a professor in Oxford didn't say "white lives do not matter", and the university didn't stand behind it? Are you saying that WaPo didn't publish an article yesterday that specifically argues that "Both namesakes of Washington and Lee University perpetuated racial terror. The school should be renamed"? Are you saying that no one was yelling "Burn the system down" in protest? Are you saying that no one burned the flag of the US? No one flashed middle fingers to the fireworks yesterday? And no one got beaten for waving a flag of the US? Are you saying that statues are not toppled, schools are not renamed, or Gone with the Wind were not taken offline?

> And that's exactly what people are trying to do when they tell you to stop flying the confederate flag and having statues of people with dubious past in front of their town hall.

This is such a straw man. Shame on you. Both far right and far left are dangerous. Why do I even need to mention such common sense to you?

> Right, "shut up and dribble". https://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2018/02/19/587097707.... also https://youtu.be/DMUVeMmyFxk?t=115. Racism in sport has always been there, it's painfully obvious as soon as you start digging.

Of course racism exists. In which part did I say it did't? I bet there are more racism in people's private conversation. NBA is really just one example that the system in the US is not rigged by racist. Of course I don't know what I don't know, hence I was honestly asking what policies are racist policies, and what prevents us from changing them.

[vore]

As an immigrant, I don't feel the same sadness you do. There's still many injustices in the US, and framing it as "hating their own country" is extremely unfair: people are frustrated about a lot of things, people are emotional about a lot of things, and I don't think it's fair for you to discard it as simply "disdain".

After all, America was founded on rebellion against the status quo (what day is it today again?), and I hope that doesn't change.

[zipwitch]

As an American from birth, and speaking for myself, it's not hating my country. It's frustration and sometimes anger at our failure to do better. I believe that doing better than we are is within our grasp, but we, as a nation, so often seem to turn away from positive change in favor of a comfortable and easy (for many Americans) status quo that is ultimately inadequate and often blindly hypocritical.

[vore]

Even from just examining the present, it's hard to find much to like about how the US is handling a pandemic.

[WalterBright]

It's generally left up to the states to deal with it as they see fit. I don't see anything particularly wrong with that. Some governors have stepped up, some haven't.

[082349872349872]

The epidemiological term for those that haven't is reservoir.

[maxerickson]

Budget constraints.

I know people like to fantasize that the national debt will be paid down eventually, but we are just sitting waiting for widespread budget crises and the municipal and state levels. The federal government can solve the problem with the stroke of a pen.

[hootbootscoot]

Particularly the (lack of a concerted) federal government response to the COVID pandemic.

Selective support of states rights when it's Pandemic Time counts as "kicking the can down the road" to the poster below me.

[rayiner]

We have fewer Covid deaths per capita than four of the five biggest countries in the EU. Do you think people in France or Spain are “ashamed” of their country’s handling of the outbreak?

[MagnumOpus]

That is incorrect (Belgium is not one of the biggest EU countries nor is Sweden). But even if it were true, wouldn't you want to aspire to something greater than being 7th going on 6th in the world out of 200 countries in terms of deaths per capita?

This thread seems to have too many examples of effusivelt lauding the US for being marginally better than whichever repulsive place that is worst in the world at a particular metric - rather than trying to be the shining "city upon a hill" and taking up best practices.

[rayiner]

We are ahead of France, Italy, Spain, and the UK. These are not “repulsive places” that are the worst in the world on a metric—they’re some of the richest and most developed countries in the world, and account for half the population of the EU.

[hef19898]

Well for now. With cases rising like crazy in the US, it fair to assume deaths will follow.

It always puzzles me that this kind of argument goes "we are the best" -> "here are numbers that show you are not" -> "but we are not the worst, look over there". Kind of like discussing sports teams. Same fanboyism.

France just replaced the government, the prime minister that is, after the local elections. The former prime minister is being investigated over his treatment of the Covid-19 pandemic.

[hootbootscoot]

No other nation in the world had a clown trying to turn facemasks into a political issue to argue about.

Oh sorry, one other nation did, and it's argued that that clown was installed the same way our clown was by the same foxy Australian media mogul.

No other nation had a total jackass absolutely hamper every single effort to contain the virus.

No other nation had such a moronic leader who literally stalled for 6 weeks in his initial response to this.

Spare me the nonsense, please don't LIE to my face. We all saw it.

[rayiner]

My family is Bangladeshi immigrants and we have been talking about this lately too. My parents just moved into a new house, and yesterday my dad installed a big American flag. My parents are Democrats so they agree ideologically with CNN, etc., but even they’re getting sick of the over-the-top weeping and rending of clothes.

[defen]

There is basically no penalty (social, legal, financial, professional, etc) for going "too far" in condemning America, especially if you are a middle-to-upper class white person in an urban area. In fact there may be rewards. So just thinking about the dynamics of that, why wouldn't people go too far?

[hootbootscoot]

Did it ever occur to you that media outlets are businesses, and so their talking bobble-heads pander to whatever they think will help their bottom-line and perception as being "cool" or "with it"?

TBH, I was initially imagining your family being a bit sick of all the weeping and rending of clothes about Sacred America, the national entity one must worship or be unworthy. Embrace the flag or GTFO!

Get over it, it's a place. It's a country. It has a checkered past, as most countries do. It's not perfect, nor is it the most villainous regime ever.

The current trend towards realizing Americas flaws is related to it's decline as an empire. Expect more of the same to the degree that said flaws are not addressed, expect more decline and plan for it, ideally by de-imperialising like Kemal Ataturk would have recommended, lol.

What some smarter folks may realize is that America has created a global empire and an imperial structure to match it, replete with satrapies. Surely there are some consequences for being the Global Cop (TM) As history assures us, no empire lasts forever.

I would humbly propose less handwringing but also less manipulation of the rest of the world, as this will save us from future handwringing. Let's back out of the Global Empire business and start trying to back the values we actually stand for.

Supporting Mubarak and Sisi in Egypt is not a long term value I will argue we should be projecting. Do I need to elaborate further on this theme? We risk leaving the world a legacy of mere "might = right", which is not likely the legacy we want to be remembered for.

If one truly "LOVES" ones country, (It's a bizarre thing to require compulsive adoration of an abstract entity on par with the feelings one has for a spouse or family member. Such compulsory adulation is a tool used to build armies and blind loyalty, which is wrongful. I realize that one may need to find a structure of meaning to comprehend the loss of a loved one who died following orders and "defending a nation") one will seek to fix its flaws and will address criticisms as bringing up potential flaws to address.

[_fq4v]

Vote Red. Don't mistake not being mentioned with being ignored. Took my parents (Indian) a while to make the switch, but they've never looked back.

> We believe in equal opportunity, equal justice, and equal treatment for citizens of every race, background, religion, and creed. Every child, of every color — born and unborn — is made in the holy image of God. (Applause.)

> We want free and open debate, not speech codes and cancel culture.

> We embrace tolerance, not prejudice.

> ...

> We are the country of Andrew Jackson, Ulysses S. Grant, and Frederick Douglass. We are the land of Wild Bill Hickock and Buffalo Bill Cody. (Applause.) We are the nation that gave rise to the Wright Brothers, the Tuskegee Airmen — (applause) — Harriet Tubman, Clara Barton, Jesse Owens, George Patton — General George Patton — the great Louie Armstrong, Alan Shepard, Elvis Presley, and Mohammad Ali. (Applause.) And only America could have produced them all. (Applause.) No other place.

-- Trump's address at Mt Rushmore

EDIT: you don't even need to vote for Trump, just look at your local elections.

[ThrowawayR2]

Ye gods, no. Never.

While the progressives are indeed successfully driving Indians, Asians and other immigrants into the arms of Republicans thanks to their embrace of identity politics and cancel culture, the answer is for the silent majority of mainstream liberals to openly repudiate progressivism, as Obama did, and drive them away from the Democratic Party. Make it clear that the liberal left truly welcomes people of all races and beliefs, not just the ones the progressives favor, and that the left seeks to heal the country, not to divide it as Trump and the progressives do.

[AnthonyMouse]

> Make it clear that the left truly welcomes people of all races and beliefs

Everyone could do this regardless of party affiliation.

[jessaustin]

Is it truly the "progressives" who have the identitarian obsession? From my observations of really leftist folks, they seem most eager to talk about class and economics and peace. (Thanks, Obama!) Meanwhile the presumed presidential candidate, embarrassed as he must be by his racist history, can't decide which woman of color he wants as VP, but he knows she will be a woman of color.

[jessaustin]

Based on her performance on "Beat the Depressed" this morning, she'll probably be Susan Rice... Less problematic domestically than many of her rivals, but more problematic internationally.

[charlescearl]

If you fail to understand how so many Indigenous and Black people of this country view it with such contempt, I would recommend a few reads. But first I would ask you to consider that whatever greatness it can claim lies not in it’s continued founding myths, but in the many unheralded acts of sacrifice and resistance that so many of it’s marginalized citizens made and continue to make down to this very minute.

James Baldwin’s “The Fire Next Time”, or his “No Name in the Street” layout both how the country was brought to the reckoning of the Civil Rights movement and then completely capitulated to white supremacy. Frederick Douglass’s “What to the Slave is the 4th of July” [1] still rings true to so many of us. Read David Truer’s “ The Heartbeat of Wounded Knee: Native America from 1890 to the Present” on the meticulousness explicated horror of how this country has and continues to destroy and devalue Indigenous life.

The people protesting Friday in the Black Hills or in the front lines of the Black Lives Matter actions are calling upon us all to view it as it is, and dare to imagine what it could be. I am sad that we don’t embrace the movement to bring about real democracy.

[1] https://nmaahc.si.edu/blog-post/nations-story-what-slave-fou...

[rayiner]

> I would ask you to consider that whatever greatness it can claim lies not in it’s continued founding myths, but in the many unheralded acts of sacrifice and resistance that so many of it’s marginalized citizens made and continue to make down to this very minute.

Did you mean to make this an either or thing? I’m a supporter of BLM and have long been a supporter of criminal justice reform. But I also think a lot of America's “greatness” rests on the founders’ creation of a Republic with limited government, separation of powers, free speech, freedom of religion, freedom of assembly, an armed citizenry, due process, etc.

People shouldn’t take those things for granted, because those were also achievements, not some inevitable, universal principles. I come from a country that has ideas like freedom of religion and due process embedded in its constitution. We lifted these ideas from the US Constitution and the magna carts because they are foreign to us. For example, according to the dominant religion in our country, people of other religions should not enjoy equal status. Likewise, freedom of speech is a totally foreign concept imported from the west.

[wincy]

Who isn’t embracing it? Every person I know on LinkedIn has made some sort of statement, including a few high level managers I went to school with and could call out because they say they’re an “ally” and lived in a “diverse” neighborhood when really they lived in the rich subdivision and went to private school as the neighborhood became “lower class”. But I don’t really know what putting an old classmate on blast on LinkedIn is going to accomplish.

[noworriesnate]

Black lives do matter, but BLM the organization gets a lot of flak because they're unfortunately hijacking the concern of black lives with a Marxist political agenda. Here's one of the founders discussing this in an interview about BLM: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kCghDx5qN4s&t=423s

It's sad to me that we can't have a conversation about police brutality without having Marxists inject themselves into the conversation and harness it for a political agenda that is so violent and manipulative. I care very much about the sanctity of all lives, but I can't discuss black lives without having to explain that I don't support Marxists. That is messed up.

[charlescearl]

If you have come to a point of discomfort in seeing Marxism discussed within the context of Black Lives Matter, then you are where you need to be. Sit with it.

It is a radical movement, the larger goal of which, discussed in [1,2], is the complete dismantling of white supremacy. What would a United States look like in which all life was equally valued? We don’t know, none of us has experienced that world, and that is why (I would contend) there is an urgent need to consider all options. The movement is not just about anti-Black policing, it is about bringing about a United States (a world?) where Black life (or the life of any marginalized person) is as valued and as treasured and held as sacred as any other.

You might also consider that Black radicalism has a long intellectual history [3,4,5].

In sum, I am saying to take a moment to understand the long historical context that birthed this movement. Sit with the discomfort that goes along with the process that will bring that world into being.

[1] “When they call you a terrorist: a black lives matter memoir”, Patrice Khan-Cullors, Asha Bandele

[2] “Stay woke: a People’s Guide to Making All Black Lives Matter”, Tehama Lopez Bunyasi, Candis Watts Smith

[3] “The Black Jacobins”, C.L.R. James

[4] “Black Marxism: The Making of the Black Radical Tradition”, Cedric Robinson

[5] “Black Reconstruction in America: 1860-1880”, W.E.B. DuBois

[dorado3]

The idea that others are to blame for one’s suffering is maybe the most potent and toxic of all political ideas, and it has thrived like a mind-virus for thousands of years. The truth is that people of all races in the USA are _not_ blocked by racism from living a good live, but certain political forces sell this story (the victim identity) in order to control certain groups of voters, and play shallow ego-gratifying mind games in academia.

[nec4b]

I have hardly seen any black or native American viewing its country with contempt. Most of the haters are young native born white leftist without any recent experience with immigration within their families.

[rconti]

I believe you've constructed a straw man argument about those who "hate" their own country.

It's easy to feel self-righteous when your opposition "hates".

I guarantee you someone out there thinks that I hate America, just because they extrapolate a whole set of beliefs from one thing I've said.

There are people out there (probably on your Nextdoor, because they're certainly on mine!), angry about BLM protests. Angry about the chaos. Angry about statues. Angry about violence. Angry about looting. People saying "if these protestors get in my way, I'mma run them over in my truck." People saying "if you want help defending your business, just say the word and me and my bros will come back you up". People saying "when the looting starts, the shooting starts." People like our president. Advocating extrajudicial execution of American citizens. Do they hate America? Why or why not?

[watersb]

We don't hate our country! We want it to live up to its promise for everyone. Truth and justice for all is hard. If we didn't believe in it, we wouldn't try.

[refurb]

As an immigrant the US I feel the exact same way. American don't know how good they have it compared to a lot of the world.

[pdonis]

> we are so sad how much the "native born" people of the US hate their own country

Not all of them do. I was born in the US and I love my country.

[systemvoltage]

It’s interesting to see how Europeans are so nationalistic. The Swiss are very proud. They have excellent branding so to speak and you’ll know when something is Swiss made because the marketing around it would be overwhelming. I dated an Italian and there was intense sense of patriotism in everything they did. On the other hand, Swedes and Germans aren’t as much.

Nationalism in some ways bothers me because it creates a lens through which you see the world in a form of distortion.

Btw, I am an American.

[WalterBright]

My mother was an immigrant. While she always loved her country of origin, she grew to love America more.

[beaner]

I feel like I might get downvoted for this, but a large part of it comes from a sense of guilt about clearly being the most successful and powerful country in the world. When nearly everyone else on earth constantly gives you shit (while also trying to enter...) many people here have started accepting those foreign perspectives and seeing themselves as spoiled and privileged. I can remember this being true from when I was a child. It has been happening for a long time. Complacent adults have never stood up and tried to set things straight.

Many Americans don't want to seem naive about how good they have it, so they overcompensate by disliking the country instead.

It doesn't help that being successful has made life incredibly easy for a significant fraction of people, who find fulfillment in social justice rather than family and work, because they aren't as necessary anymore. Social justice as a way of living tends to correlate with self hatred, which extends to the country.

There are other factors of course, but these ones are large.

[microtonal]

about clearly being the most successful and powerful country in the world

And this to the rest of the world is typical America arrogance. I am sorry to be blunt, but I have to call it out.

I won't debate that the US is the most powerful country in the world. But 'most successful' is very debatable. I have been in the US often, and found that most Americans are far less well off than in other Western democracies. Most Americans have very few vacation days, poor healthcare, and are in a spot where losing their job means a large probability of falling into poverty. Plus your political system (democrat or republican) completely fails to serve most citizens.

To add to the offense, the nationalism instilled in many Americans makes it so that they believe that these are not failings of the system. After all, everyone can live the American dream, and if you do not make it, it is your own responsibility rather than that of the system that puts most people at a large disadvantage.

I would never even consider moving from Nothern/Western Europe to the US. Canada, maybe. Australia, New Zealand, possibly. But never the US.

[beaner]

I don't know that it's possible to debate without going down very large, very opinionated rabbit holes. You're very clearly wrong on a number of things, I'm sorry. But it should suffice to quantify it with numbers and trends. Namely that Americans don't leave America for quality of life reasons; millions of foreign immigrants want to and attempt to and many succeed illegally; immigrants try from all over the world, not just its direct southern neighbor, despite the US's relative distance from the rest of the world; even Americans who claim to hate the country never leave.

I understand your perspective and think it's fair. When it comes to people voting with their feet however, you do not represent the reality for most people.

Edit: Additionally, "Western Europeans move to the US in far greater numbers — both proportionally and in absolute terms — than Americans move to Western Europe." [0]

[0] https://mises.org/wire/3-times-many-europeans-move-us-other-...

[nec4b]

And the majority of world voting with its feet does not agree with you.

[hef19898]

There is a huge difference between seeing and accepting the bad things, past and present, and hating ones own country. A lot of people I know, that share your opinion, seem to overcompensate for all the bad things. They try to ignore them, and everyone pointing these bad things out has automatically fail to see the good things, thus hating ones country. This is a very slippery slope.

[sizzle]

Twitter and social media platforms shoulder some of the blame here for this phenomenon you are noticing due to their engagement algorithms amplifying outrage in your newsfeeds.

[sorwin]

This has also been a constant topic amongst my family, extended family and many friends (mostly european).

My entire family (including me) and extended family immigrated here within the last 10-30 years, yet we all love living here, and have the same sentiment around people who have been born here. They were given such a great opportunity (that we all had to work for), yet most of them throw it away and have little love for the country and what it offers.

I even have family and friends on H1B/student visas who despite all thesese issues, are supporting a lot of these right-wing issues after these protests, which was a bit surprising (considering the ban on the visas)

[bradhoffman]

Me too.

[hootbootscoot]

Do they hate their country or the wicked humans and laws ruling it? Do they hate their country or love it deeply and want it changed for the better?

Does criticism equal hatred in your mind?