When I was in high-school, we at my school were, by today's standards, 'diversity-deprived'. Perhaps we knew this, because some of us formed a 'foreign exchange club' and eventually we were blessed with diversity in the form of an exchange student from Europe. Well, that was what was reckoned as 'diversity' back then; that was exotic enough for us.
As it turned out, our much-anticipated exchange student appeared not to like us or our school or our country very much. We had a school assembly in which, upon being introduced to the student body, to applause from all of us, he went into a pompous little speech about how lacking our school and our little suburban community was. And he made it clear that he thought America was a backward and uncultured place in comparison with his central European country. The general reaction was shock: he didn't like us, and our nice new high school with its well-scrubbed students and friendly atmosphere. We weren't cosmopolitan and sophisticated enough. I for one was inclined to write him off as an ill-mannered ingrate (and his year there bore out my impression of him), but many others only worked harder at making our guest like them. As near as I could judge, he never dropped his superior attitude, and left us in June, never to look back. I suspect he is some kind of bureaucrat now, maybe working for the EU or his own country's bureaucracy, and he was probably one of the anti-American protesters back in '68.
But by his presence I was made aware that despite our high opinions of our own country, not everybody shared our opinion. We were not, and are not, universally liked outside our country. Some don't like us for political reasons (we are too right-wing, too militaristic, too powerful, too meddlesome.) Some just don't like us as people. They dislike the American tourists who may come to their countries to visit; they like our money well enough, but they think we are badly-dressed, loud, lacking in polish, and overbearing. And too rich.
I've long been aware of this antipathy that many people have towards America and Americans, and it's just a fact of life. Even if we changed our politics to suit the rest of the world's requirements, I doubt they would like us even then; they would find other grounds to dislike us. We are envied in many places. They often have a love-hate feeling towards us. They emulate us while speaking ill of us.
These facts were not quite as troubling when most of the world stayed in their own countries, but it's becoming more of a concern when the very same people who have little regard for us are now coming to live next door to us, or at least in our communities.
It comes out in today's follow-up story from the AP that the Binghamton shooter, Jiverly Wong (formerly called 'Voong' in the earlier stories) expressed the view 'America sucks' to co-workers attempting to make friendly small-talk with him.
From what little I've been able to glean from the MSM stories, Wong has been in this country since childhood or adolescence, and thus was partly educated here. There is no reason why he should have had a poor command of English, which supposedly caused him to be 'humiliated', and there is no reason why he should have felt himself to be an outsider after spending most of his life in the U.S. -- at least if we believe the assimilationist propaganda. He was not 'FOB' -- fresh off the boat, or off the plane. He had gone to school here, lived here for years, worked with Americans. Yet he felt separate from Americans and America, and thought we 'suck.'
This is the kind of impression I get of many, if not most of the immigrants we receive in America today: most of them appear to have an equally derogatory opinion of us and our country.
Is that our fault? The media talking points always put the onus on us to make immigrants feel at home, to flatter and coddle them, to cater to them in every possible way, and to require little back from them in the way of effort or cooperation. They are so coddled in many cases so as to develop an attitude of entitlement. They are led to believe that they should not have to meet us halfway; they seem to have the notion that everything should be handed them on a silver platter, and that they are entitled to an easy, trouble-free life in this country. If they meet with troubles or difficulties, it is always our fault; we haven't smoothed the way for them, or done enough for them. If they encounter rude people in the course of their life here, they never chalk it up to simple rudeness; it's always 'racism' or persecution of some sort. Perhaps the people who gave Wong a hard time about his accent or poor English did so playfully; some Americans indulge in that kind of humor, which might be acceptable among peers, but when directed at a hypersensitive immigrant, might inspire simmering rage or anger. That's an example of what I wrote about yesterday.
Or it may be that some people were unkind to Wong about his accent or something else -- that happens to everybody at some point, but in our politically correct society which focuses exaggeratedly on race, it becomes a grave offense to hurt a minority's feelings. We Americans are expected to just let it roll off us when we encounter bad manners or rudeness, and that's the healthy attitude, but minorities are encouraged to feel their honor and dignity have been seriously affronted by some petty rudeness, and these affronts accumulate into rage over time, it seems. The same thing appears to have happened with Cho Seung-hui and others like him.
Many Americans, though, seem clueless about how much many immigrants resent us or dislike our country. And I think this is often a self-willed cluelessness. It's very important to many Americans that others like us; many Americans seem to have an excessive need to be liked and to gain the approval of foreign people. I can't count the number of times I've heard a fellow American ask a foreign person, whether a visitor or an immigrant, how they like it here in America. They always ask with a sense of expectation, as if they just know the answer will be glowing praise for America, and gratitude for being here. And yet, of all the times I've heard the question asked of various tourists and immigrants, the latter almost never offer praise for this country or gratitude for being here. Like our European exchange student of so many years ago, they compare this country unfavorably to their own, and in some cases, offer criticism of American behavior. Maybe I've heard a few people say they love it here, but many, at best, give noncommital answers. Some, when Americans ask them 'do you like America'? will give a rather unconvincingly affirmative answer, probably believing that they have to answer yes when put on the spot.
Quite honestly, most of the immigrants who are coming here now come here not because they like us, or capitalism, or anything else about our country. The come here because of the lure of prosperity and a higher standard of living, a safer and easier life. Granted, not all find a bed of roses when they come here, but they seem to like the trappings of life in America just enough to stay despite their feelings for us, not because of any affection or affinity.
Still, most Americans, in their puppy-dog fashion, crave hearing that our new 'Americans' love us, and love apple pie, baseball, the Stars and Stripes, and the Fourth of July. Many Americans are shocked when they come to find out that our need to be loved by foreigners is not requited with love towards us, or even an equal need to be liked by us. Quite frankly, many of the immigrants are aware that their increasing presence in our country discomfits many of us, and they don't care. They do not care. Our opinion of them is of no consequence; we are of no consequence to them. We are an annoyance, an obstacle. Some, like the Mexican revanchists, look forward to being the majority in this country, when they can sweep us aside like so much debris.
Needless to say, this attitude will further alienate many Americans, and the cycle goes on. Still, immigrants and native-born minorities are never chastised for their antipathy towards us, as we are berated for resenting them. It's a most unequal relationship.
What would help, though, is for Americans to stop craving the good opinion of immigrants and foreigners in general; it would help if we faced the fact that many do not like us, and it's useless for us to cater to them or hope for their approval and love. That is what drives, in part, the typical liberal's desire to bring half the world to live in America.
Perhaps incidents like the Binghamton shootings will make more Americans aware that our new 'neighbors' think we 'suck'. If more people realized this, maybe the illusion of 'assimilation' would no longer deceive so many people. But maybe not; the media always find a way to put a pro-immigrant spin on every story, and this one will be no exception.
On another topic: the media, in fact, will probably de-emphasize the immigration aspect of the Wong story in favor of the gun aspect of it, and the gun-banners will get quite a propaganda boost from today's incident in Pittsburgh, in which a White man shot and killed three policemen.
This story will have immense propaganda value, and I predict the shooter will be portrayed, whether accurately or not, as some kind of White extremist, gun-nut type, probably also as a 'racist' or nazi of some sort. Bad news.
