America’s Chickens Are Coming Home to Roost
by William A. Cook on 01/04/2012
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(An end of the year lament)
"Violence begets violence. Hatred begets hatred. And terrorism begets terrorism. A white ambassador said that y'all, not a black militant (Ambassador to Iraq, Edward Peck). Not a reverend who preaches about racism. An ambassador whose eyes are wide open and who is trying to get us to wake up and move away from this dangerous precipice upon which we are now poised..."
(Jeremiah Wright, September 16, 2001)
Prophets fare poorly in their own country, yet countries would do well to hearken to their prophets. Scorn, ridicule, and innuendo attend their pronouncements as the righteous defend their actions as logical, existential and necessary. Jeremiah Wright suffered such scorn and mockery because he understood the consequences of revenge on the innocent and the defenceless, justified by whatever inane discourse. Wright spoke truth to power that Sunday after 9/11 and the righteous cried to heaven condemning him to perdition for defaming America, for even suggesting that revenge for the sake of revenge is the motivation of the arch fiend against the Almighty, the foulest, most ignorant, most amoral rational for action.
Prophets anticipate truth; they review a nation's past history and can predict its future. Witness America's past as the Reverend Wright did that Sunday morning, and what America is doing now repeats its ugliness. Wright said this about America's past:
He pointed out, a white man, an ambassador, he pointed out that what Malcolm X said when he was silenced by Elijah Mohammad was in fact true, he said Americas chickens, are coming home to roost."
"We took this country by terror away from the Sioux, the Apache, Arikara, the Comanche, the Arapaho, the Navajo. Terrorism.
"We took Africans away from their country to build our way of ease and kept them enslaved and living in fear. Terrorism.
"We bombed Grenada and killed innocent civilians, babies, non-military personnel.
"We bombed the black civilian community of Panama with stealth bombers and killed unarmed teenage and toddlers, pregnant mothers and hard working fathers.
"We bombed Qaddafi's home, and killed his child. Blessed are they who bash your children's head against the rock. (See Psalm 137 to understand how the righteous take revenge against the innocent and defenceless.)
"We bombed Iraq. We killed unarmed civilians trying to make a living. We bombed a plant in Sudan to pay back for the attack on our embassy, killed hundreds of hard working people, mothers and fathers who left home to go that day not knowing that they'd never get back home.
"We bombed Hiroshima. We bombed Nagasaki, and we nuked far more than the thousands in New York and the Pentagon and we never batted an eye.
"Kids playing in the playground. Mothers picking up children after school. Civilians, not soldiers, people just trying to make it day by day.
"We have supported state terrorism against the Palestinians and black South Africans, and now we are indignant because the stuff that we have done overseas is now brought right back into our own front yards. America's chickens are coming home to roost.
That was the Sunday after 9/11, 2001 when Wright quoted Ambassador Peck. But even that list of America's atrocities is not complete as Mark Twain would attest in his recounting of the massacre of the Moro's at the turn of the last century 1900 and our disastrous foray into Vietnam when we lost 58,000 American soldiers and killed millions of Vietnamese and Cambodians.
This is the America that exists now: we preach righteousness, but lie with impunity; declare God's mission to bring freedom to the mid-east, then decimate the women and children, the old and infirm as necessary collateral damage; proclaim the existence of Weapons of Mass destruction, then massively destroy a nation's infrastructure, steal its natural resources, take control of its government replacing it with a favoured puppet; and then write the history to extol our righteousness while defaming the defenceless people decimated. Wright knew.
Perhaps our President might hearken back to a time when principles mattered, when truth mattered, when might did not make right, when the souls and hearts of people mattered, when justice and equality mattered not deceit and dominance over all. When did America become a dictatorial empire manipulated by an elite few using the Presidency like some houseboy to do their bidding? When did the founding documents get trashed, mocked and ridiculed as weak, worthless, and obsolete? When did the American people vote to become the dominant empire in the world? What interests of the people demand that this nation establish military bases in about 140 nations around the world then threaten the nations of the world with pre emptive slaughter should they dare to embark on economic or military equality with the United States? How do the actions implicit in these questions reflect a nation based on the rule of law, on justice for all its citizens, on equity of rights and recognition of rights, on the morals inherent in the Bill of Rights and the ideals enunciated in the Declaration of Independence?
Let's say it loud and clear, the America of our founding fathers no longer exists; America is owned in mind and pocket book by those who have purchased our representatives, propagate their news through the corporate controlled media, determine the receivers of our tax dollars salvaging those who wrought havoc with our economy, write the legislation that controls the American people orchestrated through the largest conglomerate of a police state ever assembled, Homeland Security, and in its final nail in the coffin of human rights has legislated the abolishment of habeas corpus and rule of law by installing the draconian National Defence Authorization Act (NDAA 2012). This act in the words of Jonathan Turley, expert in constitutional law (December 21, 2011 on C-Span, gives dictatorial power to the President:
President Obama has just stated a policy that he can have any American citizen killed without any charge, without any review, except his own. If he's satisfied that you are a terrorist, he says that he can kill you anywhere in the world including in the United States.
Two of his aides just ... reaffirmed they believe that American citizens can be killed on the order of the President anywhere including the United States.
You've now got a president who says that he can kill you on his own discretion. He can jail you indefinitely on his own discretion
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I don't think the Framers ever anticipated that [the American people would be so apathetic]. They assumed that people would hold their liberties close, and that they wouldn't relax...
This is the President that rejected the Reverend Wright's prophecy, that capitulated to his new masters who demanded that he repudiate him, that now elevates himself to the role of Judge, Jury and executioner, the role that used to be played by the Sheriffs of the old segregated south when they turned a blind eye to those dragging a slave to the hanging tree. Indeed, we have turned back in time to that denunciated by a real leader of men, a man born into slavery, Frederick Douglass, when he described the America he lived in just before the Civil War:
What, to the American slave, is your 4th of July? I answer: a day that reveals to him, more than all other days in the year, the gross injustice and cruelly to which he is the constant victim. To him, your celebration is a sham; your boasted liberty, an unholy license; your national greatness, swelling vanity; your sounds of rejoicing are empty and heartless; your denunciations of tyrants, brass fronted impudence; your shouts of liberty and equality, hollow mockery; your prayers and hymns, your sermons and thanksgivings, with all your religious parade, and solemnity, are, to him, mere bombast, fraud, deception, impiety, and hypocrisy-a thin veil to cover up crimes which would disgrace a nation of savages. There is not a nation on the earth guilty of practices, more shocking and bloody, than are the people of these United States, at this very hour.
Go where you may, search where you will, roam through all the monarchies and despotisms of the old world, travel through South America, search out every abuse, and when you have found the last, lay your facts by the side of the everyday practices of this nation, and you will say with me, that, for revolting barbarity and shameless hypocrisy, America reigns without a rival.
The American people are now in Douglass' shoes; they have been put on notice that any pathological employee of Homeland Security, of the armed forces of the United State, of our local police and National Guard, can suspect a citizen of associating or being engaged somehow with "terrorists," can be arrested, interrogated, imprisoned indefinitely, without charge, without review except his own. The America Douglass so graphically describes existed up through the 100 years of segregation until the Civil Rights movement of 1954 got under way. We've had a modicum of equality for the past 50 years brought on by national movements that made clear to the government that they were elected to serve the people, not arrest them.
But let it also be said that the America Douglass describes, the one grounded in "bombast, fraud, deception, impiety, and hypocrisy," still exists outclassing its past a hundred fold. Our savagery knows no bounds: we decimate people wantonly throughout the world as Dresden, the fire-bombing of Japanese cities, Hiroshima and Nagasaki, Vietnam, the sanctions against Iraq, the illegal invasion of Iraq, the unqualified military support we provide to the Zionist government in Israel against a defenceless people, the abominable use of drones against the people of Pakistan and Afghanistan, the continuing development of weapons of mass savagery and our willingness to develop further atomic weapons graphically illustrates.
The numbers slaughtered in this review is in the millions--not all dressed in combat fatigues. The numbers of the defenceless and the innocent outstrips those trained to kill. All of those slaughtered happened outside the United States and every son and daughter, mother and father, sister and brother, aunt and uncle, grandfather and grandmother felt the pain of loss that was to our forces a "body count." "Revenge is mine sayeth the Lord." "Violence begets violence, hatred begets hatred, terrorism begets terrorism," so rings the prophetic knell of the Reverend Wright to his congregation one of whom happened to be our current President Barack Obama. Would that he had listened, for if any man was ever elected to the office of President to change the world, this was the man and he has failed.
* William A. Cook is a professor of English at the University of La Verne in southern California and author of The Rape Of Palestine: Hope Destroyed, Justice Denied, Tracking Deception: Bush Mid-East Policy and The Chronicles Of Nefaria. He can be reached at: wcook@laverne.edu.
ConSexually Related posts:
Crying Wolf
Radical circles practice positive discrimination in favor of women. This inverted sexism is, at root, the same as old-fashioned sexism. Some men expect women to talk crap, so they don't contradict them when they do. As a result, in recent years, there has been a rash of false allegations of sexual assault against men, and even against women, by women, among radical activists in the north-west.
* In December 2004, a woman falsely claimed that an Oregon anarchist and his girlfriend had drugged her at a party with the intention of raping her.
* A few years ago, two women independently claimed that a man in the Seattle squatting scene sexually assaulted them. Recently, both women have withdrawn the allegations.
* Feminists in Portland went around accusing a local artist of rape. It turned out to be a case of mistaken identity.
* Feminists from Eugene handed out pictures of an activist, falsely accusing him of rape, at an environmental conference.
* A woman had her car smashed up because her husband was considered too 'macho' for the Eugene scene.
Sexual assault happens. But this does not excuse slandering innocent people, any more than September 11th excuses Guantanamo Bay.
The US government claim that alleged 'terrorists' are not entitled to the usual presumption of innocence, whereas among left-wing activists, it is alleged sex offenders who are given that distinction. The logic of both political extremes is identical. Both sides believe that, because some crimes are particularly bad, those accused of those crimes should be treated differently, that they should not be presumed innocent until proven guilty.
We reject bourgeois justice. But the presumption of innocence is not bourgeois - it was already in place among the Anglo-Saxons some 1500 years ago. Unlike the government, anarchists are not about to put suspected offenders in concentration camps. But the suspension of the ancient right of presumed innocence is as dangerous in sexual offence cases as in any others. To mention just one example, in the 'Satanic child abuse' panic of the early eighties, numerous parents were falsely convicted on ridiculous charges of sexually abusing their children during Satanic rituals [1]. The accusers were a holy alliance of self-righteous feminists, Christian fundamentalists and cops. But first, my argument that feminism is taken too seriously among radicals.
The Portland anarchists are holding a series of 'consent workshops'. Why? Because of "...the instances of sexual assault that were tearing up the anarchist community in Portland and Eugene just a year and a half ago. It's great that I haven't been hearing of any further assaults in that time, although that doesn't mean they haven't happened..." [2].
It is true that, because you haven't heard of something, doesn't mean it hasn't happened. But it doesn't even occur to the author of this article that the fact that she did hear of sexual assaults doesn't mean that they did happen. What was 'tearing up the anarchist community' was not sexual assaults, but false allegations of sexual assaults.
The journal "Do or Die" is a British radical environmental magazine with a class content. But this has not innoculated it against crackpot ideas from the other side of the Atlantic - sort of mad cow disease in reverse. "Let Patriarchy Burn!", is a typical piece of loony feminist nonsense [3]. The only reason it was published is because it was written by a woman, and because the editors of "Do or Die" suffer from the inverted sexism of guilty liberal men. The article is typified by vague allegations which cannot be proven in principle, lack of evidence for the concrete allegations which can, and outright lies. The author claims that the radical environmental movement is riddled with oppression of women, rape, machismo, etc.. This is the exact opposite of the truth. The founding meeting of "Earth First!" in Britain, and the subsequent evolution of the environmental movement, were harmed by the uncritical acceptance of American-style feminist manipulation [4]. The instigators of these divisive tactics are not necessarily women, who are sometimes less interested in making sure there is a 'women-only space', or adding up the number of times women have spoken, than the blokes. Affirmative action not only allows feminism to have an undue influence, it also allows other aspects of American identity politics to divide the radical opposition. "Do or Die" would not have published a statement entitled 'Abandon Your Privilege' had it not been slipped in under the cover of 'a feminist rant'.
Why are 'rants' by women taken seriously? [5]. I think it's sexism - the archaic notion that women are incapable of rational thought, so they should be given special license to use emotions in place of arguments. The Satanic ritual abuse panic exposed how easily liberals are led astray by feminists: "If many ritual-abuse cases were so easily discredited, even as early as the late 1980s, where were the doubters in this country whose public protests might have dampened the panic? They existed, but glaringly absent from their ranks were the prominent civil libertarians who usually denounce police overzealousness and witchhunting. So taken were these people with the feminist and pro-child pretensions of ritual-abuse claims makers that they failed to question the hysteria, even as dozens of defendants were marched off to prison desperately insisting on their innocence" [6]. The book "Satan's Silence" clearly shows the feminist movement's complicity in the Satanic abuse scare. Anarchists are as easily cowed by feminists as the rest of the left - when feminists claim there is an outbreak of sexual violence, no-one challenges them, for the same reason that 'civil libertarians' failed to challenge the Satanic abuse hysteria - too much respect.
In fairness, the authors explain why feminists supported the weakening of the presumption of innocence which allowed the police and social services departments from Oildale to the Orkneys to frame up numerous parents of horrific crimes on entirely false evidence. The 'burden of proof' allows the defendant a lot of leeway. If a woman accuses a man of rape, his attorney is allowed to say things like "what were you wearing?", "you wanted it, didn't you?" and other insinuations, which are deeply offensive if the allegations are true. But, with the presumption that the defendant is innocent, you don't know they are true until they are proven. As long as that presumption exists, accusers have an uphill struggle. That's the price of avoiding false convictions. "Satan's Silence" proves this beyond doubt. If it is traumatic for an adult victim of sexual violence to be called a liar in court, it is even worse for a child. Video evidence, recorded (and doctored) tapes, and other unreliable approaches were allowed for this reason. The result was false convictions. There is no easy answer to this problem. But however fair you try to be, however complex the issues, however much you try to see things in context, you cannot tolerate lies.
Anarchists oppose the state, but this does not solve the problem. Lies can be believed, false convictions can take place, 'justice' can be done, without the state being involved. Mob justice is often worse than state justice. To give credit to the author of the Indymedia article cited above [2], she does not advocate violence against alleged offenders. "Confrontational warnings of revenge attacks" [3] is probably just a fantasy, but there was an outbreak of mob attacks on alleged paedophiles - all of whom were innocent - a few years ago in Britain, and anarchists in Germany shot someone accused of rape.
At the root of all this is clearly an emotional issue. This, I believe, is part of a wider problem - emotions overruling reason in political decision-making. Emotional blackmail is obviously a major factor in American politics, and anarchists are as guilty as anyone. You might expect that people agreeing or disagreeing with this article are likely to be divided by gender, because women are more likely to be the victims of a sexual assaults than the victims of false allegations, and men the opposite. Inevitably, we tend to be aware of things which harm us before others. But I wouldn't be surprised if some of the more outraged reactions to this piece come from men, who make the worst feminists. And I can't conclude without mentioning the women who stand up against feminist blackmail and insist on the evidence.
It is important to regain context and a sense of perspective. Feminists do not commit violence - except against language, truth and logic [3]. False allegations rarely result in attacks, but they do cause division, demoralization and defeat (Eugene). So what do I propose? As far as the anarchists are concerned, I am not suggesting that they should change. The 'ultra-left' are a more extreme version of the left, and the feminists in their ranks ditto. I'm not sure that arguing rationally against political correctness will do any good [7]. It might result in a more sophisticated kind of feminism - the kind that started the Satanic abuse panic. If there is one positive feature of radical feminism, it is that it is too mad to have any influence outside the left. It is arguable that the tolerance of lies, the concessions to feminism and other forms of emotional blackmail, among anarchists, environmentalists and other radicals, are symptoms of irreversible decay. Whatever movements emerge in the future to contest the ruling order, they will be innoculated against mad cow disease.
1. 'Satanic Crack Dealers in Child Abuse Scandal', Wildcat 15, wildcat/w15-moral-panics.html
2. 'The Dark Side of Sex', portland.indymedia.org/en/2004/12/306653.shtml
3. 'Let Patriarchy Burn! - a feminist rant', 'Do or Die' no. 8.
4. 'Earth First! - Which Planet Are They On?', Wildcat 16,nwildcat/w16-earth1st.html
5. "Rachel's Blog", rachelfeministrants.blogspot.com/2005/01/really-angry.html
6. "Satan's Silence", Debbie Nathan and Michael Snedeker, NY 1995
7. 'Wilful Disobedience', Portland, 2004
Jay Knott, January 2005
Footnote: from Philadelphia, 19 July 2005:
I'm glad you wrote. I'm currently in Philly, where I have seen some problematic behavior from Philly's Pissed/Philly Stands Up, which are apparently modeled after the Hysteria Collective. When i lived in Olympia, not so long ago, I heard about one person who was run out of town, for crimes unknown. I googled your piece and was truly intrigued by the stories you told about Portland. I'm wondering if there's more documentation for the stories you alluded to, though based on my own experiences I have no doubt that sketchy accusations are used to ostrasize, threaten or attack men who may or may not deserve that treatment.
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