Posted on 07/22/2014 1:41:19 PM PDT by Kaslin
Its friends in the media would have us think that Dinesh D’ Souza’s latest cinematic work, America: Imagine a World Without Her, is worth seeing because of the effectiveness with which D’ Souza demolishes the standard leftist charges leveled against the United States. I come away from this film with a dramatically different response.
While D’ Souza is to be commended for establishing, by way of quite a few tidbits that promise to be news to most viewers, America hardly has a monopoly on “oppression,” what he gives with one hand D’ Souza takes with the other: D’ Souza not only endorses his leftist targets’ position that America has mistreated its racial minorities, particularly those of African descent; he actually—but, doubtless, inadvertently—underscores this interpretation.
D’ Souza stresses that America is not unlike any other country or society that’s ever existed inasmuch as it is spawned from the same set of circumstances—slavery, war, conquest—comprehensively, oppression—from which all other historical societies spring. In one and the same breath, though, he insists that America is an idea.
But if America is an idea—a proposition, a principle, an ideal—then it is most emphatically not a historical society. Ideas are abstract and impersonal; the stuff of history consists of concrete actors, individual persons and the communities that they compose. And since America is allegedly not just an idea, but the idea of human equality—equality of rights, or something to this effect—then America is exponentially more guilty of the crimes with which D’ Souza’s left-wing targets charge it.
Consider: If America is alone among the nations of the world in purporting to be the idea (ideal) of (say) “unalienable rights” incarnate, as D’ Souza maintains, then, at the very least, it alone among the nations of the world has the least excuse—no excuse—for resembling the nations of the world in engaging in oppression.
So, to the list of grievances filed by his leftist foes against America we can now, courtesy of D’ Souza, add those of rank hypocrisy and invincible hubris: hypocrisy for claiming to be the world’s messiah while falling miserably short of the ideal that it claims to embody, and hubris for, well, purporting to be the world’s messiah.
Of course, D’ Souza contends that while America is not unique in practicing the most egregious form of oppression—slavery—it is unique in that it waged a “civil war.”
Not being a historian, I will put to one side the inconvenient fact that there is no small number of remarkably accomplished historians that reject this grossly oversimplified account of the War Between the States. Familiar as I am with some rudimentary logic, however, I will simply make the following observation.
If D’ Souza’s narrative is correct and Americans, or the bearers of “the idea” that is America, had to slaughter one another in numbers eclipsing those produced in any of our wars with foreigners in order to abolish slavery, then this reveals that Americans are “exceptional,” yes, but exceptionally corrupt! As the black libertarian Walter Williams, among many others, has amply shown time and time again, many societies have ended slavery, but all—with the sole exception of the United States—have done so peacefully.
D’ Souza’s narrative actually paints a most unflattering picture of America, for it distinguishes Americans as the only people ever that, in spite of having dedicated their collective being to an abstraction, nevertheless had to savage each other to stop themselves from savaging Africans and others.
D’ Souza’s position that America is an “idea”—to an even greater extent than most ideological fictions—is a recipe for all manner of disaster. Those protesting against the unmitigated mess that is our southern border have made signs that read: “Honk if you think the U.S. should have borders.” If these protestors are remotely as interested in preserving the canons of logical consistency as they are interested in preserving the territorial integrity of America, then they must reject the D’ Souza doctrine. The reason is basic enough:
Ideas do not have borders.
Once love of country—patriotism—is defined to mean devotion to an abstract, inherently universal idea or principle, then geography is rendered morally irrelevant, and maybe even obscene: since anyone and everyone, regardless of where or when they live, can affirm the idea, all who do so are Americans.
There can be no moral justification for denying American citizenship to anyone willing to affirm the idea that is America.
D’ Souza and his supporters may have given the left the biggest present of all with America: Imagine a World Without Her.
The best argument against America Being oppresive is this: “If America is so oppressive, then why are oppressed people from all over the world trying to go to America?”
Not really. Any foreigner that agrees with American exceptionalism is to be commended, and welcome to create their own version of the idea of "America", or failing that, welcome to *apply for* LEGAL American citizenship...
Would be fantastic for there to be spread out around the globe *MANY* countries, nationalities, cultures that embrace the idea of "America".
So the idea is that by making America out to be too good, D'Souza ends up making it look worse.
Okay, but in trying to make D'Souza's movie look bad and falling for all the depraved Lost Cause b*llsh*t, Kerwick makes D'Souza and his movie look much better than they probably are.
He takes ‘America is an Idea’ to the rabbit hole of academia. America is a country, D’Souza goes with that basic premise, and with the assumption that people can grasp the metaphor.
Duh.
This writer has education credentials as extensive as anyone, and a conservative endorsement from no less than About.com.
From the article:
‘There can be no moral justification for denying American citizenship to anyone willing to affirm the idea that is America.’
If he can find and quote just one conservative, or anyone, who wants to deny citizenship to anyone willing to assimilate and to do so legally, he might be able to begin to consider making this point. But he, like everyone I’ve read in liberal media (mainstream) misunderstands, out of convenience for their silly position, that the above is the case.
But besides that, D’Souza says nothing of this in the theme of his film, nor anywhere in it that I perceived.
Here’s a little something from ‘Ex-Army’, quoting this writer (why Town Hall wants him on their site, I do not know, but he probably spent way too much time in his philosophy classes, or harassing his students as philosophy professor):
“If America was founded on the principle that ALL people have ‘inalienable rights’ – if THIS is what distinguishes America as a country, as we are tirelessly being told- then the American is a citizen of the world and citizens all around the world are Americans. There is no idea that is more destructive of Patriotism and citizenship than this one”. –Jack Kerwick
Could slavery in the US been ended peacefully..not in turbulent times of the 1860s and not if the union were to hold together. Had the Civil War not been fought slavery might have been ended by simple economics. It would become cheaper to mechanize labor intensive jobs like farming than to maintain unpaid but still costly slaves. However, slavery might have well persisted into the 20th century.
We should also note that slavery still exists in Muslim Africa.
See my tagline. If there were no borders then would be tyrants could easily attract the mobocracy the founders feared, and the rule of law would end. What are we seeing now?
Kerwick leaps to some strange conclusions. Sorry, Mr. Kerwick, because I believe America is an idea as well as a reality does not mean I believe in letting everybody in.
Well said. My most concise way of saying something similar is this: "There may not be room here for all who want to come, but there's room on the flag for more stars."
“There can be no moral justification for denying American citizenship to anyone willing to affirm the idea that is America.”
Classic Dinesh D’Souza, the reduction of America to a “proposition nation”, a position that makes the historic American people insignificant.
This fits right in with D-Souza’s role in getting Sam Francis fired at the Washington Times back in 1995 when Francis gave a speech arguing that race and culture were fundamental in the development of America. That America is the result of the culture and beliefs of the particular people who created the country.
D’Souza is a believer in humanistic universalism and he’s offended by any claim that America is the result of a particular people.
Sad business Dinesh
Rare is a human not colored by what they are
Dinesh has always struck me as a grasping opportunist. His latching on to the ‘proposition nation’ nonsense fits right in. It’s a useful tool for the crowd that loves mass third world immigration because it nullifies the importance of the historic American people passing on our culture and values. Diluting the American people into insignificance with mass immigration increases his own position.
In D’Souza World there’s no difference between a Middle Eastern import raised by jihadis and the descendent of American minutemen, as long as the jihadi spawn raises his hand and recites the proper words. If being an American is nothing more than signing your name to a proposition then we really aren’t a country. We are a club.
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