4th july
The Patriot, fresh from freedom's councils come
Now pleased retires to lash his slaves at home.
american independence day. somehow these two lines summarize my thoughts about america - often so idealistic but also all too often falling short of its idealistic expectations.
if there is any nation on earth today founded upon universal values it is the USA. this is what makes it sometimes so oddly noble, its actions in history somehow transfigured by its founding principles.
and yet this fledgeling republic of the free had among its foremost citizens slaveowners. claiming to foreswear the corruption of old europe it was among the last countries in the world to abolish bond labour (only brazil was later, in 1881). it was also an expansionist and land hungry state, dispossessing and then exterminating the amerindians, swallowing up spanish colonies and bullying mexico, all in the name of manifest destiny. this was the country which saw the most horrific racial pogroms (in california 1860's) and racist segregation (in the south till the 1950's)
but still it is undeniable that america was a land of opportunity for many; that on its shores people found the freedom and equality lacking elsewhere.
this history is reflected in the american psyche today, and in american policy, and in american writing - this duality of thought and purpose, the selfish and the selfless. strategy with moral objectives. geopolitics and ethics. (just read anything by kissinger) sometimes the fusion is done effectively, sometimes it isn't; this leads to fiascos.
perhaps what describes america best today is the phrase "huddled masses yearning to breathe free" inscribed at the base of the statue of liberty - the traditional symbol of hope for immigrants escaping the squalor and poverty of the old country, and also of the oppressed peoples of the world who rally around the symbol of america - but it is a phrase that rings at once both hollow and resonant.
***
sometimes i think it's not the accumulation of a vast store of facts that matter but the way you draw lines between them. the more lines you draw the better - sometimes you just feel that these lines are an infinite pathway along strings of facts going on and on and on; quite often it's the discovery of some new connection somewhere that you'd overlooked before that really exhilarates, and not the discovery of uncharted waters in the limitless sea of facts.
and even more exciting, the feeling that these links overlap and overlay and affect each other in the most subtle ways, creating layers and layers upon layers of meaning over meaning such that a simple object can be seen in so many different ways from so many different angles.
http://inkpot.com/classical/images/Bachmonogram.jpg
how do you view this?
Now pleased retires to lash his slaves at home.
american independence day. somehow these two lines summarize my thoughts about america - often so idealistic but also all too often falling short of its idealistic expectations.
if there is any nation on earth today founded upon universal values it is the USA. this is what makes it sometimes so oddly noble, its actions in history somehow transfigured by its founding principles.
and yet this fledgeling republic of the free had among its foremost citizens slaveowners. claiming to foreswear the corruption of old europe it was among the last countries in the world to abolish bond labour (only brazil was later, in 1881). it was also an expansionist and land hungry state, dispossessing and then exterminating the amerindians, swallowing up spanish colonies and bullying mexico, all in the name of manifest destiny. this was the country which saw the most horrific racial pogroms (in california 1860's) and racist segregation (in the south till the 1950's)
but still it is undeniable that america was a land of opportunity for many; that on its shores people found the freedom and equality lacking elsewhere.
this history is reflected in the american psyche today, and in american policy, and in american writing - this duality of thought and purpose, the selfish and the selfless. strategy with moral objectives. geopolitics and ethics. (just read anything by kissinger) sometimes the fusion is done effectively, sometimes it isn't; this leads to fiascos.
perhaps what describes america best today is the phrase "huddled masses yearning to breathe free" inscribed at the base of the statue of liberty - the traditional symbol of hope for immigrants escaping the squalor and poverty of the old country, and also of the oppressed peoples of the world who rally around the symbol of america - but it is a phrase that rings at once both hollow and resonant.
***
sometimes i think it's not the accumulation of a vast store of facts that matter but the way you draw lines between them. the more lines you draw the better - sometimes you just feel that these lines are an infinite pathway along strings of facts going on and on and on; quite often it's the discovery of some new connection somewhere that you'd overlooked before that really exhilarates, and not the discovery of uncharted waters in the limitless sea of facts.
and even more exciting, the feeling that these links overlap and overlay and affect each other in the most subtle ways, creating layers and layers upon layers of meaning over meaning such that a simple object can be seen in so many different ways from so many different angles.
http://inkpot.com/classical/images/Bachmonogram.jpg
how do you view this?
posted by zhongkai at 10:30 PM
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home