 |
| Rob's Soapbox | ||
|
Congratulations!
You have finally landed on the one page on this entire site (and on the entire internet for that matter) that is purely without bullshit... my soapbox page. There are a lot of times during our show that, whether it's because of time constraints and other obligations, I don't always get to address some issues that I feel don't get the attention they deserve. There are even more times when I just don't feel like waiting until the show the next day to get some things off my chest. Thus, I have started the "Rob's Soapbox" page. If you have clicked on this page looking for someone to coddle your fragile sense of self-esteem, or tell you what you want to hear or to reinforce your outdated world view, then exit this page right now and go somewhere else. If you are in search of the last forum for reason and common sense left in the world, then sit back, relax, and enjoy. I make only one promise with this soapbox page... if you read long enough and often enough, you will eventually be offended. So here's my latest soapbox. Listen up, 'cause you just might learn something... |
||
|
||
|
April 23rd, 2007 WHEN IN DOUBT, BLAME AMERICA Pride in America went by the wayside decades ago, culminating with the "make love, not war," debacle that was the 1960's, during which America was evil and everyone else just "trying as hard as they could." America has drifted ever since and the culture wars have solved nothing but to divide us further. Even events such as 9/11 have failed to galvanize our patriotism and unite us for longer than a few brief moments when placed against the backdrop of all of time. We live in a culture of self involved, cowardly, ignorant lemmings who will simply follow the "popular" movement of the time or at the very least succumb to what I call the politics of repetition. Long ago, marketers learned that to convince people, all that needed to be done was to say the same thing over and over again and eventually people will just repeat the phrase as though it were fact. In the political arena (and cultural arena for that matter) the same theory is applied. Most of America has no idea what the hell a stem cell is, but they've been told over and over again by Michael J. Fox that if we researched them, diseases like his Parkinson's would be cured. To whit, 67% of America supports Stem Cell research, but less than 20% of them know what it is. In the fall of 2002, 75% of America thought that Iraq had no direct involvement in 9/11. 6 Months later after being barraged by an all out assault of Public Relations on the part of the Bush Administration, lead by their most credible speaker, Colin Powell, 75% of American's said that there was a direct tie between Iraq and 9/11. The politics of repetition are both effective and powerful. After more than 4 decades of being publicly told, repeatedly, that America is gluttonous, selfish, imperialistic, wasteful, intolerant, hateful, lavish, rude, arrogant, too strong, too successful, too powerful and too insistent we have created an entire subculture of people dubbed the "Blame America First" crowd. Alas, when anything, ever, happens anywhere, the culprit is publicly pronounced to be the United States of America. It's akin to being the Bart Simpson of the world. Someone broke something? Must be Bart. Somebody doesn't feel good about themselves? Must be America's fault. Don't for a minute misunderstand me. I am an avid fan and student of history and I am the first to acknowledge and admit to America's myriad of mistakes. We are far from perfect and must accept such. However, it is one thing to admit that the Bay of Pigs was one of the greatest military failures in history, it is far another to blame America for global warming, AIDS, and the creation of terrorism. In the wake of the Virginia Tech shootings, it took less than a day for the finger of blame to be pointed at all the wrong places, headed straight for our very culture. It began with gun laws, circled towards the media and ended up at the feet of the American people themselves. During the week-long coverage, it was never the shooter's fault that he murdered, in cold, calculating blood, 32 innocent young Americans and still isn't. It was also not, and still isn't, the shooter's family or parents who had anything to do with his "snapping." If America had stricter gun laws, a media that was more responsible, and a culture that was less mean and bloodthirsty, none of this ever would have happened, screamed the handwringers of our society. For a while, violent video games were blamed (then we discovered he didn't play them), then the psychiatric profession was put under a microscope for about 9 minutes until we realized that "they tried." It mattered not, because the target was always the same; this country. The trick was figuring out the way to wrap all of the reasons into one neat, little, ball, as to why America must take the blame for this massacre. The story goes something like this; nearly two decades ago, Cho Sung Hui's family legally immigrated to America in search of the American Dream because it wasn't available to them in their native land of South Korea. This country of America, as it has always done, welcomed them with open arms and provided them all of the opportunity one could imagine. The Cho family assimilated into our culture, the most tolerant and least bigoted culture on the planet, bar none, and ultimately became legal residents and immigrant citizens of our country. Cho's sister became an employee of America's State Department, while Cho himself attended one of the most elite universities in the nation, Virginia Tech. We are a cold, miserable country aren't we? Along the way, Cho was teased for being "different." Apparently, despite my identical experience while growing up, Cho is the only person to have ever gone through such a thing (Arnie, that's meant to be sarcastic). Kids teased him for the way he looked and talked, and because Cho felt isolated from the world and had a hard time fitting in, he blew away 32 people, the natural extension of things (more sarcasm Arnie). The irony, of course is this; if America closed its borders and stopped letting the millions who are begging to come here daily to do so we would be intolerant, racists. Yet, the very fact that we allowed the Cho family to come here is what caused Cho himself to be exposed to our hideous culture of meanness and thus turned him into the murdering monster he became. Had he never come here, he clearly would have been the happiest, most well adjusted kid in South Korea, yet who asked him and his family to come? This is hardly new, of course, and the cause has never used logic or reason to defend itself, just hatred and jealousy. America is always to blame, even when a story turns on a dime. When 3 rich, white Duke Lacrosse players were publicly found guilty of raping a black stripper, America was blamed for cultivating a culture of racial supremacy and allowing rich white boys in the South to continue to propagate a master/slave mentality. It wasn't the boys fault for being evil; it was America's capitalistic culture which had taught them that money, power and race allow you to use people of lesser means and color in whatever way you see fit. A year later when the obvious truth was revealed that the whole story had been made up by the African American stripper, it wasn't her fault for lying; it was still America's fault because of our culture. Since we created and tolerate a society that offer opportunity to only a handful of people, and even fewer people of color, this poor girl felt helpless, desperate and compelled to create a lie and we should all not only forgive her, but try to understand her since it's all our fault anyways. Iran wants nukes? That's because we have so many. North Korea has nukes? That's because we scared them into it with our imperialistic ways (even though America has never "taken over" a country and kept it for themselves… oops, there I go again, injecting facts into this silly little game). AIDS? That's America's fault for not curing it. Global Warming is America's fault because we have the audacity to be so successful that we burn the most gasses while living our lives (never mind that we are also the most environmentally conscious and friendly nation on Earth and that we… ooops… I'm doing it again. Never mind). 9/11 was clearly America's fault because we don't understand the Muslim culture and we just want to steal their oil anyways. The corn shortage in the world that is now bankrupting what was a thriving Mexican economy is America's fault because we own too many cars. If you can't beat 'em, join 'em I say. Let's just all melt this whole place down and start over, and do it from the inside. From now on, when you lose your job and apply for unemployment, make sure you list the reason for termination as "America's fault." If ever you find yourself before a court of law, plead "not guilty by reason of it being America's fault." Most of all, murder a few people and then look at the dead persons' relatives, shrug your shoulders and proclaim, "America did it."
|
||