h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

While I am in the mood for performing the little known circus trick of hopping onto a high horse followed by a down the throat dismount, a speciality of mine I may aswell point out to you that I was only responding to what was in your post.

You could have simply posted something like the truth rather than some vague old tosh that just happened to suit the point you wanted to make. Which is something likes Moores point in his film.

one love

"run by an unholy alliance of organised crime, business and government"

You sure? Look closer.

I was born and raised in Britain. "Organised Crime" describes several major institutions quite nicely.

Actually, your description is more literally true of Italy. Or Russia.

As for business and government not being an unholy alliance, need I remind you about Westland? Shall we talk about Cheri Blair and that little property deal? Tory Sleaze? The quite startling number of high placed civil servants and former ministers who turn up as non-executive directors on the boards of large companies? Companies that they were able to 'assist' during their careers, usually.

This is what I mean about all fur coat. Europeans point the finger and seem to think that their country is morally superior when in nearly all the Western nations are as bad as each other!

There isn't a "right" and there isn't a "better" there's just a "more accomplished at hiding things from their citizens" and a citizenry who don't look too hard at their own countries, governments or histories. What would happen if America's critics turned that finely honed perception on themselves, as the FBI agent said to the caged serial killer? Would they really see America as a great evil or would they see a reflection of their own country?

I don't think anyone in Europe could mistake what they see staring back at them, and I think Canada, Australia and New Zealand might offer whispered thanks because there, but for the grace of god, go they.

>> "Organised Crime" describes several major institutions quite nicely.

No. Organised Crime is organised crime. It can be applied metaphorically to various major institutions, but it is a metaphor. Playing 'find the lady' with terminology doesn't help find the truth, it only serves to obscure it. Britain is not run, partially or completely, by organisd crime. It has not been run in that way in the last 600 years, and well you know it.


>> Actually, your description is more literally true of Italy. Or Russia.

I know.


>> As for business and government not being an unholy alliance...

I was talking about a triumvirate of organised crime, business and government, not about business and government in combination. We live in a post-democratic age, when business has more influence, control and raw power than government. The original point about Mark Twain and the way in which the American West was run described his reportage of the systematic use of oganised and murdering gangs of criminals to police less well organised, less murderous and smaller gangs of more minor criminals.


>> This is what I mean about all fur coat. Europeans point the finger and seem to think that their country is morally superior when in nearly all the Western nations are as bad as each other!

How is making accurate observations about the history of a country claiming moral superiority?


>> ... there isn't a "better"

Er. Yes there is.


>> What would happen if America's critics turned that finely honed perception on themselves

There would be even more people as disillusioned, world-weary and cynical as I am.


Still no reply on American 'isolationism' post 1941?

B

So 1900-1941 was the USA's isolationist phase, eh?

It may have left Europe well alone, but it had a tendency to get involved everywhere else before you could say "manifest destiny".

The US was already busy waging war in the Philippines at the start of the century and didn't finish until 1913, during which time it managed to put its troops around Tianjin (I'm sure it's just along the road from Des Moines) to good use by putting down the Boxer Rebellion and adopted a laissez-faire approach to the Panamanian revolution by provoking it and then sending in 15,000 troops to ensure that someone who actually wanted an American canal to cut their country in half was running the show. In 1914 the US occupied Veracruz because some drunken Marines were arrested or in an effort to destabilize the Mexican government, take your pick. Having got involved in WWI late in the game (and with on-going conflicts in Mexico, Haiti, Cuba and The Dominican Republic, who can blame them?), American troops stayed on for overtime, fighting Bolsheviks in Archangel. Then there was just a small window of opportunity to fit in further jaunts to Honduras, Nicaragua, Guatemala, Turkey and China (I may have overlooked a few) before joining WWII.

An interesting entry, I'll read it more closely later.. thanks for the link, Ben.

<>

Gradient, I am not 100% sure what you're on about, with your criticisms, but as a New Zealander, I can say I'd far rather our country was modelled on UK/Europe, rather than, as at present, the USA! The USA is some weird distortion of what it would like to be/claims to be.

So that nails the myth of America's "policy of isolationism for a good chunk of the 20th century".

(I always enjoy it when you are in a thread Mycroft).


Regarding "Freedom Fries", Gradient, your response was odd. I am still not sure of the relevance of "Corporate Shill" in this context, though if you were trying to say what I think you were trying to say, then it is a sweet example of the pot calling the kettle black.

My intention was to highlight the fact that America *does* mind when people critique it, and my comments were about America's *collective* (though not unanimous) response to a democratically elected government opposing the decision of an arguably un-elected government when it decided to wage an illegal and un-endable war on a non-agressor nation based on intelligence which was suspect at the time and which was later proven to be inadequate and against the will of the UN.

Your response was: "If you can't tell the difference between the sentiment of a nation and the frankly amusing attempt by a fast food company to move merchandise then...ummm...well, marketing must be more effective than they'd believed."

http://www.cnn.com/2003/US/South/02/19/offbeat.freedom.fries.ap/ - the response of an individual small businessman - not a fast food company.

http://www.cnn.com/2003/ALLPOLITICS/03/11/sprj.irq.fries/ - congress - not a fast food company.

http://www.nationalreview.com/comment/comment-wilhelm041103.asp - "A coworker told me to stay away from 'suspicious looking men in berets', and my liberal friends mocked me with glee. What? No boycott? You're going to visit 'Freedom'? Be sure to have some 'Freedom' wine with your 'Freedom' cheese!' - the reactions of individuals, not a fast food company.

http://encyclopedia.thefreedictionary.com/Anti-French%20sentiment%20in%20the%20United%20States - "According to the president of IC&A Inc, a business that imports only French products, demand for these products fell in the vicinity of 40% to 50% from February 2003 levels." - the collective and un-coordinated response showing "the sentiment of a nation" - not a fast food company. Probably the most interesting of all these links, showing that this renaming action was not the first time that Americans have responded in this way.

B

I read especially the last one with great interest, Ben. It always struck me as bizarrely funny, the whole "freedom fries" thing!

Apparently all French imports, including wine, were being boycotted. I mean, how stupid is that? Personally I can't imagine any political opinion getting in the way of enjoying a lovely French bordeaux, but hey, that's just me talking.

I also heard that a completely American company with the unfortunate name of French's mustard took a financial beating. Again - ridiculous.

az

French's mustard actually took out adverts saying "The only French thing about French's mustard is the name."

I've also seen a fair number of Americans justifying their anti-French agenda by bringing up France's admittedly obnoxious testing of Nukes in the Pacific. Kind of hard to stomach considering the US's continuing refusal to compensate Pacific islanders who were forcibly relocated or irradiated by the US's Pacific nuclear testing.

This is what annoys me about US reaction to criticism; aggression followed by changing the subject.

And not to mention the US wanting to store nuclear waste on Indian land, or the probable testing of the new range of uranium and depleted uranium weapons in Afghanistan (and probably Iraq).

From YOGABIKER
>>>
Just a reminder.
A lot of Americans are good, decent, reasonable people.
It's just the Sylastic armorfiends of, I mean the extreme right wing that is turning noble ideals into meaningless rhetoric.
The problem is that few decent people crave power to the extent that these people do.
In addition, when a moral person appeals to our morality, he/she has to use the same language already corrupted by those manipulators.
The result is tolerant people come off as anti-moral.
If we judged people by what they did instead of what they said in this country, we would be electing very different people.<<<


YB I just wanted to come back to what you are saying. I was thinking that because you are newish to h2, it might be helpful to know that there is a robust tradition of sorts here in critiqueing the US. I think that there is a general acknowledgement that this isn't about lumping all Americans together, or being 'anti-american' (although there have been the odd researchers in that mould).

I can imagine that it might be a bit much as an American reading such strongly negative views all the time. I think that the degree of 'negativiity' is relative to the current world situation and the US' role in that, and that most researchers would also find positive things to say about the US cultures if the thread was that way inclined.

Things got so heated at one stage (see the thread in <./>Ask</.> called 'What's wrong with Americans') that it descended into farce, and so we have a run of threads now variously called 'What's wrong with [insert nationality of choice - French, English, Australian...*]'. Eventually of course we got to 'What's wrong with h2g2 researchers'



kea.


* You might be interested to know that the NZ thread was the only one where no-one could some up with any substantial criticism

Gradient
"Unless you can point to a nation that was colonised and fought over by Britain and France leading to the French being more or less ejected and an unfair system of Trade, Tax and a lack of representation in the English parliament being set up, you can't really compare"

That would be India you were thinking of comparing the U.S. to then. Oh, and it would be the British Parliament. The Act of Union was in 1707.

<<* You might be interested to know that the NZ thread was the only one where no-one could some up with any substantial criticism>>

I believe there was one started about Canadians as well, kea, that didn't last very long . . .




az

http://www.guardian.co.uk/Columnists/Column/0,5673,1259935,00.html

"Fahrenheit 9/11 asks the questions that should have been asked every day for the past four years. The success of his film testifies to the rest of the media's failure."

"Tomorrow the Butler report will reopen the debate about who was to blame for the lies with which we went to war - the government or the intelligence agencies. One thing the news networks will not be discussing is the culpability of the news networks. After this inquiry, we will need another one, whose purpose is to discover why journalists help governments to lie to the people."


az

az: "I also heard that a completely American company with the unfortunate name of French's mustard..."

French's mustard is in fact an ENGLISH company, but they did indeed put out the "the only French thing is the name" advert, pre-emptively, and as far as I'm aware did not, in fact, suffer financially as a result (apart from the cost of the ads...).

H.

Oh, is it really and English company, Hoo? My mistake.

I grew up in Canada with French's mustard (rather icky stuff really, much prefer dijon) and the reports I read in the paper made it sound like it was an American company.

az

French's mustard is manufactured in the US by Reckitt Benckiser Inc., an American subsidiary of UK FMCG conglomerate Reckitt & Colman plc.

There was also a spoof e-mail that said something along the lines of "the only thing we have in common with the French is we're both yellow".

RF

"the only thing we have in common with the French is that we make your eyes water"?

Sorry, just rambling through.

B

I don't think French's "mustard" will do that, Ben. So far as I recall it is a largely flavour-free condiment that is frequently added to hot dogs in a yellow squiggly line. Now try that with a proper English mustard and your eyes will *really* water!

RF