- Originally published in The New Yorker September 24, 2001
Copyright 2001 The Conde Nast Publications, Inc.
The Talk Of The Town -- Pg. 28
The disconnect between last Tuesday's monstrous dose of reality and the
self-righteous drivel and outright deceptions being peddled by public
figures and TV commentators is startling, depressing. The voices
licensed to follow the event seem to have joined together in a campaign
to infantilize the public. Where is the acknowledgment that this was
not a "cowardly" attack on "civilization" or "liberty" or "humanity" or
"the free world" but an attack on the world's self-proclaimed
superpower, undertaken as a consequence of specific American alliances
and actions? How many citizens are aware of the ongoing American
bombing of Iraq? And if the word "cowardly" is to be used, it might be
more aptly applied to those who kill from beyond the range of
retaliation, high in the sky, than to those willing to die themselves
in order to kill others. In the matter of courage (a morally neutral
virtue): whatever may be said of the perpetrators of Tuesday's
slaughter, they were not cowards.
Our
leaders are bent on convincing us that everything is O.K. America is
not afraid. Our spirit is unbroken, although this was a day that will
live in infamy and America is now at war. But everything is not O.K.
And this was not Pearl Harbor. We have a robotic President
who assures us that America still stands tall. A wide spectrum of
public figures, in and out of office, who are strongly opposed to the
policies being pursued abroad by this Administration apparently feel
free to say nothing more than that they stand united behind President
Bush. A lot of thinking needs to be done, and perhaps is being done in
Washington and elsewhere, about the ineptitude of American intelligence
and counter-intelligence, about options available to American foreign
policy, particularly in the Middle East, and about what constitutes a
smart program of military defense. But the public is not being asked to
bear much of the burden of reality. The unanimously applauded,
self-congratulatory bromides of a Soviet Party Congress seemed
contemptible. The unanimity of the sanctimonious, reality-concealing
rhetoric spouted by American officials and media commentators in recent
days seems, well, unworthy of a mature democracy.
Those
in public office have let us know that they consider their task to be a
manipulative one: confidence-building and grief management. Politics,
the politics of a democracy-which entails disagreement, which promotes
candor-has been replaced by psychotherapy. Let's by all means grieve
together. But let's not be stupid together. A few shreds of historical
awareness might help us understand what has just happened, and what may
continue to happen. "Our country is strong," we are told again and
again. I for one don't find this entirely consoling. Who doubts that
America is strong? But that's not all America has to be.
-
Susan Sontag
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