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Looking for scapegoats The instant mass slaughter of over 6,000 civilians at the World Trade Center and the Pentagon was nothing less than a crime against all of humanity. Rationalizations among so-called leftists to explain away the horror, such as "U.S. imperialism's chickens coming home to roost," sound a bit too much like the war hawks who try to rationalize the H-bombs dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, or those who try to rationalize the civilian massacres at Thanh Phong or My Lai, by saying such horrors are necessary in war. All the rationalizations for these atrocities fly in the face of the common humanity we all share. These rationalizations are a shackle on our thinking. Bush's rhetoric of a "total war" to smoke out and hunt down the enemy has fanned the flames of ethnic scapegoating. All across the U.S. we have heard of attacks against individuals who look Arab or Afghan, anyone who fits the profile of the new "enemy," the new "other." Bush's declarations in response to terrorism threaten to turn the whole world into Taliban-like unfreedom. TWO OF A KIND TERROR I am reminded of Raya Dunayevskaya's description of "two of a kind" terror in the aftermath of Reagan's bombing of Libya: Islamic fundamentalist terror at home against its own people (especially women) and abroad, and America's own form of fundamentalism and drive for war and total domination. The crimes of the Sept. 11 bombings gave Bush's right-wing government a green light to unleash draconian domestic measures previously unimaginable. The "New World Order" has turned out to be an order of fear. This fear has rationalized the sacrifice of civil liberties in the name of "national security." LIKE ETHNIC ATTACKS IN BURMA The same justification was used in my birth country, Burma, when we ethnic Chinese were considered to be risks to "national security." These horrible reports of Arab-looking people being dragged out of their cars and beaten or shot, their homes and stores vandalized, reminded me of my childhood experiences during the days of racial attacks by the Burmese majority in Rangoon, Burma, in the late 1960s. There were ethnic riots all throughout Southeast Asia and the Indonesian Archipelago. I heard the riots were due to scapegoating the ethnic Chinese as a reaction against the fanatical Maoist Cultural Revolution in China. Anyone who
looked Chinese on the streets was stereotyped as a potential "Maoist subversive." We were also blamed for the economic problems in each of these
countries. We were all considered "foreigners," even if we had been born there. Thousands who fit this profile of an unacceptable "other" were I remember it was the solidarity of some of our Indian, Muslim and Burmese friends and neighbors, who hid and protected us, that saved our lives. It is now imperative that we express the same kind of solidarity for any of our ethnic minorities here in the U.S. who are now under the same kind of threat of violence spawned by rampant xenophobia, racial scapegoating, and jingoistic nationalism. At times like these, the fine line between complete terror and a civilized existence depends on the stand taken by all conscientious "bystanders." As against the false opposites of terror (Bush's "crusade" against Taliban's "jihad") there is the reality of the "two worlds" in every country, the rulers and the ruled. After the attacks in New York, I met a lot of people in the hospital where I work and on the streets in the poor section of Oakland who wanted to talk about this. One concern expressed by some Black women was the risks this new war drive poses to people everywhere. Everyone expressed a deep concern that a new expanded war would escalate into unknown realms where more innocent people would be hurt or killed. Some expressed fear that the whole thing could fall into chemical, germ or nuclear warfare. All had trepidations that a rampant knee-jerk reaction by jingoists would unleash a new level of indiscriminate terror, with Bush's rushing into war whenthis "new enemy" hasn't even identified itself yet. Many pointed out that minorities usually are the ones put in the front lines of these new wars. One said, "I'm a Vietnam veteran, and no one ever told me what I was fighting for." Four Black men I spoke to focused on the unconstitutionality of racial profiling, and said they could identify with the new plight of their Arab and Afghan-American brothers and sisters, now being profiled as potential terrorists. U.S. CONCENTRATION CAMPS Another woman reminded us that the U.S. government punished all the interned Japanese-Americans for attacks that they had nothing to do with, simply because of their racial profile. All felt that the terrorist attacks have given Bush and Ashcroft the green light to further escalate the ongoing attacks on our civil rights. When I mentioned that the media took a poll that said 85% of Americans presently supported Bush's new efforts, one man replied, "That may be 85% whites, not us." We have to find ways to fight for justice at home and abroad and stop the fundamentalist drive for permanent war and terror, on both continents. Our collective thought not only reflects the world, but in the end, actually helps create either a horrible reality, or a totally new reality. What would we be fighting for, if it is nothing more than an endless inventory of what we are against? Rejection of war is only the first step. What is necessary in the face of the current reality of absolute terror is a new kind of global solidarity based on freedom. |
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