--- Dan Minette <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > > The closest the US/UK have come to achieving the > former is Bush mumbling > a > > rehashed version of manifest destiny suggesting > it's America's turn to > > take up the 21st century version of the White > Man's Burden. > > Why mock his view like that? The US does not have > colonies. I think that > the actions and results in Japan and Europe after > WWII is the ideal Bush > wants to emulate. Unless you think that human > rights just exist in a > cultural context, and dictatorial rule and genocide > are acceptable within > other cultural contexts and it is terribly > egotistical to think that other > people think like we do and don't want totalitarian > government. > Dan M.
Apart from which, has anyone actually read "The White Man's Burden"? It was racist to modern ears - although not to those of his time, let's give Kipling some credit, please, but if people did they might realize it does have something to say. Take up the White Man's burden-- Send forth the best ye breed-- Go, bind your sons to exile To serve your captives' need; To wait, in heavy harness, On fluttered folk and wild-- Your new-caught sullen peoples, Half devil and half child. Take up the White Man's burden-- In patience to abide, To veil the threat of terror And check the show of pride; By open speech and simple, An hundred times made plain, To seek another's profit And work another's gain. Take up the White Man's burden-- The savage wars of peace-- Fill full the mouth of Famine, And bid the sickness cease; And when your goal is nearest (The end for others sought) Watch sloth and heathen folly Bring all your hope to nought. Take up the White Man's burden-- No iron rule of kings, But toil of serf and sweeper-- The tale of common things. The ports ye shall not enter, The roads ye shall not tread, Go, make them with your living And mark them with your dead. Take up the White Man's burden, And reap his old reward-- The blame of those ye better The hate of those ye guard-- The cry of hosts ye humour (Ah, slowly!) toward the light:-- "Why brought ye us from bondage, Our loved Egyptian night?" Take up the White Man's burden-- Ye dare not stoop to less-- Nor call too loud on Freedom To cloak your weariness. By all ye will or whisper, By all ye leave or do, The silent sullen peoples Shall weigh your God and you. Take up the White Man's burden! Have done with childish days-- The lightly-proffered laurel, The easy ungrudged praise: Comes now, to search your manhood Through all the thankless years, Cold, edged with dear-bought wisdom, The judgment of your peers. If you can come up with a better description of what we will do in Iraq than "Send forth the best ye breed . . . To serve your captives need" except for the fact that the people or Iraq will be partners, not captives, I have yet to hear it. Kipling was an Imperialist, but he wasn't a cheerful one, or one arguing that Britain should go out and rape and plunder across the world. There was plenty of that (and we shall, hopefully, avoid doing any of that) but there was plenty "Fill[ing] full the mouth of Famine / And bid[ding] sickness cease" as well. I'm guessing you don't object to that, Marvin? Patronising and racist, certainly. But there's a certain nobility to it for all of that. Unless you know of something the US can do that would be _better_ for the people of Iraq than toppling Saddam Hussein, maybe you should be a little bit more sympathetic to the President. He's doing it for American interests, certainly - there's nothing immoral in that. He is, after all, the President of the United States, not of Iraq. But the course he has chosen is the single best one that he could have chosen were he governing solely in the interests of the people of Iraq, and he deserves some acknowledgement and credit for that as well. Gautam __________________________________________________ Do you Yahoo!? Yahoo! Mail Plus - Powerful. Affordable. Sign up now. http://mailplus.yahoo.com _______________________________________________ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l
