Is the US evil?

[Logan]

Taken from the BBC website : 'A poll by the UK's Daily Telegraph website in late May showed that in Britain, France, Germany and Russia, more people regarded the United States as a force for evil than for good. Only in Italy did the US fare better.
And Senator Barack Obama was the clear preference (52%) across the five countries to be the next US president. This indicates that the mood in Europe is one for change, though it remains true that countries of the former Soviet bloc have much more positive views of the Bush administration than those in Western Europe. '

What do you think?

 

[Tez3]

I think this is going to start a long and probably rather acrimonious discussion. I also think believing polls is for fools and politicians.

 

[Logan]

I think this is going to start a long and probably rather acrimonious discussion. I also think believing polls is for fools and politicians.

Quite possibly. Or possibly not. The idea of evil sparked my interest though, not the poll. I find it an interesting idea that "evil" is a debated (biased?) perspective.

 

[Makalakumu]

The answer depends on which version of history you believe?

 

[Tez3]

Quite possibly. Or possibly not. The idea of evil sparked my interest though, not the poll. I find it an interesting idea that "evil" is a debated (biased?) perspective.

I hope it can be debated without endless jibes at liberals, personal comments and name calling as we have seen in other contentious threads, it's perfectly possible to disagree with someone without being disagreeable. Based on the last few threads we've had though I'm not holding my breath.

 

[Brian Johns]

I have to believe that's an asinine poll question to be asking. More than likely a reaction to the Bush policies of the last 8 years. While I think that the Bushies have engaged in a pattern of lies, deceit, deception, half truths etc ever since entering Iraq, I do not think that they are "evil" per se. They are wrongheaded and I believe, on the wrong side of history, but that hardly makes them evil. One cannot compare these folks to Lenin, Stalin, Beria, Mao, Pol Pot, Idi Amin, Hitler, Robert Mugabe, Ahmadinejhad, the suicidal jihadis and many other butchers in history. While I disagree deeply with Bush and his cowboys, I do not regard them as "evil." So for those reasons, I think that poll is just idiotic.

Off my soapbox.

Take care,
Brian Johns

 

[Big Don]

I also think believing polls is for fools and politicians.

There is a difference?

 

[Makalakumu]

I disagree, Brian. The US is the worlds only superpower right now. And it is engaged in attempting to spread the benevolent hegemony of Pax Americana to the rest of the world. If the US succeeds, a version of history will be written and passed to others either by guns or diplomacy. In the "civilized" world, the education systems will teach it and the generations will be indoctrinated to view the US with goodwill.

If our country fails, things could get ugly. Look at how harshly British Colonialism is treated by "historians". All of the blemishes are fully examined so that it looks like there is nothing but blemishes. Reading that version of "history" is going to paint the Brits as an expansionistic, agressive, oppressive, stratified, jingoistic, racist, regime hell bent on world domination.

Are the British evil?

Like it or not, I think we are destined to be painted like this. The sun never sets in the empire of the US, but just like the British, we will not be able to maintain it. Our debts are rising astronomically, our currency is devaluing and more and more people are dropping off into poverty, our standard of living is dropping, and our military is finding it nigh impossible to procure resources for our out of control consumption.

Hopefully, we do not have the twin calamities of "WWI" and "WWII" that effectively put the nails in the Pax Brittania coffin. Hopefully, the US declines peacefully, we slowly alter our culture to live more sustainably and equitably, and we begin the process of pulling the tendrils of hegemony back to let people live as they may.

The alternative is WWIII. Our enemies will be China, Russia, and India. With the state of our financial system and resources at home, we'd never be able to sustain such an effort and Pax Americana will be forcibly put in the history books alongside Pax Brittania.

So, is the US evil? Not yet, IMO. Our society is on a direction that has been taken before by others and they were painted as evil. Can we change before it's too late? Is it already too late? The answer to both of these questions in regards to both "Pax" examples above lies in who controls the money.

 

[MA-Caver]

While I'm not offended by the idea that other nations/peoples may view these United States of America as evil. The topic does merit civil discussion at the why's and wherefores of these views.

Yet ones definition of evil is what needs to be addressed here before determining if another's actions are evil. That's on an individual level. Is a whole country evil? Or is a country as evil as it's government?
What is the U.S. doing that causes other countries to view (us) as evil?

Evil is like stupidity. It is as it does. But the definition helps determine if it is or isn't.

 

[CoryKS]

I think the term "evil" has been overused to the point of meaninglessness. I think people have gotten so wrapped up in the belief that theirs is the only true moral way that anybody who deviates from that belief must necessarily be "evil". And I think that the belief that the US is "evil" reflects more on the quality of the people taking the poll than it does on the US.

 

[girlbug2]

Of course we're evil!

Problem is, so are all of them..

 

[Tez3]

I disagree, Brian. The US is the worlds only superpower right now. And it is engaged in attempting to spread the benevolent hegemony of Pax Americana to the rest of the world. If the US succeeds, a version of history will be written and passed to others either by guns or diplomacy. In the "civilized" world, the education systems will teach it and the generations will be indoctrinated to view the US with goodwill.

If our country fails, things could get ugly. Look at how harshly British Colonialism is treated by "historians". All of the blemishes are fully examined so that it looks like there is nothing but blemishes. Reading that version of "history" is going to paint the Brits as an expansionistic, agressive, oppressive, stratified, jingoistic, racist, regime hell bent on world domination.



Are the British evil?

Like it or not, I think we are destined to be painted like this. The sun never sets in the empire of the US, but just like the British, we will not be able to maintain it. Our debts are rising astronomically, our currency is devaluing and more and more people are dropping off into poverty, our standard of living is dropping, and our military is finding it nigh impossible to procure resources for our out of control consumption.

Hopefully, we do not have the twin calamities of "WWI" and "WWII" that effectively put the nails in the Pax Brittania coffin. Hopefully, the US declines peacefully, we slowly alter our culture to live more sustainably and equitably, and we begin the process of pulling the tendrils of hegemony back to let people live as they may.

The alternative is WWIII. Our enemies will be China, Russia, and India. With the state of our financial system and resources at home, we'd never be able to sustain such an effort and Pax Americana will be forcibly put in the history books alongside Pax Brittania.

So, is the US evil? Not yet, IMO. Our society is on a direction that has been taken before by others and they were painted as evil. Can we change before it's too late? Is it already too late? The answer to both of these questions in regards to both "Pax" examples above lies in who controls the money.

I'm curious as to why you include India?

 

[CuongNhuka]

Anouther thought is that Iran supported Clinton!!! They hated McCain of course.

 

[FearlessFreep]

I'm curious as to why you include India?

Probably resource-population issues make them a natural competitor for the same set of resources as the US which, when resources get scarce, will cause tensio

 

[mook jong man]

I think it seems to be a european thing to bash the united states. In Australia we like Americans, one of my mates just married an American girl from colorado she is a lovely girl. We owe a big debt to the yanks if it wasnt for them we'd all be speaking japanese right now. But by the same token we would have fought to the last man, woman and child.

 

[Grenadier]

Do the European television stations broadcast images of American soldiers in Iraq helping kids in that nation, or do they only focus on the mistakes that some of the troops have made? Do they focus on how much the folks in the Kurdish area of Iraq are soldily pro-US, or do they give more sympathy and attention to the insurgents?

Do the leaders of the nations try to seize on any anti-American feelings, or do they try to work with a nation to smooth things over? Are they going to reach out a hand, such as Merkel has done, or are they going to try to fan the flames in order to gain some temporary popularity, as former leader Schoeder had done (before losing to Merkel)?

I would suspect, that a lot of how a particular nation feels about the United States, is dependent on how the USA is portrayed in the media, and how the leaders of such nations portray us as well, for good or worse. It would then come down to the citizens of such nations to make choices for themselves, biased or not.

It cannot be ignored, though, that the media can especially influence the thoughts of people.

 

[girlbug2]

You are sweet! Thank you for your kind words. It's nice to know there are friends out there.

 

[Ahriman]

Polls... making me laugh. Loudly.
...
The USA, according to what I read and see, wants to expand it's influence. This is not "evil", it only confronts other nations' interests in some cases.
The USA, according to what I read and see, sometimes uses military force to reach it's goals. This is not "evil", just questionable in some cases.
The USA, according to what I read and see, seeks global control. Again, not "evil", but some may not like it.
...
And honestly - can you show me a country that DOES NOT want these, or at least one of these?

 

[Empty Hands]

Your question and the poll question are not the same. Yes, the US is a "force for evil", as in the poll. Of course, it is also a force for good. An 800 lb gorilla pursuing its interests in the living room of the 150 lb gorillas can't help but do both.

Your question focuses on the state of the country as evil rather than doing evil things as the poll does. In that case, I don't see how almost any country can be "evil" by nature. There are too many people with too little information all pursuing different things that have different outcomes in the government and the country at large to decide that the country as a whole is definitionally "evil."

 

[Nolerama]

I don't think America is "evil."

But I do think certain aspects of American corporate culture are evil in the truest sense: unfair monetary-based lobbying of government office, outsourcing jobs, price gouging, etc all happen within the United States' private business practices.

American business is more "evil" to Americans than to other countries, where they reap the benefits of our tremendous debt (China, EU) our willingness to pawn off jobs to save money (India), and our insatiable hunger for consumer products (Japan, China, India, EU, Earth) an resources.

American corporate culture maintains a definitive line between the rich and poor, while making the poor buy from the rich and rack up debt---> Indentured servitude. Yay.

However, as Americans, I don't think we're evil. Our government at least on a municipal (possibly county/state government) can handle themselves in a progressive way to benefit the populous because that's where our democracy lives. On a nationwide level, other interests get involved.

There are good people here. In my opinion, it's a majority of the American population. However, we ARE ignorant in ways of government, media, the effects of globalization, and empathy for the views of other countries.

You can't hate the slow rich kid in class. You can only help him.

It's profiteering corporations, of which many are partially or wholly owned by a multinational group of investors. And even though they're doing what they were meant to do as capitalists, from a the other side of the table, one can consider them evil.