Arguably then it was the way they were treated that was the disconnect, not them leaving.
Last year in Thailand I was helping with a pub quiz. The MC (a Brit) said “are there any Americans in the crowd?” A couple put their hands up. “We don’t like you,” said my compatriot. I was mortified and went over and offered my profuse apologies. They said “don’t worry, we’re used to it”.
That’s frankly bizarre behavior, jjimm. What gave that presenter the idea that it was OK to insult someone because they are Americans? He wouldn’t think to insult someone for being Chinese, Cuban, Chilean, Moroccan, Iraqi, Burmese, Palestinian, Danish, German, Estonian, Thai, Namibian, Mexican, Brazilian, Korean, Phillipino, Italian, Maltese, Cambodian, Swiss, Russian, Iranian, Indonesian, Ethiopian, Somali, or Nicaraguan.
He’d have been embarrassed if anyone else had insulted someone’s nationality…if it were anyone other than Americans.
Well, I suspect it was meant to be a “joke”, but not a very good or funny one.
I think that hatred is probably mostly for the US government as opposed to the people.
An awful lot of America tourists are not good ambassadors either, though.
I think some of it (not all by any means), is a certain economic envy. I’m an American, and I remember being in the Philippines in the early 1990s when the American military was being asked to leave. The stated goal of the government was to “take the county back” what ever that meant. But as we actually began to leave, they seems personally unhappy to see us go, and I wish I had a nickel for every Filipino who asked me if I could help pull strings to help them immigrate to the US! I remember an article titled “Yankee go home and take me with you!” That sums up quite a bit.
I’d have to say that the US is probably the most hated, feared, loved, disrespected/respected, envied and generally talked about and watched power on earth today. I’ve noticed in my own travels throughout the world that, love the US or hate it, we are on peoples minds, in their news (you see the silliest things from US news in the most unexpected places in the world), and imbedded in their conversations. Perhaps its only because I don’t LOOK much like (I assume The World™ view or expectation) an ‘American’, plus the fact that I speak english with a slight accent (slight here in the states, pronounced appearently in other parts of the world), people talk a LOT about America to me. I hear it all…from the over the top good, to the loony bad…and everything in between. I’ve heard how the US single handedly saved the world, to quite serious discussions about how the Evil Bush™ engineered 9/11 and the slaughter of his own citizens for fun and profit.
From my own viewpoint I think that the various attitudes toward the US stem from A) How very powerful we really are…militarily, economically and, gods help us all culturally (this isn’t to say our culture is necessarily GOOD…but it IS pretty pervasive, as anyone who travels will quickly find out), B) How deeply even our most minor actions can have a great or even profound impact on other nations, C) either a wistfulness or even envy for the lifestyles many PERCEIVE we lead coupled with the perception of how powerful we are (see A) and D) how we chose to wield that power without (seemingly) the wise restraint of the older, gentler powers (I’m looking toward you guys in Europe for this one 
).
Put it all together and you have a muddle of half understood ‘facts’ about the US, how we operate, how our system works, our aims, fears and goals, with a lot of equally muddled ‘facts’ about US history, what we have and haven’t actually done (some good, lots bad) world wide, magnified by the constant stream of American news, action, products, movies, etc…and you get a nation that even your average African Bushman and herder in Outer Mongolia have heard of…and has some kind of opinion on.
-XT
I’d say it’s less “Why aren’t they listening to us? We’ve been the top people for years! seethe seethe” and more “Why aren’t they listening to anyone else? Like it or not, a lot of other countries get helped/fucked by what you do, so could you perhaps at least take that into account?”
That reminds me of something I was telling my husband just yesterday.
A local comedian (Dominican) used to play a character based on the stereotypical Latin American 60ish revolutionary commies. He’d go on and on about the country being “stepped on by the bloody boot of the imperialistic monster” (sounds like Chavez and Castro, eh?). The funny part is that whenever the opportunity arose he’d try to get a visa for the US. When questioned about the obvious divorce between his rhetoric and his wishes he’d explain it by saying “I want to study the monster from within”.
Well, just a minute there…what do you mean by “have sex with.” We most certainly did not have sex with that dog.
I think folks just like to talk trash about other people. And it’s easier to form an opinion about the cumulative action of one entity than to extend that courtesy to the 300 million or so dissociated chunks that form it. My money says that whoever whelped that article has an axe to grind and chose the easy, sensationalist path as opposed to something more legitemate. We’re used to seeing that attitude as a matter of policy in the US by now, we’ll be sure and let you all know how to spot its death throes…just as soon as we ourselves are sure of how to kill it.
The key word there is “supposedly.”
No, that’s just silly.
The US is the world’s only remaining superpower. Of course everybody is going to blame us for everything.
P.J. O’Rourke’s analogy is the US is a beautiful and unattainable woman, and the Third World is a teen-age boy. They spend tortured nights dreaming about us. We are vaguely aware that they exist.
If you can’t get a reaction any other way…
Regards,
Shodan
Well, obviously YMMV, and for you perhaps number 2 is true. My own anecdotal info from Europe says that number 1 is also alive and kicking…and IMHO may be the majority reaction. Sort of a puzzled ‘Why don’t they listen to us? After all, we are the cradle of civilization and were out doing this empire stuff when they were just a twinkle in the various European powers eye, so to speak…’. 
From my perspective, and with a nod to the current government as what I consider an exception, I think America DOES take other countries attitudes into account when it makes its calculations for foreign policy. At least as much as any other major power does, and again IMHO more so that most. Certainly more so than, say, your British Empire did at the apex of THEIR empire…no? Even under George the Terrible here I think we take other nations opinions on things seriously…though we don’t always then do just what they want us to do, even so. After all…we are a soveriegn power too and have to make decisions based on what we think is best for America…not necessarily on what is most popular with The World™…a.k.a. Europe.
I think this is where the disconnect comes about. Just because we listen to the views of other nations and take their opinions seriously (well, granted, SOME nations we do this for), doesn’t mean we reach the same conclusions as they, or take the actions they WANT us to take. I think you’d be hard pressed, however, to take a stroll back through history and find any other world power equivelent to the US who even bothered listening first before doing what they wanted to do.
Of course, this very attitude and the power that it entails is part of why the US generates the emotional response it does in other countries.
-XT
Imperial arrogance? Where do they get these weird ideas? When have we ever used military might to force our views upon the unwilling? What, four or five times, tops, since we mugged Mexico? Aren’t we always willing to compromise with others, unless we don’t want to?
Almost. Actually, it’s “The bitch set me up!”
Ah. :smack: 
You’re right. My mistake.
Yes, America is the most hated country on earth. Just like all the superpowers of the past have been and all the superpowers of the future will be. The only time there isn’t one most hated country is when everybody is scrambling to get on top of the pile. Then the winner becomes the most hated.
This patronizing is very obnoxious.
It may be news to you, but people in the Third World are as able and prone to come to informed judgement as anyone on the USA; unfortunately education infrastructures are sub-par in vast areas so treating them as retards because of economic handicaps and/or not fitting on your own cultural paradigms is completely demeaning.
There’s definetly a sense in the minds of the government and the more “patriotic” Brits that we used to be a great power, and now we’re just a running dog; but I don’t think most people look at the U.S. in terms of the British Empire. A good amount of us are pretty much just embarrassed about it, really. Like a firing for theft on a resume.
Oh, most certainly.
Here’s where I disagree. For most governments (dictatorships at that ilk not included), their country comes first before all other countries, and that’s fair enough. However, what I see as the difference is that many countries are willing to give an take a little; in the spirit of keeping good allies, we’re prepared to get a deal most benefitting us from other nations, and in return making one benefitting them more. We’ll gouge a nation on trade agreements and so forth, but not completely. After all, we want to still have trade arrangements with them. The U.S. government, though, seems quite prepared to just go out and get whatever they want. They must have the best deal for America, in all cases; there’s less willingness to enter into a give-and-take relationship. Look at your ambassador to the U.N.; does his appointment strike you as the act of a government willing to listen? Now, that’s fine; the U.S. can do that. No-one’s going to stop you; but that’s the point, really. All that’s stopping your government from doing what it wants is, for lack of a better term, honour, and that seems to be something you’ve traded for superiority a long time ago. (And yes, we other countries do that too; that’s bad, also.)
From a practical standpoint; it’s fair. Every government wants what is best for their country, and often it’s at the expense of another. But running roughshod over everyone else? Eh. It just comes off as somewhat arrogant.
That’s fair. I’m not saying the U.S. is the worst superpower ever; just that there’s room for improvement.
True; there’s going to be a strong emotional response no matter what the U.S. does. But it could so easily have been a good response.
To a certain degree I see your point and even somewhat agree. I don’t think its clear that the US ALWAYS tries to get its way, or ALWAYS steamrolls foreign disention, or ALWAYS tries to force things through to our sole advantage. But certainly we do things with an eye out for whats best for the US.
I want to use Iraq I and II as an example here…I think its relevant. In the first Gulf War, the US built a coalition of nations, and though we dominated the conflict, by no means did we go it alone. Many other nations (including your’s) were full participants. In the end, though it may have been in the US’s best interest to finish off the Iraqi’s, we allowed ourselves to be guided by other nations (Europe, several of our allies in the Middle East) into a ceasefire…letting Saddam and Iraq pretty much off the hook. Had we acted solely in our own interest, without reguard for other nations desires, we would have rolled through Iraq easily and deposed Saddam then and there. This may have been a good thing, it may have been a bad thing…from our perspective at the time however, it was the optimal thing for the US to do (we had the army right there after all, Iraq’s military was shattered for well and good, and there was substantial evidence that the Shia and Kurds were ready to rise up with help).
This brings us to Gulf War version 2, and George the Terrible. Fault him as you will (I certainly do), but initially the US under his less than steady hand ALSO tried to play the game. The current administration obviously felt that they wanted to deal with this situation once and for all…and equally obviously many (in the US, certainly many in the Administration) felt resentment that the US had been guided before on a course that held no resolution, but continued to cost us in terms of maintaining sanctions and the no fly zones. That said however, initially they DID try and play the game in the UN. It was only after it became obvious even to the idiots in the Administration that it wasn’t going to fly that they decided to take whatever countries were willing to follow us and do things essentially on our own.
Now, I don’t fault those countries that opposed the US going into Iraq…hindsight has shown us that they were right and the US was wrong. But…at the time, the US felt it was in our best interest to do what we did. After trying to gain a consensus and failing (and without resorting to FORCING other nations to follow us or else…a key point IMHO), we made a decision to do so. We were wrong…but we weren’t arbitrary or completely unheeding or disreguarding of international opinion on it. In the end we just disagreed with their assessment, and had a different opinion on what was best for the US.
And all this was under perhaps one of the worst foreign policy presidents we’ve had in our long history. But even he, George the Terrible, TRIED for consensus on the issue first before sending in the troops. True, his efforts were feeble and fat fingered…but they were efforts none the less.
YMMV, but I think its a key point myself.
Oh, I definitely agree. I’m well aware of our glaring flaws myself.
True, it could. But I’ve seen negative responses to the US reguardless of what we do (or don’t do) for most of my adult live (pretty much for as long as I’ve BEEN an American), so I’m a bit skeptical that, reguardless of what we do, we’d be getting a good response in any case. Its sort of the boy who cried wolf syndrome…
-XT