Cultural Hijack
I've reviewed Susan Faludi's fine new book over at Truthdig. Here's a sample:
There was the trauma of Sept. 11 and there was the trauma that began that day. The first was the murderous work of 19 hijackers. The second began as a work of repair—I mean cultural repair, the sort that any society needs to make sense of breaches of decency—and turned into a cultural hijacking. This second hijacking began with a profound and unacknowledged sense of humiliation—precisely what was supposed to be a distinctly Muslim trait. Alongside a lot of grown-up resolve and plain decency in action, ancestral myths were reinvented—action heroes, “security moms.” There emerged a whole raft of artifacts that enshrined a certain image of the approved American way to respond—like a Hollywood montage called “The Spirit of America” that began and ended with images of John Wayne rescuing his little niece in John Ford’s 1956 Western “The Searchers.” Eventually, too, the trauma spawned a catastrophic war fought in the name of a hodgepodge of deceit and delusion.
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Based solely on Gitlin's review, I gather Faludi's book is a standard piece of psychosocial bulls**t based as usual on the author's having read the CW put out by the media -- "Americans are terrified! Run for the hills!" -- and watched man/woman-in-the-street interviews where any response not playing to the "a trauma the equal of Pearl Harbor" narrative wound up on the cutting room floor.
November 5, 2007 9:04 AM | Reply | Permalink
One of my neighbors, before 9/11, bragged to me about how he had feigned illness while in the army and was able to complete his enlistment sitting at home. Immediately after 9/11 he had two American flags on his car (remember those?) plus a US Marines bumper sticker, and told me that "we should turn Afghanistan into a parking lot". Out of 9/11 a slacker was thus reconstituted into a warrior.
Gitlin: "Meanwhile, in the wings, the preachers of warrior destiny and embattlement await their next round of oblivious power."
ecotourism
WeGoEco.com
November 5, 2007 9:27 AM | Reply | Permalink
You gather wrongly.
November 5, 2007 10:16 AM | Reply | Permalink
Please, Officer Krupke, please forgive me; it's not my fault. I'm so traumatized I can barely hold myself together until the grief counselors arrive.
The Trauma! The Trauma!
November 5, 2007 12:05 PM | Reply | Permalink
That's right Ellen, republicans never play the fear card. Oh never o ever. It's all sunshine hope and optimism. No blah blah about World War Three or Domestic Terrorists, nope never. No fear and loathing in America, Ellen, its all sunshine.
November 5, 2007 1:02 PM | Reply | Permalink
Actually, they think it's World War IV. They're like a whole war ahead of you.
Soon they will set their sites on the Klingon Empire.
thosethingswesay.blogspot.com
November 5, 2007 1:39 PM | Reply | Permalink
Hmmm, you wouldn't happen to know how hard it is to get Romulan citizenship would you destor23?
I mean hypothetically of course. In the event of a war on that imminent Klingon threat we should begin hearing about shortly. I even hear that they (the Klingons) think women should be strong warriors that fight along side of their men. That's certainly not where our brave Republican leaders think a woman's place should be... That sounds like a threat to me!
November 5, 2007 5:45 PM | Reply | Permalink
I have no idea as to what you mean, but you have a wrong impression of the book by reading Gitlin's review.
Why don't you read the book?
November 6, 2007 8:03 AM | Reply | Permalink