few days ago, there was yet another of those inane public opinion polls conducted by one of the interchangeable mainstream media organisations in which as many as 49% of Americans would agree to allow the U.S. government to force Arabs and Arab Americans in America to carry "special identification," whatever that means. Soon enough, reports of hate crimes against brown-skinned Americans (often other ethnicities mistaken by idiots for being Arabs) began to pour in. In the end, these incidents do not surprise me. Despite countless efforts of heroism and selflessness in Lower Manhattan, I still do not hold Americans as a whole in very high regard. However, there's a significant part of me that wants to be proven wrong. I want to be part of a nation that I can be proud of, but stories like these always seem to prevent me from doing so. Deep down, I don't want to give up hope on America. It's my home. Anyway, I've kept quiet since the day of the September 11 tragedy because I was not in the mood for pretty much anything. However, I'm downright disgusted by all this hate at a time when the world, more than ever, needs time to heal, forge peace, and act in a careful, thoughtful manner. Discrimination and violence against people of Middle Eastern descent should stop immediately.

s it any wonder that only Japanese Americans, and not German or Italian Americans, were sent to concentration camps in WWII? Was anyone surprised that there was an utter lack of attacks against camouflage-wearing Caucasian Americans after the Oklahoma City bombing? Do people even need to ask why atrocities like Bosnia, Rwanda, and the Holocaust occurred? Why has the American public continue to allow Fox News to continue broadcasting? Good old-fashioned prejudice and racism have once again raised their ugly heads. Needless to say, we cannot allow this to continue. So far, President Bush has admirably denounced acts of prejudice against Arabs and Muslims in America, but I fear all his efforts may not be enough. He's up against human nature, which is often vile and irredeemable. Ultimately, if the terrorists cannot bring down America, hatred will finish the job. America remains a beacon of hope for millions around the world, and it would be the greatest tragedy if it failed. America's greatest triumph, and what really sets it apart from all the other countries of the world, is the incredible diversity of its people and their cultures. When you get such an astonishing mix of human perspectives, anything can happen, and sometimes magic happens; we invented radio, television, the net, the Galileo space probe, and even disco. Tamales, falafels, and pad thai are part of our lives. That's why we're so cool. That's why we have energy and creativity. That's why so many people around the world want to come here. Contrary to what American politicians are always telling you, this vague and often subjective concept of 'freedom' isn't what makes America great or special. President Bush always makes a big deal about protecting and defending 'freedom.' Big fucking deal! It seems like that's America's one trick pony. Like so many other stupid and smug Americans, he somehow believes that the States have a monopoly on this thing called 'freedom.' The truth of the matter is that most of the fucking developed world are democracies which have 'freedom,' sometimes much more than what Americans have. Hell, you can't even smoke pot in this cointry. Anyway, by compromising in any way America's often wayward commitment to maintaining a society of diversity and tolerance ultimately undermines America's greatest and true asset.

he only thing we can do is to stop this senseless cycle of violence and hate once and for all. It's a cliché, but violence breeds only more violence. Supposedly revered by Americans, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. once wrote:

Hate cannot drive out hate; only love can do that. Hate multiplies hate, violence multiplies violence, and toughness multiplies toughness in a descending spiral of destruction... The chain reaction of evil-- hate begetting hate, wars producing more wars-- must be broken, or we shall be plunged into the darkness of annihilation.

Anything otherwise would just be stupid. The terrorists must be brought to justice, but our government should not be bombing innocent civilians in order to capture the perpetrators. (Civilians in the Middle East and Central Asia are no more guilty or innocent than the people who were killed in the World Trade Center, in the flight over Pennsylvania, or at the Pentagon.) That would simply bring us down to the level of these terrorists, and you can guarantee that we would not see the end of terrorism no matter what action our government takes.

hat is especially troubling is the fact that it seems that everyone in American society, from the President on down, somehow equates justice with vengeance. However, they are not the same! In the country, we only care about getting back at someone- an eye for an eye. President Bush and his ostensibly fascist cabinet seem perfectly content to maintaining this "chain reaction of evil." We just want to kick some ass (somebody’s ass, anybody’s ass will do). Again, haven’t we learned as human beings that ultimately nobody ever wins in this kind of a war? Along with our pathological disinterest in the causes of terrorism, this attitude somehow reminds me of our permanent prison/ police state system. We care only about locking those evil criminals up, letting them rot, killing them, or throwing away the keys. We want to punish them hard. (In some jurisdictions, the prosecutors don’t really seem to care about who committed the crimes either.) We never think about reforming the criminals. We just want justice. On the other hand, we never think about why we have such a large prison population. Why does the U.S. have such a high crime rate? Why does our society perpetuate a permanent underclass that sustains rampant criminal behaviour? We never think about how we can prevent crime, just like we never think about how we can prevent terrorism. We just want blood, no questions asked. Because Americans never address the important and truly relevant questions, we will never be secured, here at home or abroad.

midst all this chaos, there does not seem to be enough people out there thinking clearly. Does anybody out there see the tragic irony and the utter stupidity of all these Americans driving around in their enormous, gas-guzzling, polluting vehicles while displaying flags and decals? The recent tragedy would never have happened if Americans were not so thoroughly addicted to gasoline. (U.S. consumes 26% of the world's petroleum! Remember that addicts would do anything to fuel their addiction, no matter what the costs are.) If it weren't for our completely irresponsible addiction, we would not have fought the Gulf War; we would not be permanently stationed in Saudi Arabia; and we certainly would not have Osama bin Ladin and his insane fanatics going after us. Not surprisingly, the American mainstream media certainly isn't helping. Is anyone out there asking why there are people out there who hate us so much that they would resort to such atrocities? Why are terrorists relentlessly going after Americans? How come they don't go after Swedes, the Swiss, or even the Canadians? Is it because Americans have been acting like assholes and bullies around the world for decades? Is it because that we ourselves have been bombing innocent civilians (sometimes covertly in the case of Cambodia and Laos) and murdering thousands throughout the Third World for decades since WWII? Why shouldn't we experience ourselves what we've been doing to the rest of the world after all this time? It's not too big of a stretch to expect something really bad to happen to Americans one of these days when you consider that our government has been planning, instigating, funding, and committing overt acts of terrorism against millions around the world for decades.

mericans and their media should wise up, do their job, and start asking the relevant questions. How can we permanently end the threat of terrorism? Beefing up security to the extent of turning our nation into a frightening police state under John Ashcroft would not end terrorism. Continue to bomb other countries would not end terrorism. Why can't we just simply eliminate the causes of terrorism? That's the only effective way to stop terrorism. Ultimately, the main cause of the September 11 attacks has a lot to do with our nation's lack of a responsible energy policy as well as with our evil postwar foreign policies, which were largely based on hate, misunderstanding, mistrust, and plain stupidity against significant segments of the Arab world and against the Soviets. (Remember the noble "freedom fighters" in Afghanistan whom we had trained and armed to fight the Soviets? Guess who they became? The Taliban regime, Osama bin Laden, and those of their ilk would not be here today if we weren't acting so perennially stupid in the Middle East. Hasn't the U.S. government learned anything after enormous fiascoes whose underlying causes could be traced to earlier American support of odious regimes led by the likes of our former allies, including Saddam Hussein, the Afghani mujahadeen, and Manuel Noriega?) It's such a cliché, but we need to learn from history. Just like in the case of violence, stupid foreign policies breed stupid results. Commenting on the atrocities, Susan Sontag pleaded, "Let's by all means grieve together. But let's not be stupid together."

23 September 2001