Flowings of Your Everlasting Taffyman

turns out it was a big miss understanding...
so i sent a big e mail

here read

Well colleen, I’m glad you were the bigger person here to some extent, because though I wouldn’t necessarily change many of the ideas i wrote about-- I think my reaction to this e mail this morning says a lot. (i was saddened and sorry... in that I felt bad about the way I had conducted myself) I was running late this morning or I would have written back to tell you so, but I’m glad I didn’t have time because today was a good day for processing.... maybe some of this will be the same old, but it was good for me.

Despite feeling badly about the accusations as well as the whole incident this morning I also had a reaction of wanting to say why these things come up with me so hard, and I think the majority of what will come is explaining that...

So my first thought this morning was about uncle Tony, and wondering why he would send this stuff... I saw a book in you guy's office that someone said he had sent and in general i get the impression that he has some pretty "hardcore" beliefs in process, that sort of get to me.. I used to listen to both Tony’s with admiration, I thought they spoke very well, were educated and passionate, but made conclusive statements focused on reasonable evidence, and though I haven’t had a conversation with either of them lately, more and more I get the impression this is not the case (anymore). I read some of that book on the floor, maybe just the back cover and it horrified me that anyone would write something like that. (the book was basically depicting Muslims as anti Christian war mongers) and I felt that was both unjustified and unreasonable in terms of throwing out that accusation to an audience who is obviously hoping for information to help them understand serious topics.
this is why I bring up the stuff on the Quran, because though the book itself was at times hard for me to read because in conjunction with going to Muslim countries, it helped me understand the mind set and background of a group of people who are "alien" to me, but what’s more it made me realize they aren’t alien at all... nothing to fear, worry about, etc than anything/one in the US.
And it made me sad, that that the people I met/befriended would be depicted in such a way. it seems no better than Islamic fundamentalists who depict Americans the way they do without further examining the issues.
My friend Gabi was helping me understand some of this stuff, she and I have both had a pretty liberal education as well as extensive travel time, and more than anything she pointed to travel and getting outside of one's own culture that bridges the gap that we saw Americans having... (it appeared to us that Americans have a hard time understanding others, but when we seek out others we become much more inclined to be empathetic/sympathetic in terms of foreign policy) for instance, last week when we had our little dispute...
A lot of the stuff I felt was justified, you felt was manipulation of the truth.. what i meant by writing something out as an explanation, is that I say things that jump to the point assuming factors that are often not the case with people who haven’t had my same experiences...
Thus why I make accusations pointing out the death toll on both sides, because from my perspective people are people, it doesn’t matter who's right or wrong in the political reasoning for the war, the death toll is not ok. I think that is a valid statement, but its hard for me to remember that when you say something like "they attacked us" and I say "we attacked them" the two sound very different to your ears, though they sound the same to me.
Its not that I’m right or you are, its that we are coming from different backgrounds, and i think you try to jump back to that a lot, and remind me but I get so caught up in it that I forget.
I think in those terms its hard for passionate liberals to not get overwhelmed in the same way that anti-abortionists get caught up in their cause... it seems a matter of life and death, and both sides cant figure out why its not important to the other.

The American thing came up today in my class (I’m taking a class on depictions of war, partially the reason all of this seems so immediate, and threatening to me) we were discussing the effects of 9/11 on the population of the US, and how for most Americans things like war don’t come as an immediate understanding, or an immediate empathy, because we have not had many wars, and when we do they happen on other people's land. 9/11 is particularly painful for people because it was surprising, and took us out of our myth of "exemption from bad things" its not that bad things don’t happen, they happen elsewhere... but on 9/11 it happened here, and for some this was a wake up that meant we need to change things for the better here and abroad by using the methods that we haven’t in the past -turning away from vengeance and war, to embrace the world community to say "we are now with you, we understand." but for others they took it as a sign that said "we need to go back to being more hard line against our enemies so they understand us." and that meant shunning the UN and world popular opinion to create situations which they felt were better for US policy (overthrow a few govts, keep the fight over there rather than here). but in general that approach means assuming that 9/11 was a flook, that Americans should go back to their myth of being untouchable... and in terms of that, 9/11 (despite the horrible incident) is actually an easy thing to go back to life from, a few buildings (out of millions) a few thousand people died (not the majority by any means, and not even related to the majority) an economic recession (but not collapse that throws people in to panic, or cuts people off from resources) and not every day violence, instability, fear and hurt, pain, hunger, sickness, death or even (despite liberal propaganda) the terribleness of having a gov't that does not care about you, your needs, or is downright oppressive terrorizing...
9/11 made Americans trust Bush, the wars didn’t stop that, his biggest popularity crash was after Katrina, when Americans felt -uncared for, sick, hurt, hungry, etc etc.
what I’m saying I guess, is that its hard for us to understand what others are going through.. me you and the next guy. But, that that is where a lot of my "propaganda" comes from, it comes from reading, talking to, and researching the "other".
Now I know you are not new to this stuff, I mean you do it all the time with cases within the US... but that’s why its hard for me to understand stopping there. I think James and I both get frustrated a lot because we see the potential to go down the same path, and don’t understand why you guys go your way and we go ours... to us there is a disconnect there, and maybe you feel it to, and that’s what is so frustrating.

today there was a memorial on the main lawn of campus, it was a 1000 or so flags lined up like graves... and I immediately felt a sense of cynicism... and wondered why? throughout the day i kept running in to them, and then finally at lunch i brought it up to a friend (a more moderate friend)... I said "is it wrong that I get so aggravated by something like that? that I question it?" and she said "its not wrong, but you shouldn’t go out of your way to bring it up…” and I thought a little more….
I guess the 3 things that got to me, were
A) not all the people who died on 9/11 were American, so why all American flags?
B) where is the memorial to those who have died from American bombings?
And then addressing my defensiveness…
C) why is it that we are expected to solute, or not react to memorials, when in fact that is what they are for? Is the purpose to remember and think fondly, or to question why the event happened? What was it worth?

For me 9/11 has since the beginning been met with cynicism, because I felt like we never got the message. Instead of thinking about it, we reacted (similar to how we might when we are frustrated) well though this is a common element in people, I always thought governments were supposed to do the right thing, not react like humans, not like the crowd, but be the responsible one… Humans are good, but we are reactionary, so we set up institutions that act for are better interest when we are incapable… we allow the police and courts to dish out “justice” when we might hurt the person. We take drugs from drug addicts for their good. We give food/money/shelter to those who cant find it because as a society we know that is right, where as individuals we don’t always know…
Well I had high hopes that our government would act responsibly, but instead they did the same thing right back to (not the terrorists alone) but to countries filled with people.
And I felt like we a bully in our own “right” got stood up to, and hit right back rather than changing are bullying ways. There is no doubt that we bullied and scavenged our way to the top, but we did so saying that once we got there we would do a better job than the other guys, and I just don’t see it. For every positive thing about the US, there is many a negative thing as well, and though this does say there are two sides to each issue, it also says there is controversy…. and if we were as “righteous” as we claim why would there be controversy?
The other guys (a miniscule minority) hurt us, and we decided to kill them all so it wouldn’t happen again… when is enough enough?

What I was trying to get across the other week was that, its not only the common people who act like this, but our governments as well, and having seen the reaction of our own government I don’t understand how we can presume that leaders in less powerful states would act any differently… in the “game of power” they are trying just as hard to stay on top (if not rise) through what ever means they can, democratic or not, militarily or not… thus we cannot give Iraq, Iran, Israel, or Saudi Arabia weapons and expect them not to use them. We would use them given their situation in the same way we use thousands of bombs to revenge the deaths of a few thousand of our own. Its true that Israel was not at first responsible for the current war with Lebanon, but Hezbollah was provoking a response and they got it in sense proving what Hezbollah has always said “Lebanon is not safe from Israel” well, Israel charged in and proved their point.

I guess lastly
I do take a condescending tone when it comes to religion being brought in, because it bothers me that so many Christians (including myself often) have such terrible records in following Christ, I don’t make claims to being a good Christian because of this, and I rarely say it at all because though I strive to be better I hate how often Christianity is used with such condemning terms. At the same time it makes me sick to see how some “Muslims” claim they are following the right path when they do things that are so obviously not Muslim.
But anyway I was thinking about that when it came to Tony, and wondering why it is that he feels his Christian/American identity is so under attack…
It especially bothers me when I know how much influence religion has on him, as well as how much that religion teaches, not only in terms of that “peace and not judging are better than their opposites” but also in terms of the education value…. The Christian Bible is a wonderful history book, if not always (in my view) for factual information than at least for contextual information about the time. In the same way you find the Quran both identify, support and condemn “the peoples of the book” (jews and Christians) when Mohammad is trying to get Jewish support he tries to impress them with his understanding of the teachings, when he becomes more powerful and sees them actively confronting him, he acts as leaders do, and condemns them. He comes out of the same traditions interpreted by the slight changes in culture that a few hundred miles brings about, and its fascinating as much to see the differences as the similarities…
For instance that thing about praying…
Well the big building Muslims pray around is believed by them to be the first church ever built to God by Abraham, (I believe after the would-be sacrifice of Isaac).
All three traditions speak of this event, and all in different ways.
The last remaining piece of Solomon’s temple revered by Jews, is also revered by Muslims who feel Mohammad visited it in one of his most influential dreams guided by the Archangel Gabriel… I mean it’s clear that the tradition comes from the same roots, and its hard to understand why people use religion so furiously when the religions all teach relatively the same principles…
The word Muslim means “one who submits to God” is that not a Judeo-Christian principle? So its hard for me to understand where some Christians feel so afraid, or feel so righteous in condemning those they don’t seem to understand, which is why I get so defensive when it comes to things like that e mail, or that book, because I feel like there are millions out there trying to understand, and that very biased misinformation doesn’t help the situation…. I guess I’m particularly sensitive to this lately A) because like I said earlier I feel that the whole 9/11 and following wars have been caused by such misinformation when questioning why? Might have been more appropriate… and B) because also like I said before, I am in a class right now that deals with depictions of war, and it is so common and abundant in history, in the media etc to see misinformation start terrible things… pretty much any war ever has been depicted without question, and propped up on misinformation to sway public opinion for support.
The former Secretary of state Robert McNamara admits in his biographical documentary
“fog of war” that the Viet Nam war was started because of a mistake without enough questions…
“did they fire on us?” well in Viet Nam it turns out they didn’t, but that was never told to the American Public who got sucked in to a war for a decade.
Cheney just yesterday was asked if the Iraq was the right decision based on the fact that there were no WMDs and he said “(it )was the right thing to do, and if we had to do it again, we would do exactly the same thing,”
And though a lot of people for the war say that’s fine… its hard for me to understand why its ok that we attack and overthrow a country based on rumors of weapons, and when we don’t find them we don’t even say “we were wrong, we wont do it again” instead we already are planning the next one. If this is the way we run the world, we are no better than terrorists, we are no better than Napoleon or Attila the Hun or Genghis Khan, we are Stalin and Mao or even Castro imposing our will on others and saying it is for their own good. And I don’t think that is acceptable, but it certainly needs to start with us questioning…

So in conclusion… not that this was supposed to be a formal essay… I’m glad to hear you were in fact questioning that e mail, despite the fact that you felt it was from credible source. And I’m sorry for misinterpreting the situation., so I hope that doesn’t happen again.

Thanks for listening to me babble and um just for the record, the whole formal word thing, isn’t just in response to you, but rather because a number of people have felt I jump to conclusions or am not explaining myself, and so I thought maybe I need to return to basics and learn how to get back in the habit of explaining things.

Peace and love
taff