Human Shields, Part 2
By Michael R. Bowen (03/11/03)
Disproving an old adage, a Marine veteran named Kenneth Nichols O'Keefe is leading a group of "human shields" to Iraq. O'Keefe has also renounced American citizenship, and opined that "the potential for White Western body parts flying around with the Iraqi ones should make them think again about this imperialist oil war." Guess there is such a thing as an ex-Marine, after all.
Other members of the troupe have declared that Americans don't really see Iraqis as people, and don't think they would be bombing human beings if we went to war.
So let's see: these people believe America would slaughter millions to top up their SUVs. Americans don't think the people of Iraq are actually human. America doesn't mind bombing civilians, has long as they're brown. This is the way the "human shields" view America, and they have the nerve to get all huffy when we call them America-haters? The very core of their worldview is hatred of America.
America-hatred really comes down to self-loathing. And self-loathing ultimately means Leftist. The American Left enjoys a comfortable lifestyle and political freedom unlike anything in the world, and they hate themselves for it. Their lives have become consumed with attempts to assuage their guilt: recycling, "organic, fair-trade" coffee, reparations for slavery, obsessing about how the rest of the world despises us. Rocker Chrissy Hynde hopes for American defeat in Iraq, saying, "Give us what we deserve!" The pathetic "self-esteem" indoctrination in our public schools is another attempt to run away from inner shame.
Sometimes the leftist neurosis takes a messianic turn, as when a woman in New Zealand offers to be crucified to get President Bush to call off the war -- IF he drives the nails personally.
Self-loathing, in turn, is really a form of narcissism. What the American Left can't stand is that all the rich blessings of American life are not to their personal credit. They are the fruit of the endeavors of others, and they don't exist because of the Left's enlightenment. Worse, there are people less well-off all around us, and for people as self-absorbed as our peacenik friends, that can only be because of us -- as if our five dollar cup of latte was drawn directly from the veins of the third-world poor, as if every breath we take is sucked out of the mouth of an old lady in Bangladesh. Children famously are the center of their own universe, and blame themselves when their parents divorce; but if you're old enough to join the Marine Corps or to buy a plane ticket to Iraq, you should have moved beyond that kind of childish thinking by now.
But no: America once had some kind of alliance with Iraq, and now the two are getting divorced, and all the Left can think to do about it is to spread themselves bathetically on the sacrificial altar. Lately they've been climbing down from it quickly enough, once they realize that the grown-ups are ignoring their breath-holding. And when the altar is no longer draped with their bodies, you can see it for what it really is: an altar to themselves.
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