Culture in the Blender

This blog is moving

2008-01-13T21:53:00.000-06:00

I have moved my blog from Blogger to hosting on my website. I will leave this blog intact, but new posts will be made at http://blog.globalistgirl.net/. See you on the other side!

TCK music

2008-01-08T14:02:00.000-06:00

I recently joined a TCK forum site called TCKID. Someone posted links to a video by a TCK artist called Makiza.

This is a song called La Rosa de los Vientos. Here are the lyrics and the English translation.

A veces quisiera desaparecer del mapa
Volver donde yo nac�
Pero no es tan papa, me achaca
Las duda no se saca es ta peg�
Como laca, el peso a lapa
Makiza es mi capa,
A veces quisiera tener alas como p�jaro
Volar por el tiempo donde estuvo Lautaro
Y olvidar yo, por un tiempo que la mitad
De mi familia esta muy lejos
Hay d�as en que me quejo,
hay dias en que estoy bien piola
Hay d�as en queme r�o hasta del Guat�n Loyola
Ay! Comadre lola, si usted supiera
Lo que estar dividida, no saber cual es su tierra
Ana chola, en la bola como rat�n sin cola
Mi mama me hablaba a mi del C.H.I
Por all� bien lejos donde yo nac�
Donde yo crec�
Y no juego a la gringa si eso tu cre�
Nunca niegues donde tu provengas
Tengas lo que tengas,
Vengas de donde vengas
Vengas de Dinamarca/ o de chiloe
Si el mundo es una gran arca de Noe
Y si yo he nacido fuera
Estoy orgullosa y tengo sangre ind�gena
Mejor por que es hermosa, soy una trotamundo
Sin Fijo rumbo me fundo,
Al lugar donde yo tumbo, as� es mi mundo
Soy del norte del sur,
Del oeste, del este,
Una viajer�a sin paradero sin nombre sin carnet,
Una Ulyse si tierra prometida Eh, eh
Creado en mi propia odisea moderna nene
Se eh, hacer camino al andar caminante
por eso no tengo bandera representante
da lo mismo mi nombre, lo importante es lo que hago
valorar el hombre por la calidad de su trabajo
y es que el mundo es tan grande
y uno tan peque�o,
s�lo me dirijo por la Rosa de los Vientos

Somos hijo de la Rosa de los Vientos
De la rosa de los vientos
Somos hijo de la Rosa de los Vientos
De la rosa de los vientos

De ni�o e seguido el camino de la calle
Tan dif�cil que me pare como quien me calle
Donde me halle nunca olvido mis ra�ces
Los pa�ses donde e vivido han unido sus matices
Para que me caracterice con mi personalidad
Ser una persona de calidad,
La calidez de la verdad, me ampara
Me prepara, para levantar mis alas
Me protege como un chaleco antibalas,
Cala mi alma al mundo en que vivo,
Pido un minuto pa' recopilar lo ke he vivido
Las ciudades en las que he vivido
Las ciudades en las que he residido
Las personas con las cuales e compartido
He sido yo he que he partido recorrido
Miles de kil�metros en todos los sentidos
Miro la importancia de mi vivencia
En mi existencia, encuentros coincidencias
Cuando me preguntan a que sector represento?
Respondo que en verdad yo no entiendo
El sentimiento de estar ligado aun barrio
Al contrario que el salir de el pa' no ser marginado
Yo soy ciudadano del planeta tierra
Ser humano que no cree en las fronteras
Tanto Squat, Cenzi, Anita vivieron fuera
Yo igual hermano, ah,ah
No es por que yo quiera, pero mi lugar
Es tanto aqu� como donde sea, cuatro puntos cardinales
Cuatro cabezas, ver�s que la nacionalidad no es la gran cosa
Si no mas bien girar con el viento como la rosa.

Somos hijo de la Rosa de los Vientos
De la rosa de los vientos
Somos hijo de la Rosa de los Vientos
De la rosa de los vientos

Somos hijos de la rosa de los vientos
de la Rosa

Sometimes I would like to disappear from the map
Go to where I was born, but it is not that easy
The doubt comes over me and doesn’t leave, it sticks like glue
The weight doesn’t go away, makiza is my cape
Sometimes I would like to have wings like birds
Fly through time, where Lautaro was
And forget for a while
That half of my family are very far away
There are days where I complain
There are days where I am ok
There are days where I even laugh about Guantón Loyola
Oh! My friend Lola, if you knew
What it is to be divided, not to know what is your land
Ana la Chola, lost like a rat without a tail
My mother spoke to be about the C.H.I.
In that place far away, where I was born
Where I grew up
And I am not playing at the foreigner if that is what you think
You can not deny where you come from
You have whatever you have, you are from there where you come from
You come from Dinamarca (or from Chiloé)
The world is a big Noah’s Arc
And if I was born far away, I am proud
And if I have aborigianal blood, good, because it is beautiful
I am a globe trotter, without a fixed course I am based
In the place where I find myself landing, that is my world!
I am from the north, from the south, the west, the east
A traveller without address, without a name, without an I.D.
A Ulyseis without promised land,
I created my own modern odysey
Making the way as I walk,
Because of this I do not have a flag representing me
My name does that job, the important thing is what I feel
Value a man by the quality of his work
The earth is so big and one is so small
I am only guided by the compass

We are children of the compass

(I come from other latitudes)

Since I was a girl, I knew the way of the road
I am not gonna stop and I am not gonna shut-up
Wherever I find myself, I don’t forget my roots
The countries in which I have lived have united their differences
So that I can characterise my personality
To be a person of quality, the warmth of the truth
It protects me, prepares me to raise my wings
Protects me like a bullet-proof vest
The world pierces my soul, I request
A minute to reflect on what I have lived
The towns in which I have lived
The people which whom I have shared
I have been the one to leave, to cross
Thousands of kilometres in all directions
I measure the importance of my experiences
In my existence, encouters and coincidences
When you ask me which sector I represent
I respond in truth, that I don’t understand
The feeling of being bound to a district
On the contrary it is necessary to leave it not to be marginalised
I am a citizen of planet earth
A human being that does not believe in borders
As Squat, Cenzi and Anita always lived outside
No matter brothers, it is not because I wanted it that way
But my place is as much here as there
The four corners of the earth, four faces
You will see that nationality is not a big deal
Instead spin with the wind like the Rose

We are the children of the ‘rose of the wind’ (compass)

Although my Spanish is terrible, with the help of the English translation, I really like the lyrics.

The same person posted another video by Wir Sind Helden of a song called Soundso.

The lyrics are about categorization, which relates strongly to most TCKs. Cultural marginalization has certainly been a big issue for me, and I imagine it has been for many others as well. You're supposed to be from somewhere, and when you are from somewhere, everyone already knows what you should be like. It can be quite marginalizing to be told that, essentially, you can't exist. Aren't allowed to exist, because you have to be from somewhere and be like those from that somewhere. The lyrics follow.

Sie wissen genau, wer du bist - Du bist uns so einer
Sie sagen es so, wie es ist - So gut kennt dich keiner

They know exactly who you are - To us, you’re like one of those (*)
They say it like it is - Noone knows you as well as they do

Und zwar bist du vom Wesen so und so - So und so! So irgendwie!
Verstehen sie dich, dass macht sie froh - So einer ändert sich nie

Namely your nature is like that and that - That and that! Somehow like that!
When they understand you, it makes them happy - Someone like that never changes

[Refrain]

Aber nichts davon bestimmt dich, weißt du
Nichts davon verglimmt nicht mit der Zeit

But nothing of that defines you, you know
Nothing of that doesn’t fade with time

Nur du bestimmt nicht, weißt du
Nichts davon ist wirklich
Nichts davon

Only you surely won’t, you know
Nothing of that is real
Nothing of that

So und so
Und sowieso bleibt nichts davon

Like that and that / Anyway (**)
And anyway nothing of it stays

So und so
Und sowieso ist nichts davon

Like that and that / Anyway
And anyway nothing of it is

So und so
Glaub mir, nichts davon
Bist du

Like that and that / Anyway
Believe me, you’re nothing of that

So und so warst du schon immer - Genau so, nur kleiner
Im Alter wird so was nur schlimmer - Genau so, nur alleiner

You’ve always been like that and that - Exactly like that, just smaller
With age it’ll only get worse - Exactly like that, just lonelier

Wie gut, wenn man geliebt wird, wie man ist - So und so, und so allein!
So wie du warst, so wie du bist - Bist das du, musst du das sein?

How nice if you get loved as you are - Like that and that, and so lonely!
As you were, as you are - Is that you, do you have to be that?

[Refrain]

Dein Vater ist froh, weil er weiß, du bist so und so
Und Mutter ist froh, weil sie weiß, du bist so und so

Your father is happy because he knows you’re like that and that
Your mother is happy because she knows you’re like that and that

Dein Haustier ist froh, weil es weiß, du bist so und so,
Dein Lehrer ist froh, weil er weiß, du bist so und so

Your pet is happy because it knows you’re like that and that
Your teacher is happy because he knows you’re like that and that

Die Freunde sind froh, alles klar, du bist so und so
Auf Arbeit: alle froh, alles klar, du bist so und so

Your friends are happy, alright, you’re like that and that
At work: everyone’s happy, alright, you’re like that and that

Zuhause: alle froh, alles klar, du bist so und so
Und du gehst k.o, weil du weißt du bist so und so
du gehst k.o, weil du weißt du bist so und so

At home: everyone’s happy, alright, you’re like that and that
And you break down because you know you’re like that and that
You break down because you know you’re like that and that

Weil du weißt du bist so und so
Nichts davon

Because you know you’re like that and that / anyway
Nothing of it

Knowing what's going on

2008-01-06T00:54:00.000-06:00

A while back, my boyfriend's (sambo/avomies) sister told him, after him mentioning that the dollar was falling, that the dollar falling was some kind of lie or conspiracy or misrepresentation. I'm not sure how the wording was put, I wasn't there. But she clearly hadn't heard of it in the probably 2+ years that it's been falling, and wasn't ready to believe it now. I'm unsure how to react. It seems a little... impossible not to know. Apparently, that's not the case.

Maybe it's being a TCK business brat in particular, but knowing rough exchange rates off the top of your head for major world currencies just sounds like a basic piece of being informed. And knowing whether any of those major currencies are doing anything unusual, like falling for a few years, also goes in that category. I wonder if she knows that the Thai baht crashed? I wonder how many other people in the US have no idea what their currency is doing, or what impact other currencies' behavior have on their economy?

'Tis the season to celebrate in the third culture

2007-12-29T15:45:00.001-06:00

This was the first year that I didn't travel anywhere for Christmas. I stayed home with my boyfriend. Although I'd been making Christmas dishes for a while, I really realized how much I associate the third culture with holiday celebrations on Christmas Day, the day we chose to celebrate. Feeling connected to many parts of the world is a huge part of Christmas for me. Thinking of my friends elsewhere and of how they are celebrating (or not) and wishing them well is really the embodiment or the Christmas spirit for me, and being the only third culture person in my house celebrating was a little weird.

President Halonen's Letter to Finns Abroad

2007-12-07T09:24:00.000-06:00

Yesterday was the 90th anniversary of Finland's independence. My mother forwarded a letter from President Halonen to all Finns abroad that her Finnish club had been sent. I find it remarkable what this says about her (President Halonen's, not my mother's) deep understanding of cultural globalization and its implications for her country. And sort of mine. I'd vote for her. I think she should run for President of the United States of America. This letter made me feel very close to belonging in Finland, even though I know it's not that simple.

TASAVALLAN PRESIDENTIN ITSENÄISYYSPÄIVÄTERVEHDYS

Ulkosuomalaisille yhteisöille 6.12.2007

Kuluvana vuotena vietämme Suomen itsenäisyyden 90-vuotisjuhlaa. Voimme olla ylpeitä siitä, että pohjoinen, lähtökohdiltaan hyvin köyhä maamme on vuosikymmenien kuluessa kehittynyt sitkeällä työllä pohjoismaiseksi hyvinvointiyhteiskunnaksi, joka selviää kovassakin kansainvälisessä kilpailussa. Suomalaisten on syytä olla myös kiitollisia sotiemme veteraanisukupolvelle, joka puolusti itsenäisyyttämme ja jälleenrakensi maatamme.

Tänä päivänä Suomi on osa yhä kansainvälisempää maailmaa. Olemme jäsenenä Euroopan unionissa ja aktiivisesti mukana kansainvälisissä järjestöissä, kuten Yhdistyneiden kansakuntien toiminnassa. Kuluneiden vuosikymmenien aikana myös talouselämämme on kansainvälistynyt. Suomalaiset yritykset ovat lisänneet ja laajentaneet toimiaan ulkomailla, samalla kun ulkomaalaiset yritykset ovat tuoneet toimintojaan Suomeen.
Kansainvälistyminen näkyy ihmisten lisääntyneenä liikkuvuutena. Suomesta mennään ja Suomeen tullaan työtehtäviin, opiskelemaan, eläkepäiviä viettämään. Ihmiset liikkuvat maasta toiseen jokaisessa elämänkaarensa vaiheessa.

Te, suomalaiset maailmalla, olette keskeisessä asemassa vaikuttamassa siihen, millainen kuva Suomesta muodostuu. Riippumatta siitä, oletteko asettuneet ulkomaille pysyvästi vai määräajaksi, te kaikki teette tärkeää työtä Suomen ja suomalaisuuden lähettiläinä. Te myös välitätte Suomeen ulkomailla saamianne vaikutteita ja rikastutatte näin suomalaisuutta. Teidän tekemänne työ ja luomanne verkostot ovat korvaamattomia.

Suomelle on tärkeää, että teidän ulkosuomalaisten siteet kotimaahan säilyvät. Kaikki te elätte, työskentelette ja toimitte kansallisina vähemmistöinä nykyisissä asuinmaissanne. Toivon, että voitte tässä ominaisuudessa kertoa kokemuksistanne
Suomelle, joka on yhä varsin yhtenäisen kulttuurin maa hyvin pienine etnisine vähemmistöineen, mutta vääjäämättä muuttumassa yhä monikulttuurisemmaksi. Te tunnette sen voiman ja mahdollisuudet, joita taustaltaan erilaiset ihmiset voivat yhteiskunnalle antaa. Meillä Suomessa voisi olla siitä opittavaa. Lämmin tervehdykseni Suomen 90. itsenäisyyspäivänä!

Tarja Halonen
Tasavallan presidentti

Translation:

THE INDEPENDENCE DAY GREETING OF THE PRESIDENT OF THE REPUBLIC

To the overseas Finnish community Dec 6, 2007

During this year, we are celebrating the 90th anniversary of Finland's independence. We can be proud of that our northern, originally poor country has developed over the decades with long and enduring work into a welfare society [difficult to translate - a society that is rich enough to take care of all its citizens] that is surviving even in hard international competition. Finns also have reason to be thankful to the veteran generations of our wars, who defended our independence and rebuilt our country.

Today, Finland is part of an increasingly international world. We are members of the European Unions and are actively involved in international organizations, such as the United Nations. During the past couple of decades, our economy has also become more international. Finnish companies have added and expanded their activities abroad, while foreign companies have brought their business to Finland. Internationalization manifests itself as increased mobility. People move in and out of Finland for work, studies, for retirement. People are moving from one country to another in every phase of life.

You, Finns in the world [implied: outside Finland, but less alienating overtones than 'abroad'], are in a central position to influence what kind of a picture people have of Finland. Regardless of whether you live abroad permanently or only for a time, you are all doing important work as ambassadors for Finland and Finnishness. You also transfer the influences you have encountered abroad to Finland, and thus enrich Finnishness. Your work and the networks you create are irreplacable.

It is important to Finland that the bonds of you Finns abroad to Finland remain. All of you live, work and act as national minorities in your current places of residence. I hope that in that capacity you can tell us about your experiences to Finland, which is still really a monocultural country with its very small populations of ethnical minorities, but is unavoidably becoming more multicultural. You know the power and the possibilities that people of different backgrounds can give to society. We in Finland could learn from that. My warm greetings on the 90th anniversary of Finland's independence!

Tarja Halonen
The President of the Republic

Holiday Season & Life in a Can

2007-11-06T15:33:00.000-06:00

Now that it's November, the holiday season is approaching. Yesterday, I was slightly late for a workshop in another building, and walked there briskly. Breathing in and out in the cold air felt familiar and invigorating. It reminded me of walking home from school in a snowfall in the dark. It reminded me of lights in windows, scarves, hats, Loden coats, and winter boots. I talked my boyfriend into taking a walk yesterday night, and we walked down the biggest road close to our apartment, a typically American road with neglected sidewalks, fast food restaurants, and car dealerships. The glittering lights in the dark and cold night made me miss Advent decoration events. I wish there was somewhere I could walk around and decide on a whim to enter this store or that, somewhere where each shop owner has decorated their windows for Christmas and where the city has put up lights. A downtown where you take a walk for pleasure with friends and family. Above all, somewhere you are not allowed to drive. A place meant for people and their senses, not cars. I miss smelling the fine bakeries and cafes. I miss feeling the wind on my face and the snow landing quietly on my hair and my bag and my coat. I miss watching the lights and the people. When you have to get everywhere in a car, because nothing is close by anything else, it's like living in a can. Are you really alive when you're never outside while doing things?

I don't want to take a walk at the mall. One mall is like another is like the next one. I want to take a walk downtown, somewhere that's different from Anywhere, USA. Are you really celebrating anything when all the food comes from cans and boxes and even the trees are pre-decorated? I know there are people who don't do it this way, but the consumerism is everywhere. It drowns out those people who celebrate in a different way. It drowns me out. Perhaps this recent cultural fight about Christmas here in the US is in part due to that people lack Christmas olive trees, using Friedman's framework - they see ideology and politics where others have tradition. No one can sell me Christmas, because no one can sell recordings of the silence of snowfall or can the smell of gingerbread cookies in the oven. Above all, no one can sell the energy of a community celebrating together, face to face. Individual people in cars driving past each other isn't a community.

Cultural resonance

2007-10-26T19:00:00.000-05:00

You know you're not American when the first thing that pops into your head as a defense when people accuse you of being classist, even as a joke, is to confess your bourgeoise background (because you know you're not talking your way out of that one) and proclaim the insignificance of your suffering compared to the proletariat, and the finale is your sincere sympathy for the class struggle (and possible revolution). I clearly need an American version. Does anyone have any suggestions?

Cultural marginalization and homesickness

2007-10-24T21:38:00.000-05:00

Having spoken to people so much about my future and having had to stay a night at the Sixth Avenue Inn recently, even though I am back "home" I still feel displaced. I like staying at five-star hotels because it makes me feel a lot like I came home. It reminds me of the Lidu. (Before its current fall.) I've gotten over the urge to tell every Holiday Inn employee I deal with that I live in the apartments in order to get better service, but I still miss it. I feel like I go from one local environment to another, try to make myself a little zone of transnationalism in a culturally oppressive majority view, get told I shouldn't be so attached to other places when where I am is so great, and eventually start doing the chameleon trick. Staying at the five-star hotels is like a vacation from locality, even though I only live in them when I'm working now. It's an escape into a deterritorialized zone where mobility is the norm and the environment is naturally a mix of people and places, everywhere yet nowhere in particular.

Looking at the Lidu website, I found the videos showing apartments. I almost cried. That's our furniture! Those are our sofas, our dining room chairs, our layout... That's home, almost exactly! I wish I could step into the video, go to the sofa and turn on StarTV. Or look out the living room window to look at ISB and the big foreign cars in the parking lot. Or walk into my room and see the scroll that's on the wall to my right over my bed. But as for so many others, home is a combination of time and space. The Lidu isn't as it was, and no one in our family lives anywhere in China anymore. My visa has expired for good. I have pages and pages of Z visas that are no good to me now. There are two more ring roads now. I can never go home.

My new friend is Chinese, but has never been to China

2007-10-17T16:49:00.000-05:00

One of my new friends is born in Thailand. Her parents came from Laos to Bangkok, fleeing across the border between Laos and China to escape unrest. If she could go anywhere, she would go back to Thailand with a lot of money, but she feels Chinese, even though she's never been there. Her heart is open. Perhaps there is a connection.

Networking Warm Fuzzies

2007-10-17T13:21:00.001-05:00

After being over that horrid hotel ordeal, I'm having a blast networking. I've made four friends in 24 hours, and I love it. I love connecting people across disciplines, countries, cultures, and styles. Something about connecting people makes me feel calm and at peace.

"Road Warrior" Reports, Seattle Edition

2007-10-16T18:08:00.000-05:00

I'm at a conference in Seatte, WA, US. Because I need to work on my presesntation, here's some recently discovered travel advice:

If you call the Westin Seattle and they're full, they refer you to another nearby Starwood property called Sixth Avenue Inn. Do not book a room there. It is the nastiest, dirtiest hotel I've ever set foot in, and has nothing whatsoever to do with the Westin other than having the same owner. If other regular chains are full, consider the Mayflower Park Hotel. It's not part of a chain, but it's a very well-maintained old hotel close to the convention center. The restaurant has excellent but reasonably priced food and the bar is ambient.

American Airlines has terrible customer service and can't seem to get a plane off the ground on time to save themself from bankrupcy, not even in and out of their hub. The reason they call seasoned travelers "Road Warriors" in their in-flight magazine is probably that inevitably, one must be a warrior when dealing with them. Congratulations to those who make it to warrior status - I will remain soft-footed and meek and fly United exclusively. The time it took American Airlines to fly me from downstate Illinois to Seattle is the time it takes United to fly me from downstate Illinois to Chongqing. And that's including immigration at Capital Airport. It's quite obvious that no one expects me to have 20 years of international travel experience and think that I will put up with all kinds of ridiculous things because I'm young.

Back to presentation - I've lost 36 hours of work thanks to AA and Sixth Avenue Inn.

Books as a cross-continental point of comfort

2007-10-09T10:57:00.000-05:00

My mother sends me an email stream of articles from various news media almost daily. Today's single article was about public libraries and respect and love for books. Since both of us are avid readers, I thought that was why she sent me the link. However, at the end I realized she had double motives:

"Och han [Alberto Manguel]tror att han vet varför böcker blev så livsnödvändiga. Hans pappa var diplomat så familjen flyttade runt i hela världen. Och den unge Alberto Manguel behövde en fast punkt för att känna sig trygg.

–Eftersom platserna ändrades och människorna byttes ut blev det som var konstant mina böcker. Jag minns hur jag kunde komma hem på kvällen och öppna en bok och bli så glad för att samma text var där på samma sida.

Han ler brett vid minnet.

–Så böcker har alltid varit med mig."

Translation: And he [Alberto Manguel] thinks that he knows why books became so important for him. His father was a diplomat, so the family moved all over the world. The young Alberto Manguel needed something steady to hold on to. "Because the places varied and the people changed, the only thing that was constant were my books. I remember how I could come home at night and open a book and be delighted that the same text was there on the same page." He smiles widely at the memory. "So books have always been with me."

Not only do I recognize that in myself, I know another TCK who also used books as a steady touchingstone. Funny that I should get sent this article today, when yesterday I grieved my loss of science as a similar point of comfort. Many of the books I read were popular science and math books. I guess we all have our points of comfort that come with us from one continent to the other. I wonder if books is a common one? For me, it was very natural, because my mother actively bought books in my three mother tongues to help me speak and use all three correctly and separately. I had a library by the age I was six. It always came with me. Which books to bring to China was a hard and much discussed decision. We weren't entirely sure what might get taken in customs, but certainly didn't want to bring only light-hearted novels either. (If anyone needs a tip in that department, it seems that they do not block smaller languages as effectively as bigger ones. If it's in English and forbidden, they won't miss it. You have a better shot with smaller languages, probably because they have less translators for those.) Perhaps a higher than average percentage of TCKs are avid readers for the same reasons that I, my friend and Alberto Manguel are?

Gender equity in research

2007-10-08T22:37:00.000-05:00

I haven't posted much lately because I've been very busy with my research, trying to really get somewhere. However, it's difficult not to be reminded that not only do I live in a country that doesn't take feminism for granted, I am in an atmosphere where discrimination can't be discussed - a major research university in the US. It makes me very sad sometimes to think about that the area of knowledge that I thought was truly transnational - science - is not. We will never be able to have Science like I thought we could. For me personally, science has been the one thing that has remained the same from country to country. Electrons on one continent behave like they do on another. I forgot to consider that the people who observe them not only collapse wave functions, they create social knowledge-as-truth as well. Part of that truth seems to be that I am not and cannot be a professional researcher.

I hope there is a place for me too somewhere, and for once my concern isn't cultural marginalization.

Quantum mechanics in German

2007-09-14T14:11:00.001-05:00

I recently ordered two thesis from the University of Munchen that seemed very helpful in writing my own thesis. They arrived, and although I read slowly in German compared to my mother tongues, I realized on the bus today - I'm following a discussion on quantum mechanics in relation to observable variables in surface science experiments in my adopted language! It wouldn't surprise me if I'm the only person at this (US American) university who can read this in German. If there are others who could, there can't be more than a handful. Very useful for me.

The TCK page on Wikipedia

2007-09-05T10:48:00.000-05:00

I contributed to the TCK page on Wikipedia a while ago, and after posting my previous post I skimmed through it (Alright, I admit it, I'm procrastrinating) and noticed the following header: "Non-United States TCKs". It was followed by the phrase "Most international TCKs are expected.."

Uh, what? Excuse me? Are even American TCKs so stuck on nationalism that they classify the world into American and non-American? The whole point is that TCKs do NOT HAVE A HOME. If they do not have a home, how can they be either American OR non-American? Being a TCK is the way out of 'needing' to have a home country. A TCK from somewhere makes no sense. Why consider yourself a TCK if you think you have a home country? One of the prime characteristics of a TCK is the insider/outsider duality. If you're from somewhere you're an insider; if you're not, then you're an outsider. Even positing such a duality questions the existence of a neat two-category system, which is the POINT. Nation-states are political entities and logically have nothing whatsoever to do with 'being from' somewhere, other than as a probability argument. Citizenships and passports are a paper game we play, and 'Here is something from my culture' is another game we play, with one nation-state after the other. None of it is fundamental and none of it had to be that way; it could have been completely different and yet I'd be findamentally the same. I could have grown up eating salmon sashimi and upon my first encounter with Nordic smoked salmon realize this is almost like salmon sashimi, or realizing that when buying linen you can think about what makes good bamboo.

For someone like me who looks at the flag of her country of citizenship, her mother's birth country and her current host country with equal (lack) of emotional engagement - they are special to me because I recognize them very well, but they do not represent me - the concept of 'international TCK' is just redundant. And irritating. It's like saying that a TCK is supposed to have a home after all, that all this "international stuff" is just a phase or some neat tricks or like an extended vacation and all the scholarly research that's been done on the subject isn't really like that either. I feel so misunderstood all of a sudden.

More episodes from the home life of a TCK

2007-09-05T09:47:00.000-05:00

I went to visit my parents over the 3-day Labor Day weekend. Americans have their labor day in September for some internationally ideosyncratic reason, but even here it's a bank holiday. (Not that anything else other than then banks are closed - the proletariat is busy selling things to other proletarians and bourgeoisie alike.) Anyway, my father was arriving slightly after me from Peru again. He brought some Peruvian coffee, much like he brought Chinese tea during my childhood. He once made a good profit on selling some Chinese businessmen some Chinese tea, because of course garden variety Swedish supermarkets like Hemköp and ICA don't carry Chinese tea, especially not at the time. No one knew there was any other kind of tea except red/black, and there certainly weren't enough people where we lived to support the expat grocery stores. It was local or nothing. So now fates have shifted such that we have a lot of trouble finding decent Chinese tea of any sort, but buy shade-grown Peruvian coffee instead. Obviously, I brought back a few packets to avoid going back to Gevalia. Americans may think it's 'gourmet', but I disagree. Gevalia is the Swedish Folger's. Just because it's European doesn't make it great. Unfortunately, it's better than most of the coffee in my grocery store, so I'm stuck with it.

Actually, as I'm writing this, I'm eating sandwiches on bread that contains 0g of sugar per slice (as opposed to the obligatory 3 in store-bought bread), topped with wild-caught smoked salmon from Norway flown here in my father's suitcase and drinking aforementioned direct-imported Peruvian coffee. All of it except the cucumber on the salmon was flown to me. My mother baked some dark bread the morning I left and I brought a loaf with me. The salmon is tender and soft like salmon sashimi and the coffee is so rich and delicate in flavor that I'm enjoying drinking it black. Thinking about it, I'm very lucky. This coffee leaves even Presidentti in the dust.

Since I started thinking about being a TCK when I discovered the concept sophomore year of college, I've felt slightly disqualified from time to time, especially initially, because I've only lived in three countries and only have three mother tongues. I'm not one of those diplomat kids that's lived in ten or fifteen places before college. I convinced myself intellectually by considering the clause that it is enough if others in the environment around the TCK are highly mobile, and I recognized that my father was. (Common dinner conversation during my childhood: "-Hur var Kina? (How was China?)" -"Som vanligt. (As usual.)") It's taken me a while to fully emotionally appreciate how that has made my childhood and family different from others'. I find it very natural to do your grocery shopping in different countries whenever you can in order to get the best quality. Why, it would be positively silly not to if you have the chance! How else are you meant to get real danishes, real doughnuts, real coffee, real tea, real Polish sausage (known outside the US as kabanoses), real Schwarzwald cake or real 中餐 (zhōngcān, Chinese food)? Many products are commercially imported, yes, but many more aren't or have been adjusted to local tastes (or lack of, depending on your perspective.) The idea of traveling with half a suitcase full of rye bread or smoked salmon across the Atlantic sounds like the sort of thing one does without thinking about it too much to me.

Over breakfast the next day, my father mentioned to me that the American Airlines repfresentative who checked him in in Lima said that his American visa was becoming hard to scan electronically due to wear. I am now finally convinced that there was significant mobility in my childhood.

Rye bread

2007-08-09T14:06:00.002-05:00

I went to Finland for two and a half weeks recently with my mother, and it was very refreshing. Cold, of course, but I got to do many things I've missed doing, like eating rye bread. American have no idea of what dark, filling bread is like. "Rye" bread here is more like wheat bread with a slight addition of rye flour that's virtually unnoticable, except in the color of the bread. The food was fabulous. The coffee was even better. I had coffee and pastries in Fazer's cafe. (English page available.) A real cafe (and famous), with the hand-made pastries of normal size behind the glass counter for me to pick the special one just for me. If you're in Helsinki visiting, find this place. Kluuvikatu 3. I got to eat smoked fish. We ate muikkukukkoja (I don't know what those are in English) from the kauppahalli (market building) in Helsinki. I had fresh chanterelles fried in butter, home-made raspberry kiisseli (more dishes I don't know in English), lättyjä (like crepes) and lots of mineral water! On the more glamorous end, we also had a fabulous meal at NJK. One of the best meals of my life. And we got to sauna in two real wood-heated saunas! One was even by a lake in the proper old-fashioned way.

After a few days in Helsinki, we went to see my grandfather near Vaasa and then to the opera festival in Savonlinna, then back to Helsinki. What felt so familiar and comfortable, despite that it sometimes annoyed me before, was how simple everything is there. How natural. How clean. Women walk like real women and smoke and drink. Everyone cooks at home, from simple and fresh ingredients, and wouldn't consider anything else. Everyone cleans. The simple things in life make people happy, and me with them. People can walk without effort. People have energy. People form a society, a community. There is simple beauty. Nothing is so far twisted or processed from its original that there is nothing left of it. If you don't feel like smiling, don't. There is no show. Don't ask a Finn to put on a spectacle for you, but you can count on one to keep it real. And to have sisu, of course.

We got tickets to a new Finnish opera about modern Finnish society by Olli Kortekangas called Isän tyttö. (Daddy's Girl) It was great. The music was moving, but above all, it had a lot to say about people and about the past. I recognized a lot of it in my own family history. The main character Anna has a mother who is a seamstress, like my grandmother. Anna herself has run away far to the south, where "the nights are nights, and the sun is right above during the day," from a family situation (I won't spoil the story, if you see it) and sings that she is younger than when she left. While Anna's family problems aren't ones I share, I can see my own relationship to Finland mirrored to some extent in this. Anna's father died in the war, and she longs to know who he was and get his support. This is a recurring theme, and having just come from my grandfather's house, where there's always a lecture on the wars being served up, lots of pictures of dead soldiers on the wall, and obligatory tours of the local veterans' graveyard on the agenda, it sure struck a chord on the behalf of my relatives. Anna's mother Siiri moves them to the city after her husband dies, in order to earn enough money sewing to send Anna to college and give her a better life than Siiri herself has had. (Just like my grandmother did with my mother.) Anna becomes a communist in university and thinks that her mother is causing suffering by employing women to sew for her. Siiri is aghast, because she herself has worked hard for Anna and her husband died fighting the Russians for freedom. The duet ends with both singing "Whose suffering?" Anna's partner Axel is a drunk, and after a few kids, they split up. Skipping some dramatic parts of the story, at the very end, Axel and Siiri have become friends despite their earlier ideological differences.

I thoroughly enjoyed the opera. As we were waiting for the crowds to move out, the American woman behind me, who rather rudely asked me if I had a cell phone, then borrowed someone else's phone, and continued talking business and complaining about being tired very loudly while the orchestra was tuning, really started to shine as an ugly American. Very loudly, she proceeds to talk to a friend involved with organizing the event about the opera, talking about the Vietnam war, American history and communism, all under the (explicitly stated) thesis that she has to understand the opera through what she knows, namely U.S. history. After a lot of clueless jabbering, I was extremely tempted to turn around and say "Listen, lady, if you don't get it now, what you need is a book on Finnish history, not to lecture Finns on YOUR history. Shut the fuck up." She didn't understand that the reason it was so hurtful for Siiri that Anna was a communist wasn't only or even mainly politics or economics - it was the symbolism.

Russia has been trying to take Finland for centuries. In recent history, huge parts of the population have take on the Russians - a force much more powerful than they will ever be, and they know it - twice and have managed to stay independent. Thousands of people have come home missing arms and legs, thousands of people have died. Finland just barely escaped becoming part of the Soviet Union after World War II, and a constant reminder of how lucky that was has come from Estonia, which wasn't as lucky. Finland still lost Karelia to Russia, and had to pay massive war debts to Russia - most of Finland's industrial production went to Russia for a long time. To be a communist can't be wrong on absolute grounds - after all, what could be wrong with the aim of trying to improve life for the down-trodden? - but there is certainly something a bit disloyal to take Russian ideals when so many people have sacrificed so much so that you can be free, and when your own mother has worked very hard to give you the freedom to choose, to succeed, to give you a better life than she had in the shadow of the war and poverty. Americans have never, ever had to raise a single, real, physical gun to defend themselves from Russia or communism. No Americans have died or been maimed defending their country's independence from invading Russians. America has never lost land to Russia. No Americans have skied over the border with Russia by mistake, to return too afraid to speak a word of what they've seen. A cold war may be nasty, but it's even nastier to fight both hot and cold wars with your neighbor. And I can guarantee you she didn't even catch the slant on how the communism was presented - the subtle pointers to the mindlessness and ultimately meaninglessness of the slogans and the key words (We're protesting imperialism!")and what they meant in societal context. I'll also bet she didn't feel the sense of moving forward when the characters choose to value human relationships over ideology. It's quite possible that she would have though it weak to love your family instead of sticking to ideology, like many Americans do. It was a real bummer to have to listen to her after such an uplifting and personally relevant opera.

While at the festival, we stayed at a farm that's running a hospitality business on the side called Lomamokkila. (Several other languages available on the website.) No, that's not a typo, it's an o. It's 12 km from Savonlinna, but all the hotels were booked, of course. It turned out to be very nice - almost like at our old summer house, but with some extra perks. I highly recommend Lomamokkila if you're looking for a special place to stay near Savonlinna. If you don't speak Finnish, we heard the owners speak excellent English with foreigners, and they responded quickly to email. All the buildings and equipment were clean, solid and of good quality. They have many kinds of lodging (including in old liiterit, uh, a kind of old-fashioned grains storage barn), both close to the farm houses and cottages by the lake. (Mosquito warning by the lake.) There's a common fire teepee where you can grill (good place to grill some sausages), two row boats and fishing rods for common use, and a common kitchen if you want to cook yourself. You can bet we did, we made poronkäristystä (a reindeer dish). You can also pay for meals at the farm. We ate breakfast there, and it was like the rest of Lomamokkila - simple but sublime in its simplicity. Oven-baked porridge with whole wheat kernels, baked milk, fresh bread, yoghurt, fresh eggs, fresh coffee. By the time you'd eaten some of almost everything, you were stuffed. It was a lot like being at a summer house, and that area of Finland is very, very pretty.

I've spent so much time in itä-pohjanmaa (east botnia) that to see järvisuomi (lake finland) was very refreshing. It was also nice to get away from the east botnia dialect. My step-grandmother goes a bit nuts with the local identification and she'd got an east botnia dialect-Finnish dictionary she likes showing everyone. As a TCK, that's somewhat awkward. Every time she reall pushes the regional dialect I can't help but think "Lady, it's a big world out there beyond itä-pohjanmaa... Guess where we came from? We just flew from Chicago across an ocean to Germany to Finland to come see you. We switched from English to German to Finnish without much effort and you're stuck on a dialect of Finnish? Just let it go."

Back in Helsinki, we went to Ateneum to see the exhibit Music and silence. Finnish symbolism. Very interesting, as I recognize the feelings from the exhibit relating to Finland, but didn't have a way of describing them. It also suggests a different perspective on some of Akseli Gallen-Kallela's work that I hadn't considered before. We also stopped by the Academic Bookstore and picked up a huge technical English-Finnish dictionary for a mere E160.

We stayed a night at the Kempinski Hotel Airport München, since we were flying Lufthansa and our Chicago flight was early in the morning from München. Great chance to practice German! I started on the outgoing flight, of course. I asked the stewardess how they decided which language to speak with passengers. She replied that (of course) they had a system: if a passenger's last name was German, they spoke German, otherwise English. Then she peered at me and said, "Aber mit ihr ist es anders." (But with you it's different.) That made me proud! It should indeed be different with me. I'm glad to see I'm still above that barrier of ease in German where people respond naturally in the language you're trying to speak. I wouldn't let my mother get away with English after 25 years of language propriety exhortations, but I have to admit, people did respond to her in English or addessed her in English. I found a biergarten at the airport and got to have some real beer and German sausages too! Very tasty. The return flight was first class and therefore very pleasant. I managed to get the flight attendants to address me in German all the way.

Then there was the return shock. When I arrived in Finland, I thought the hotel coffee was good and that everyone was skinny as a stick. When we left, the hotel coffee was incredibly watery and barely worthy of the name 'coffee' and there were overweight people here and there. I miss rye bread again.

Pools

2007-06-18T11:33:00.000-05:00

Yesterday, I was outside late at night. Some lights were reflecting off the water of the pool. It reminded me of the pool in 重庆 (Chong2qing4). I would go swimming at night, so that people wouldn't stare as much. The neon signs would reflect off the water surface in neverending color patterns, and standing on the side of the pool, you could see the river and 解放碑 (Jie4fang1bei1) and all the lights of the city. Here, there are no neon signs, no river and few lights. I felt like I was somewhere else.

Old-fashioned vs. Exotic

2007-06-14T21:00:00.000-05:00

I took a 太极拳 (Tai4ji2quan2) class in 重庆 (Chong2qing4) sort of to have something to do over the summer. It was nice to get to know some of my traditions. I liked it, even though it's not really something someone my age "should" be doing. I can't help but want to be one of those old ladies that meets her friends every morning to do 太极拳 (Tai4ji2quan2) together. Unfortunately, I forgot bits of the form, and signed up for a 太极拳 (Tai4ji2quan2) class here.

The other day, I had planned to run some errands in the grocery store after class. I didn't think about that I'd be wearing my 太极拳 (Tai4ji2quan2) clothes - very old-fashioned indeed. As I'm walking through the supermarket, trying to be quick, feeling like everyone's looking at me thinking, "What's a modern young woman doing in those clothes? And she's a Westerner to boot, shouldn't she be a little more with it?", I realized that the clothes don't look old-fashioned here - they must look exotic.

The New American Century and Fascism

2007-06-13T11:11:00.000-05:00

Listening to Pandora at work, a song called New American Century by KMFDM came on. The lyrics caught my attention. In context of what I've been reading (and re-reading) this seems right on the money. There are strong directions in American politics that could endanger not only democracy and freedom in America, but given America's importance in the global economy and proto-community, could have reverberations worldwide. Already now, some issues that should stay America's internal struggles and problems get transmitted elsewhere - like faith-based abstinence-only education in countries that desperately need condoms (As America itself, one might note.) and a stubborn insistence in face of facts to the contrary that global warming doesn't exist. America may be taking a sharp swing toward the unreasonable, and they are often not aware of the mirrors they could see themselves in to get a reality check. If you're really dominionist, you can always dismiss the mirrors as insufficiently something or other, insufficiently Christian or insufficiently American or why not both. While we're making things up, might as well run with it.

The more I think about whether this is a real threat or not, and what would be ethically justified and/or required to resist it, I am starting to (once again) realize the magnitude of my blind spot for societies where faith plays a key role. I re-read Sam Harris's The End of Faith again. Perhaps the way in which Sweden (and the other Nordic countries) is (are) the most secular is in that evidence is always key. You are politically free to believe the Sun orbits the Earth, but society will see no virtue in your faith. Faith for the sake of faith is not seen as a virtue. Strong convictions without logic or facts is seen as a vice. I feel this way, of course, but when I think about my feelings on the matter, I feel an imagined community behind me. Just like you just can't say that gender roles are a good idea, you can't expect people to respect your opinions if you can't argue for them logically and with facts as support. Feel free to believe whatever you like about God in your free time, but reality trumps faith as soon as you try to do anything at all. If you accept that if you stick your fingers in an electrical outlet, you will get an electric shock, and this is real, then you have to leave religion for those moments when you're feeling contemplative, perhaps after a few glasses of wine. Of course, this is not globally how people feel about it. After the recent discussion with my mother about spirituality and how I can be an atheist, she a Christian and agree on spiritual, moral and ethical matters through our feelings and experiences with nature, I'm wondering if religious dogma historically never gained the hold they did in southern Europe up north, because people have engaged almost by default in another kind of spirituality that is more rational and also spiritually satisfying. I'm sure not everyone feels this way (I imagine many Chinese may not, based on their behavior in Swedish forests), so perhaps it's culturally symptomatic that I feel at once small and powerful alone in a vast forest. Listening to the sounds of the forest and feeling the harmony (or, if the forest is hurting, its plight) is for me greatly conducive to losing my sense of self, which Harris lays out as a main goal of spiritual practice. Why should I listen to dogma when I can go into the forest?

Anyone who made claims like my mother-in-law - that she believes that the Bible is literally true and that science is true - would be quietly avoided or quietly derided in gossip. In fact, I heard of such a person in Sweden once. It was delivered as dirty gossip, and it didn't occur to me that it could be seen any other way. Being deeply and professedly irrational is a dirty secret you don't want your co-workers to know. Something you might confess to a very trusted friend. But not here! Here, in fact, making a big show of your irrationality is encouraged. We are not perfectly rational - in fact, we may mostly be irrational - but that is no excuse to cling to dogma that fly in the face of evidence. Sam Harris points out in his book that many liberals - myself included - do not appreciate the gravity of the threat that truly believing religious dogma presents. Reading that section, I laughed out loud, because I saw myself on the page. Looking around in the US, it is difficult enough for me to imagine life when you really believe that the Bible is the literal Word of God. I just... dismiss it as ridiculous in several ways, unrelated to my concept of theology or religion per se. Ideas in the Koran are equally unrelated to life for me. Prior to moving to the US as an adult, I had never encountered another person who acted as if they did. I have been encased in a bubble of reality, it seems. The religious people I met in Europe had, as Harris points out, discarded large parts of past dogma and texts as unreasonable. Trying to imagine really believing them is for me an exercise where my heart screams with injustice and my head feels about as comfortable as trying to imagine that invisible pink elefants have decreed that I must have six cups of coffee a day or I will suffer for all eternity. It's very distressing, in fact, and to get rid of the cognitive dissonance I just leave the thought be.

The New American Century is a very, very scary project. Such megalomania that is untouched by reality or facts or critical thinking is one of the scariest things I can think of politically. Maybe it's because I feel I share Europe's burden to make sure fascism never, ever returns, but I have to do something. If this is all going to hell, I want my conscience to be clear. We could still either stop this or make sure it won't happen. But how?

June 4th Massacre Ad

2007-06-08T10:48:00.000-05:00

Reuters reports that an ad saluting the mothers of the June 4 天安门广场 (Tian1an1men2 Guang3chang3, Tiananmen Square) massacre got published in the Chengdu Evening News! The person who placed it also tried other newspapers, and the clerks who handled the requests didn't know what June 4 referred to. The other clerks called a supervisor. This clerk called the customer, and got told it was a mining accident, and it went through! I would love to have a copy, to see it myself.

I remember Li, one of my father's business partners, telling me about what happened. She was there as a student, and spent the next two weeks in the countryside hiding. It's amazing when you think about it, how much the world has changed since then. Now she's an overseas Chinese. She changed her citizenship, so now she has what she was fighting for then. But many millions don't.

I also remember speaking with a good friend of mine, whose name I will not type out on the vauge chance that I could get them in trouble. We were speaking about the massacre (good friend with open heart indeed, as you can see), and I mentioned the iconic picture seen all around the world except China itself, of the lone man standing in front of the tank holding up his hand in a 'stop' sign. My friend looked confused, and I realized they hadn't seen it, they hadn't seen any pictures or footage of something that happened 30 minutes from their home.

But the grip of the Party will corrode, sooner or later. There were good reasons to be so suspicious of foreigners. My friend now knows that there is footage that was seen worldwide, they know there are pictures, and they know from my face and my words that everyone abroad knows. They know there is such a thing as "the" picture from 天安门广场 (Tian1an1men2 Guang3chang3, Tiananmen Square). I don't know how far that knowledge might spread, but some young people do know. I told one myself. Looking around on campus, there are a lot of overseas Chinese here. Some of them will see the footage, and some of them will go back. The knowledge and memory will be preserved here, until China is ready.

The authorities are still very jumpy about gatherings on 天安门广场 (Tian1an1men2 Guang3chang3, Tiananmen Square), especially after the Falun Gong incidents. A police van followed me around when I was rollerblading on the square once, but that was in June. I'm not sure how someone rollerblading might be a threat, but it's apparently not out of the question.

It's so unfair. I wish my friend had the same freedoms and opportunities as I do. They deserve better. They are not a cog in a machine, they are a person. They are not some cretin that has to beg for a visa or a potential sacrifice for the glory of some leader or party or country. They are a person with their own personal sorrows and joys, their special smile, and their own hopes and wishes. I wish they could look at anything they like, discuss anything they like and had more chances for a better life than they do. There is no reason why they couldn't, and they shouldn't have to leave their country to get it. I hope we will meet again when China is completely open and rich and look back and say "Wow, things changed since we first met. Remember?"

The Face of Modern Hatred in the US

2007-05-17T11:14:00.000-05:00

While waiting at O'Hare recently, I made the mistake of walking into a bookstore to spend some time. (I don't have gold status with any frequent flyer program, since I fly so little, so I can't wait in a lounge.) I call it a mistake, because I'm almost incapable of walking into a bookstore without buying anything, but I usually promptly forgive myself for splurging on books with such a small budget, because the books I buy were very important. This time I walked out with Christian Fascists by Chris Hedges and Blink by Malcolm Gladwell, author of The Tipping Point. Blink was very intresting (and explains why I am unable to explain consciously why I do not want to be alone with a co-worker, but feel very strongly about it), but Christian Fascists triggered some third-culture associations between America and European Neonazis. Hedges is what I think of as a "normal" Christian, the kind that one can have as a neighbor without further complications. The kind I have no problem with. He is a graduate of Harvard Divinity School and actually recieved his first warning against religiously clad totalitarianism there, from a German professor who had seen the rise of National Socialism (funny how der Nationalsozialismus pops up in my head there, along with images of "NSDAP" spraypainted on walls) first-hand. Hedges is a moderate Christian who does (or at least attempts to) what Sam Harris says in The End of Faith is not possible: attack religious extremism from within.

Perhaps Harris writes from the point of view of someone who has lived in a place of mired in religious literalism and authoritarianism that imagining a culture where interpretation of religous texts is culturally mandatory. Harris is probably right in saying that religious moderates have taken values and ideas that are not strictly speaking religious when they interpret their religion. However, I think that in practice what matters is the cultural force of the value, not strictly speaking where it came from. However, here in the US, "primacy" of religious ideas is an idea with tremendous cultural force. Culturally speaking, trying to make an argument here for why literalism and conservatism (in the original, literal, general sense) are not good approaches to religion is as futile as trying to make an argument about the benefits of lowering taxes in Sweden. Forget it. You may find individuals who will admit, in private, that you at least have a point worth considering, and occasionally even someone who agrees. But public admission of such ideas is socially unwise, except in very select company. But swap the arguments between the two cultures - and you will instantly have broad support. Truth is socially - and therefore culturally - constructed. Harris's argument may well be functionally correct for the US, where a cultural change is probably necessary to allow religious moderates freedom of religion without also sanctifying religious extremism. It would have to become truth that literalism is incoherent, even from a religious point of view. This doesn't seem likely. But perhaps globally speaking, one can have faith without extremism, but only in cultures where truth limits religious fundamentalists from gaining legitimacy. Harris can certainly be forgiven for missing this; even I find it difficult to remember sometimes, in the middle of being flustered.

Anyway, back to the original subject. Hedges writes explicitly and clearly about a feeling I've had, and I believe a friend of mine also has had: that the American Christian Right feels a lot like the European Far Right. I get the same cold feeling from both. Of course, accusing people of being pseudo-members of the Far Right is very serious. Very serious indeed. I've dismissed it consciously, because they seem rather different in many ways. Fascism is part of Europe's past, and its past imagery and circumstances feel very different from the US. How can you say "Auslander raus!" when the country is built on immigration? How can you appeal to pastoral images of national dress and national music when there are none, at least none that are seen as such? These features of the US would even seem as guarantors of that fascism cannot rise here. But Hedges points out what should have been obvious: if fascism were to rise outside Europe, it would appeal to local traditions. He cites Robert Paxton (from Anatomy of Fascism): "[The language and symbols of an authentic American fasicsm] would have to be as familiar and reassuring to loyal Americans as the language and symbols of the original fascisms were familiar and reassuring to many Italians and Germans, as Orwell suggested. Hitler and Mussolini, after all, had not tried to seem exotic to their fellow citizens. No swastikas in American fascism, but Stars and Stripes (or Stars and Bars) and Christian crosses. No fascist salute, but mass recitations of the Pledge of Allegiance. These symbols contain no whiff of fascism in themselves, of course, but an American fascism would transform them into obligatory litmus tests for detecting the internal enemy."

Right in the beginning of the book, Hedges has a short text on Ur-Fascism by Umberto Eco. It's a simple list of what fascists have in common, with some explanations and examples. Here is the list.

1. Cult of tradition - truth has already been spelled out once and for all
2. Rejection of modernism and above all reason
3. Cult of action for action's sake - thinking is a form of emasculation
4. Disagreement is treason, because you have to think to disagree, and thinking falls under 3.
5. Exploits and exacerbates fear of difference - racism is built in
6. Derives from individual or social frustration
7. To those who feel deprived of a clear social identity, Ur-Fascism says that their only privilege is to be born in the same country - nationalism + obsession with a plot against the country by people with insider/outsider status (Jews are the eternal favorite, but perhaps Arab-Americans could work?)
8. Followers feel humiliated by the ostentatious wealth and force of their enemies - but construe their "enemies" to be at once too strong and too weak
9. Life is lived for struggle - pacifism is trafficking with the enemy - life is permanent warfare
10. Popular elitism - every citizen belongs to the best people in the world
11. Everyone is educated to become a hero/martyr - the Ur-Fascist hero is impatient to die, but in his (gendered pronoun intentional) impatience, he often sends others to die instead.
12. Since both permanent war and heroism are difficult games to play, the Ur-Fascist transfers his will to power to sexual matters - playing with weapons becomes a phallic ersatz exercise
13. Individuals as individuals have no rights, and the People are a monolithic entity with a Common Will.
14. Ur-Fascism speaks Newspeak.

Hedges goes into deeper discussion of these points in the book, of course, but I recognize just about every one of these qualities in the American Christian (Far) Right. He argues that the movement is not yet revolutionary, but if a disaster happens to increase individual or social frunstration, it may cross the line to becoming so.

This list is like a vocalization of what about the Christian Far Right makes me feel so cold. It's the ideas that life is war, the prominence of guns, and fierce nationalism put together with soothing statements of that they are virtuous. God, guts and guns may appeal to many Americans, but that's exactly what makes that combination so potentially dangerous. I feel like I need defending from these people. And that may be why, much earlier in the Bush presidency, I had flashes of planning how to exit the US as quickly as possible if necessary. I've even felt better knowing that I am a foreign passport holder - if they try to stop me at the border, I have a better chance of making a stink about it than an American citizen. If the borders close, I have to be one of the few who make it out, one of the foreigners who ride out on their citizenship, leaving behind the poor citizens of Whateveristan to the cruel hands of their government.

It sounds rather drastic, I'm sure. I'm a bit surprised myself, that I've thought of this, and more than once. Justified or not, these thoughts are linked to the Nazi Germany, to the Soviet Union, the Revolution in China, and the invasion of the Japanese, in different ways. These modern people in the US make me associate to some of the darker moments in human history. When I was little, hiking in the Swedish mountains, my mother and father said that if the Soviets ever invaded, we could flee on foot across the border to Norway. Perhaps that idea stuck.

But if America has even some fascist leanings, it could have consequences far beyond even this current misguided so-called war in Iraq. I'd really rather not think those thoughts out all the way, because this country is sitting on so many nuclear weapons that I feel radioactive already just thinking about them in fascist hands. Perhaps I should learn a few Bible quotes, so I can masquerade as a proper "Bible-believing Christian" should they feel that the Apocalypse needs speeding up.

Religion, mythology and the forest

2007-05-09T09:52:00.000-05:00

These past few days, I've been discussing religion with my mother. We've been talking about the cultural differences in how religion is approached in the United States compared to Sweden and Finland. She is Christian and I'm an atheist. However, what we mean - and especially the implications - aren't what they mean here in the States. Neither of us understand the cultural functions of Christianity here very well. However, both of us find spirituality in the forest. I realized that when I say I don't believe in God, I mean pretty much the same thing as when I say I don't believe in keijukaiset/älvor/elves or fairies. (I'll use the word fairy, since it has associations in English mythology closer to the 'form' of a keijukainen/älva. Fairies are translucent, female nature beings who dance in clearings in the forest, especially at dawn and at sunset. Their dance is incredibly beautiful, and they will invite you to come dance with them, but if you do, you will disappear and become a fairy too. So be careful, if you see the fairies dancing.) I don't actually believe that there are real, physical beings that are translucent dancing around in the forest, trying to lure me to dance with them. But when I walk in the forest, I feel connected to it. I feel like part of a system of life. I am not scared of the animals or plants, even though I know there are animals that could seriously hurt me there. I feel like we have a spiritual deal - I leave them alone, and they leave me alone. I make noise as I walk, so that the animals know I'm coming. I am, in fact, almost mystical about it. I feel like if you enter the forest with ill will, the forest is much more likely to hurt you. (As did the miners of old, who gave offerings to the mountain guardian/goddess before starting work, asking for her permission to mine her mountain.) But when you are at peace with the forest and everything in it, we can both prosper. Just as I know how fairies work, and know not to go near beautiful violin music from a stream or a creek (lest I be enchanted to drown myself by another mythological being, Näcken), I know the snakes can feel the vibrations of my footsteps, and I know the bears and wolves can smell my scent. Fairies, trolls, and other beings of the forest all play their role too, roles that are not cast in terms of good and evil. I do not feel afraid of the fairies, the trolls or Näcken, because although they could harm or kill me, they are only part of the life-system we live in. If I get hurt, it is because I have intruded somewhere where I shouldn't be in the first place. Perhaps I view them more as abstractions of general principles to life. But I do clearly feel that I am communicating with something. The forest has spirits that I can feel, but I don't have very strong urges to define them or roationally explain them. I think in China, people know the forest spirits as qi4. They are simply there. They always have been, and always will be.

Unlike religious or spiritual experiences in the United States, these feelings are intensely personal. My mother and I feel the same about the forest and its spirits. I can see that my mother doesn't care that I don't believe in the Christian God, and I don't particularly care that she does. We don't need to, because we can share spirituality about the forest. It is an experience of exchange between you and the forest. A congregation would only destroy it with its noise and human activity. That doesn't belong in the forest. It is disrespectful, in fact. When we move in the forest, we do so on its terms. Silence and respect are appropriate behavior. Talking and thinking about it, it seems like people who live physically close to nature often regard the forest as almost sacred space. Here in the US, I conspicuously lack culturally appropriate respect for the church and Christianity. But I cringe at people shouting in the forest, people walking too broadly, in a too imposing kind of way, or people taking things from the forest without thanking the forest, and a host of similar behaviors that just feel irreverent. The guardian-goddess of the forest (Metsänhaltija) will punish you! Can't you see that her wrath could be devastating? Without nature and the forest, we will be reduced to nothing!

This last line of reasoning is perhaps a spiritual formulation of the need to protect the environment. But to me, it isn't just an intellectual argument, it is an emotional one, too. If the trees and the animals are dying, we will be, too. Our fates are the same, because we belong together. In the forest, there can be no doubt of our oneness. Conversely, Christianty doesn't mention those feelings of oneness. In the traditional mythology (that in the Nordic countries has been mixed with Christian beliefs, but never abandoned), both male and female entities exist. That feels natural. Androgyny and/or a mix of genders is the only normal state. Simultaneously, it feels natural that the guardian-rulers are almost all female. (Perhaps this is a leftover of the original Goddess worship?) I have never been able to feel a male-only deity. I tried, but I just can't feel it. It feels... alien. God just cannot be a man. She can't. What is considered 'male' (aggressivity, domination, etc) isn't the forest at all. Power flows through all circuits of life, and life is not aggressive. Life is a flow, a complex web of life and death, pain and joy, loss and gain. To pick one strand and say "Look, how viciously the wolf is killing the deer! Life is brute force and aggression!" is misguided. The spirit of the forest is not like that. She/it is wiser and calmer and nearly eternal. (It may not be surprising I find Buddhism a great deal more approachable emotionally.)

Going back to more practical apsects of this, the hippie imagery here is also difficult for me to understand. I don't understand the connotations of 'treehugger' very well. What moral person isn't? That's not about politics. That's about the basic truths of life. I know what it's supposed to connote, but I don't think it can for me. Without the forest and nature, arguing about politics and clothing choices are moot, because we will disappear.

"Multiculturalism" and women

2007-05-03T14:05:00.000-05:00

Most of my mental capacity at the moment is going into being mad about and trying to understand the sexist behavior of someone at work. A fact that I think is highly relevant - and is currently being suppressed - is that the man in question is from a society that is generally known to be much more sexist than the country in which I am now, which in turn is more sexist than at least one of my other homes. (Not just from my personal observations, mind you, from studies and reports as well.) Susan Moller Okin has written an essay entitled Is Multicultralism Bad for Women? that raises a number of good questions about group rights and women's rights. I think she's right - there comes a point where the interests of women in a minority group are not commensurate with the interests of the men in it, and that can't be ignored. Furthermore, therecomes a point where the interests of men in a minority group are opposed to, well, ALL women. You can't give people carte blanche to oppress women (or homosexuals, or any other group) just because they're a minority. To my partial relief, I have heard multiple people respond with "When in Rome..." to that he may not have a coherent picture of what a professional relationship is, or may carry with him ideas about women and their place that are not acceptable even here in the US. However, I've also gotten quick warnings not to be racist.

I do not think that for me as a woman to be suspicious of people, but especially men, from cultures widely known to have oppressive ideas about women is racist. It simply doesn't have anything to do with skin color, it has to do with culture and cultural-societal constructs. I'm a bit suspicious of, frankly, all men on this count. However, with 99% of the men I encounter, they do not give me any indication that it is anything but suspicion, and I drop it and proceed with business. With partners that aren't from the handful of countries that have reconstructed social reality to the point where a dad who doesn't do half of the housework and pick up the kids at daycare is a deadbeat dad, I have always worried about how they will behave as a partner. At any rate, no matter how delicately you have to handle cultural imperialism, positing universals where there may or may not be any, etc - this isn't a general case of a woman in one country getting pissed about how sexism another country is. I'm pissed about how an expatriate to one of the countries I'm from is applying cultural norms from another country to me, much to my detriment. My heart tells me that a woman from his country has all right to be pissed for the same reasons I am and probably more that she might know and I don't, but that's for her and her sisters-in-arms to fight. However, I cannot see why this man ought to be allowed to break all kinds of (at least supposed) norms of this society that we're both in and oppress me because I'm a woman simply because he's an expatriate and part of a racial minority. That makes no sense whatsoever. I've spent my life adjusting to cultures, and this is what I get? Imported, sanctioned oppression?

The future of the American Dream

2007-04-07T13:45:00.000-05:00

This morning, I read my American boyfriend some parts of Jeremy Rifkin's book The European Dream. I read the sections pertaining to the American Dream and the religosity of the United States. The extent of religosity and its ties to the American Dream in the United States was made clear to me for the first time in Rifkin's book. ("They [Americans] believe that the American way is God's way" (Rifkin, 2005, p. 19); "Nearly half of all Americans (48 percent), for example, believe that the United States has special protection from God." (Rifkin, 2005, p 19); "Nearly half of the American people say that it is necessary to believe in God to have good values" (Rifkin, 2005, p 19); "Sixty-eight persent of the public believe in the devil." (Rifkin, 2005, p 20); "... 40% percent of the American people believe that the world will end with an Armageddon battle between Jesus and the Antichrist." (Rifkin, 2005, p 20)) It turns out that my American boyfriend recognized every statistic given in the book from his own experience. The section on the American Dream I recognized myself, other than the specificity Rifkin claims for the American Dream ("The first thing to understand about the American Dream is that from the very beginning it was meant to be exclusive to America. It was never meant to be a dream shared with or exported to the rest of the world. Its power rested in its particularism, not in its universalism. One can only pursue the American Dream on American soil." (Rifkin, 2005, p. 17)) and the aspect of being a "chosen people" (Rifkin, 2005, p.18). My boyfriend recognized both of those aspects as well.

Perhaps my lack of understanding of the religosity and the particularism of the American Dream are due to my being a third culture kid. I imagine that one could pursue the American Dream anywhere, just not calling it the American Dream, simply a dream of a more prosperous life. Perhaps the feeling that Americans have that one pursues this dream at home is one I share, it's just that home isn't just the United States for me, and so logically it follows (for me) that if a dream of prosperity is pursued at home, it can be pursued anywhere.

The Americans I know evidently are not representative on this matter. Perhaps that's not surprising, since people that want to befriend me are generally not typical in some way or other of their country in the first place. When it comes to the religosity, I recognize myself thinking as an European, especially perhaps as a Nordic person. ("While six out of ten Americans say that thir religion is 'very' important in their lives, in European countries religion is barely a factor in people's day-to-day lives. (...) Many Europeans no longer believe in God. While 82% of Americans say that God is very important to them, approximately half of all Danes, Norwegians, and Swedes say that God does not matter to them.") I probably have difficulty really understanding the religiosity in the United States in part because my parents are European Christians, who do not mix religion and politics and who have no problems with others having different religious views. I am an atheist, but that doesn't prevent us from having interesting discussions about religion.

My experience with America from my childhood did not include American Christianity to any extent that I remember. Therefore, my third culture logic is as follows: Religion has been responsible for so many of our moments of shame in history, like the Inquisition, and been used as a political tool, like kings confiscating the gold of the Church for fund a war, that we must make amends and make sure we will never repeat the mistakes we have made in the past. (This also applies to the Holocaust, ten times stronger, but that's not the topic here.) This is a modern insight into our own history, along with our realization of the importance of universal human rights. We modern people now know that our ideas of the past were horrible and violated the rights of countless human beings, both inside and outside Europe. That's why we have consicously left religion out of civil society and politics. You can be religious if you wish, but that does not belong anywhere but your own head, in private moments. If you bring religion into politics or anywhere else in public life, you are retracing the path that brought disgrace to our history. Since this is an insight of modernity, and since both Americans and Europeans are modern and Self (to me), Westerners collectively have left religion behind in public life. Unfortunately for me, that's not true. My sense of "we" spans both Europe and America, but the two are in fact different and the "we" I feel is a figment of the third culture.

While I was reading out the statistics on Americans and religosity, I was laughing at some of the statements, like that many Americans believe in the literal existence of the devil. It seems so incredulous to me in part because I was taught by the Catholic Church in Sweden that the devil does not in fact exist, but is rather a literary character used to make a point, and that hell also doesn't exist as a place but is a ltierary metaphor for life without God. Since the Catholic Church is hardly progressive and is supposed to be universal, I never imagined that Christianity in America could be so different. Believing such things is positively medival to me, which strongly conflicts with my feeling that the US is a modern country. My boyfriend said that he was a little hurt by my laughing. His reason was very interesting. He said that although he knew I was right, he felt hurt because he would like it to be true. Expanding on that thought, he took one aspect of the American Dream - the notion that America is destined for greatness by God - and replaced that with the emphasis on the individual and working hard. To replace his wish that God existed and was watching over the US, he chose to believe that the US is and will stay great because of the hard work of its people. He also agreed with Rifkin's - and my - opinion that in some ways the US is stuck in the past when it comes to nationalism. Then again, like I already said, anyone who wants to be my friend - and perhaps especially my boyfriend - is likely to be at least somewhat cosmopolitan.

I do wonder how many Americans feel like my boyfriend. Rifkin asks, "What happens to the American sense of being special, of being a chosen people, in a world where exclusivity is steadily making way to inclusivity? Does God really care less about the whole of his [sic] earthly creation than he does about the North American part? Europeans might find such a conjecture funny, but, believe me, many Americans remain wedded to the notion of our special status as God's chosen ones. If we were to give up that belief, or even entertain doubt about its veracity, our sense of confidence in ourselves and the American Dream might experience irreparable harm." Could others replace the idea of being chosen with the idea of making themselves special through hard work, preserving the core of the American dream in a way more compatible with a global world?

Time will tell.

References: Rifkin, J. (2005) The European Dream.New York, NY: Penguin Group

Soviet legacy

2007-04-05T17:31:00.000-05:00

Today's scary piece of news: The horrible Soviet legacy of pollution is alive and well. I once read one of the environmentally scariest articles I've ever read in National Geographic about pollution in the former Soviet Union. At the time it was written, the Soviet Union had collapsed, of course. Openness and transparency were hardly their strong suit, and the information and pictures needed to report the pollution was of course not available. I still remember my heart breaking, looking at the pictures of black rivers, children playing in oil fields, and of black snow coating a small city with people walking along the streets. It was like a traffic accident with victims just lying on the pavement, slowly bleeding out. Except I couldn't call 911 or 112 or whatever the appropriate number might be to stop death. (Governments of the future: please pick ONE number that you have to memorize. Thank you.)

So an area the size of Germany is dead around the town of Norilsk in Siberia, mostly because the metal smelter there that produces most of the world's Ni and Pd is also fabulous at making acid rain. The population in Norilsk is sick and/or dying. And still very little transparency.

The disregard that the Soviet Union had for human life is what was the absolutely most terrifying thing about the whole thing to me. That human life could only be a cog in a great machine that cares nothing for life or the Earth is just as dehumanizing as Marx's worst nightmares about capitalism. And apparently, the world hasn't quite moved on yet.

The US and global ethics

2007-04-04T10:35:00.000-05:00

The BBC reports that Dragan Zelenovic, a Bosnian Serb, has been convicted of crimes against humanity.

From the BBC report:
Zelenovic was among Bosnian Serb forces responsible for a campaign of rape and sexual assault of Muslim women in 1992 and 1993 in Foca, where he was deputy commander of the military police.

One of the women was just 15 when she was illegally imprisoned and gang-raped. Another had a gun held to her head while she was raped, the court heard.

That the US refuses to join the International Criminal Court (ICC) is incredible to me. How could any nation refuse to help build a system of justice that can convict men like Zelnovic? He was arrested in Russia and extradited to The Hague. That is not possible under most national law, and those that have laws allowing them to prosecute people for crimes committed outside their country may be building a dangerous precendent. However, I think we can all sympathise with the intention: some people commit crimes so horrible, they must be brought to justice no matter where in the world or under what circumstances they committed them, and no matter where in the world they are now. An international court is the best way to do that. That the US refuses to join this laudable effort, or would join only on the condition that US soldiers not be subject to the Court, is ridiculous. I liked Clinton a lot - he's probably my favorite US president - but that decision of his was very poor. I, and I'm sure virtually everyone else, wonder what the US has to hide.

If it believes in justice, human rights, and the rule of law, it should be supporting the Court. Do they reserve the right to torture citizens of other countries only for themselves? Is torture OK for American soldiers, but not Serbian soldiers, or Nigerian soldiers? In a time when US credibility on moral and ethical issues especially in war is disappearing rapidly, it could even be a strategic move on their part to support the ICC. The US is one of my homes, and it's special to me, but this attitude they're taking not only on this particular issue, but US foreign policy overall right now, is very alienating to me. The lack of universal, clear thinking is very disturbing in so many ways.

Even personally, do I really want to be part of a country that doesn't subscribe to universal human rights? I don't have the right to a fair trial here. I could be taken away in the middle of the night without any formal accusations or even being informed what I'm supposed to have done. Echoes of stories about the Soviet Union come to mind. I'm not imagining that the two are so similar that I'm likely to be taken to a labor camp in Siberia (or perhaps Guantanamo), but on matters of human rights, principles are important. Even someone observed murdering someone else gets a trial. I don't. And examples have come up of cases of mistaken identity, where someone who was completely innocent has been tortured by the US. State sanctioned violence never ends well.

Perhaps the US as a whole understands the impact of globalization the poorest when it comes to ethics. Economic globalization, they're doing good with, other than the farm subsidies, which Europe is also refusing to give up. (Although I oppose protectionism in principle, I have to say that Swiss food is so delicious thanks to those subsidies that it gives me pause.) But when it comes to ethics, the US is not exhibiting much evidence of understanding that what is considered to be ethical greatly depends on how you count who matters. The beauty of universal human rights is that they are sufficient to give everyone on Earth the basic conditions from which to build a life according to (almost) any culture and society structure as they please, but not so prescriptive that they are imperialistic. This beauty seems lost on the Americans. Their behavior when it comes to global warming sends the same message to the rest of us. The ethical aspects of global warming are rarely addressed, although I'm hoping that John Edwards' declaration that he will keep his campaign for president carbon neutral will help bring this issue into the political debate better. Perhaps there is still hope that the US will catch on soon enough not to damage either itself or the planet too much.

The TGV Record

2007-04-03T10:21:00.000-05:00

The BBC reports that a TGV (Train de Grande Vitesse, "train of great speed", a bullet train) made by Alstom has broken the previous speed record for trains on conventional tracks by going 574.8 km/h. That's about as fast as a 747 or an A380. It is no surprise to me that the record was set by a European company on contract for a European government. Japan would also have been expected. Between Europe and Japan, it's more of a which-company-was-it and what-technology-did-they-use kind of situation. What would really catch my attention would be news that an American company has broken the world speed record for any kind of train working on a contract for the U.S. government. That would be the day.

Speak of the future...

2007-03-29T11:28:00.000-05:00

Just a little after writing yesterday's post I happened to check the BBC News website, and lo and behold: US 'no longer technology king'. So it's happened already. I wonder how long it will take until the reality sinks in here. One day, there will be a lot of wounded national pride here - especially because this is the only Western country I've been in that, well, has any significant amount of national pride outside the soccer world cup. National pride is very last century and, frankly, not very compatible with globalization. It may be very easy to say for a person who regards citizenship as a red tape game, but it's true. Nation-states probably won't disappear, but their importance is declining. Fortunately for America, not everyone is blind to this problem. Curtis Stalbank makes fun of the implications of nationalism in the 21st century in his op-ed I'm Prepared To Give My Life For This Or Any Country on The Onion.

In a sidebar to the technology article, I saw that the BBC reports that Nordics show way in sex equality. Yet another matter that the US is assuming they are leading the world in, when they are in fact in need of playing catch-up and don't even realize it. As the Swedes would say: Högmod går före fall.

Generation e - or x?

2007-03-28T10:44:00.000-05:00

I've been listening to a radio station I created on Pandora Internet Radio from the song Encore Un Fois by Sash!. (It was a huge hit in the 90s in Europe.) So, I've been getting a mix of trance and goa, mostly, and listening to that while calculating things from some data has made me think about The Future and how it's imagined in different cultures. I come back to this from time to time, because as a young global person it's hard not to notice how people imagine the future and how they see their role in it may differ a lot from how I see it. When I listen to electronic music in general, whether it be trip-hop, trance or drum and bass, I feel like I'm striding into a new global world that will overturn the world of my parents. I feel like I belong to a new generation that understands the globalized world and globalized technology better than my parents' generation did, and we're moving the world in new directions. My work is to discover new things. To discover new science, I am also seeing the world socially in a new way. I feel like a vanguard of change. But when I look around, I don't feel connected to those my age around me. They don't seem to be interested in new ideas and visions of the world, nor aware of that the world has changed in the first place.

It's striking to me how there is an almost absence of ideas among young people in America of what the future will be like. No bold visions of instant metal connectivity to the internet via implanted wireless cards in your head. No huge LCD screens in public. No visions of a Brave New World that we are building. And no alternative vision. People - young and old alike - seem to lumber on in some kind of certainty that tomorrow will be like today, except perhaps will bigger televisions and smaller mobiles. No one seems too aware that those smaller mobiles will likely be developed outside the US and then imported here, nor that the best mobile telephony standards weren't developed here. Perhaps that has something to do with the fact that technical vocabulary isn't used very much here, not even for something as commonplace as mobiles. Very, very few Americans know what an SMS is. They say "text message". Very few of them know what a SIM card is, nor what SIM cards have to do with GSM and (not) CDMA. American mobile companies' websites don't even use these terms - multiple band phones are referred to as "international phones", making it difficult to know what you're buying. Even calling them to ask is difficult, because the service representatives don't always know either. I've never heard anyone mention - in conversations or in news broadcasts - anything about 3G.

Many of my friends listen to the same music that their parents listened to. There's nothing wrong with that, per se. It's good music that has stood the test of time better than I expect many bands and songs currently getting airplay on the radio here to. However, there is no new youth movement. Without raves and rave culture, their parents know and understand everything that they do. This generation isn't creating its own voice. There is no new dream to replace the dying American Dream. No one plans for a future where we travel more and more. Both generation e and the Erasmus generation are missing in action. Young people in Europe and Australia, and to at least some extent Asia, are creating a new vision around PLUR (Peace Love Understanding Respect) and meeting to celebrate it in clubs and at raves worldwide. Americans are left out. Indeed, many Americans, especially older ones, seem to view the world through the lens of that it's still the '70s, and those damn hippies are still around. People who care about the environment must be damn communist hippies, not rational (and often conservative!). Very little transformation of that pop culture imagery has occurred. Americans overall seem very blind to just how much the world has changed, in so many ways, since the 70s. They seem almost stuck in the past.

Sometimes it feels like the winds of change are blowing all around, except here, where the air is stagnating. While young people elsewhere area learning how to wind surf, people here are suntanning. Suntanning can be nice and all, but there's only so long I can lie on a beach. I can't help but get the feeling that when the waves and winds of globalization hit the suntanners on the beach, it will be a very cold shock indeed. It seems like when people here get hit by spray from the waves, they think it's raining and ask for an umbrella. The day it is no longer possible to think it's just rain, and it's painfully obvious a tide is coming in, what will they do? There's no vision now, how can you construct one while you're busy scrambling in suprise?

Relationships to food

2007-03-23T14:39:00.000-05:00

This morning, I stopped by the new postdoc's office to offer some settling-in support. He just arrived from Germany, where he got his Ph. D., although he's Spanish. His wife is here in the chemistry department, so he wanted to come here, and my advisor is old friends with his advisor. I mentioned not bothering to eat American food, and he said they'd already reached that conclusion and are eating at home, just like me. I recently saw dealing with American food likened to shellshock. That's probably not far off the mark. It's definetly a shock when you first come here/come back here. It's almost like a caricature, with mountains of food served on serving-platter-sized plates and half of the menu fried. Supermarkets are huge, like the Americans themselves, and carry meter after shelf meter of processed and frozen food. You actually have to find the fresh foods among them. Then your eyes glaze over, and you only see the fruit and vegetable, bread, meat and dairy sections and consider the shelves between them transport stretches. But every so often, something happens to revive the original shock, like eating out at a restaurant and being faced with so much food that eating feels like a chore or you plain lose your appetite. Sometimes I feel like a child in a world where everything is adult-sized, because living here is like being a child again, where everything is too big for you, and you need special kid-sized versions of everything. Except I'm not going to 'grow up' and find everything sized just right this time. Whoever said that Chinese are obsessed with fresh food must have been an American, because I've never seen a country so uninterested in fresh food. (I thought Chinese supermarkets carry a lot of preserved and frozen food.)

I didn't have leftovers to bring for lunch today, and I forgot about it until this morning. After missing two buses, I was so hungry I went out to eat, albeit grudgingly, because I'm tired of American junk food and didn't want to pay a lot of money for something I don't like. I walked another route than I usually do, and walked past a Chinese restaurant called 萬家香, I guess roughly translated into English as 'The fragrance of ten thousand home kitchens', and had a look at the menu. I saw 黑椒牛肉 (black pepper beef), which I have been looking for here but haven't seen yet. I didn't see 魚香茄字 (I've seen it translated as fragrant eggplant, but the literal translation is fish-smelling eggplant - fish-smelling sauce doesn't really smell like fish to me, but it's one of those common fixed-recipe sauces you can put on all kinds of things), which is one of my favorite dishes, but I figured they can probably make it whether it's on the menu or not. It was in a small, unassuming strip-mall-like set of storefronts - the American version of a hole in the wall. So I went in and ordered black pepper beef. I got the usual compliments on my Chinese, and the usual "You speak like a Beijing person!" comment. (I add 兒 (like an American 'r') to many words that don't have them in pure putonghua (gong1 yuar2 公元兒 instead of gong1 yuan2 公元, mer 門兒 instead of men 門), and use forms of words that are Beijing dialect like zhar4 這兒 and nar3 哪兒 instead of zhe4 這 and na3 哪) I asked if there was tea, and there was. As I sat down, I noticed I was the only Westerner in the restaurant. And then I felt at home.

I got free soup and my food was called out in Chinese, not English. It was a distant proximity. America and China were mixed. It was an American hole in the wall where I was the 外国人 wai4guo2ren2 (foreigner - but its reference point in Chinese is always China for me, whereas in English it's not so clear, even though 'foreigner' in English has taken on some of the connotation of the Chinese word for me). Free soup for Chinese skills, and only the real foreigner - who walked in later - got their food called in English.

I realized while eating my food that a 外国人 is exactly what I was there. Not American, not Swedish, not European. My Chinese tells people I'm from Beijing, not where the genes for my pale face and tall height came from. I've thought about this in China as well. I broadcast my third-cultureness in being a foreigner who speaks putonghua with a Beijing accent. Everyone knows I'm not like them, but I'm not like other foreigners either. It's a very comfortable place to be.

A Day in a TCKs Family Life

2007-03-22T08:54:00.000-05:00

I often eat breakfast on the phone with my mother, because both of our jobs are independent to the point of being lonely sometimes. This morning, my father was still at home, because he had a flight to catch mid-morning and figured he could save time by working from home instead of going in to the office. He was in a talkative mood and asked to talk to me. I told him about my automatic coffeemaker, because he's stubbornly insisted on brewing coffee the old-fashioned way, he mentioned he flew over the city I live in yesterday and how convenient those flight times were, we talked about what kinds of financial holdings outside the US you need to report to the IRS (Internal Revenue Service, the American tax agency), whether the divedends from my mutual funds in Europe are big enough to need reporting (which I didn't think, because I've never seen any information on that I should, and they're not large enough for me to be taxed for them locally), and then he said he had to go to Peru, and he handed the phone back to my mother.

Global Culturati Community and Forums

2007-03-21T13:42:00.000-05:00

Last night, I found an interesting online community called Global Culturati. It's small right now, but it has message boards, something I wish my page had. When I first found out I was a TCK, I had an intense need to talk to someone else who was. Perhaps this can be like a Usenet group for talking and connecting, but one that people might actually find. I hope the community continues to grow and discussions develop further. I joined up. Let's see where this goes.

Waging Peace

2007-03-20T15:11:00.000-05:00

The Globalist has reprinted parts of a speech by de Villepin to the UN Security Council before the war in Iraq began. I wish the US would have listened. The US is dangerously out of step with changing global realities that they are both subject to and help shape. They also seem to have forgotten - or never learned in the first place - the lessons that Europe learned the hard way in the past 500 years or so, especially in the 20th century. Europe shed volumes of blood and tears to learn the value of peace and of diplomacy and negotiation, and the impossibility of waging a humane war. There is no need for the Iraqi people to teach the Americans with their own blood and tears the same lesson.

The US military could be a wonderful, positive force in the world. If it were used to save civilian lives in places like northern Uganda, to save children from being child soldiers, to save women from rape, to enforce the arrest warrants of the International Criminal Court to bring perpetrators of crimes against humanity and genocide to justice in a legal due process, its capacity for death could be used in the most constructive way possible. Alas, this will never happen as long as nation-states and their military organizations conceive of themselves as agents only of their own national good.

Every country needs to understand that our fates are all linked together, and we need to behave accordingly. Some countries have understood this better than others, but none as fully as I think is needed in the future.

Concert traditions

2007-03-20T12:54:00.000-05:00

I recently attended a concert by the National Philharmonic of Russia, conducted by Vladimir Spivakov. The highlight of the evening was Rachmaninov's Piano Concerto No. 2 in C minor, Op. 18. I played that piece as a second violin in an orchestra that was a fusion of professional and student players, and it was a blast. Being there, hearing the piece that I've played myself (but not nearly as well as the National Philharmonic), made me think of concert traditions here and there.

When we lived in Sweden, I learned how to play the violin and eventually became the concertmaster of our school symphony orchestra. My parents, my mother especially, considered theater plays, operas and concerts as Events To Go To, and brought me along when I was old enough to sit still and at least somewhat appreciate it. As a result, I was brought up in the cultural tradition of especially symphonic orchestras in the Western tradition. Or perhaps I should say European tradition. I have noticed before that outside Europe, in or out of Western countries, people do not have the same set of cultural rules for proper behavior as I do. Now, Sweden never has been one of the great centers of cultural influence in Europe, and for most of its history has been somewhat of a backwater, really. If one can acquire that set of rules for proper behavior there, odds are good they're general for Europe.

When I walk into a concert venue, I feel underdressed unless I am wearing something significantly nicer than I would wear to school. Now that I'm older and am generally expected (more in my head than by my actual American environment) to dress better than as a child, the difference is less marked, but it remains. Men are lucky; they can go from work to a concert, since suits are suits. But I should be wearing high-heeled shoes, either fine pants or a skirt, a blouse, and some jewelry. A dress is even better. (It should be noted this is difficult during large parts of the year in Sweden, where anything presentable when it comes to shoes is miserably too cold to wear outside - so one has to bring two pairs of shoes. One just cannot clomp into a concert hall in winter boots of the sort that are actually practical in Sweden in winter.) When I walk in, I straighten up and hold my head high.

Elsewhere, I can slouch or have unbrushed hair while obsessing over some calculation at work. In a concert hall, I cannot. One must speak discreetly, exercise one's best manners, and carry oneself with some pride and dignity. It's Eurocentric ideas of proper behavior and dress full blast. Children are scolded or corrected when they slouch, when they put their feet up on the seat in front of them or when they speak loudly. And here, I know from an honest examination of myself, there is little tolerance for other customs. Children and foreigners are only excused for their natural ignorance for so long. Failure to behave according to the proper norms will result in social outsidership. To the extent that the norms change, they change slowly, as modernity changes reality. Entrance to this world is contingent on the right dress and the right behavior. Those children who do not learn will slowly be rejected as they become older as being of lower class or as a little uncultured. Foreigners who do not learn will be declared resistant to integrate or a little ignorant, regardless of skin color - Americans in shorts and t-shirts need not apply. And those children who never had a chance to learn will certainly be looked upon as lower-class adults, no matter how much money they have - at least while they're in the concert hall.

My mother has often whispered to me about someone else's improper behavior to make clear that I should not do the same. The negative implications of not knowing how to behave never needed explaining. It was in her voice, and others' faces. What to wear, when to applaud, how to applaud - it's all culturally transmitted as part of a system of social codes to use to communicate in a concert hall.

People with different cultural and socioeconomic perspectives may have different opinions on this. Personally, I am torn. Perhaps this is one of the most difficult issues for me to consider from a global perspective, because this concert culture is absent elsewhere, and I'm not sure what an appropriate equivalent tradition might be. I have only grown up with the European view, with nothing to counter it.

On one hand, this is a European tradition. On the other, European classical music is known, played and studied worldwide. At what point should what was a local tradition change into a global tradition? At what point does considering a previously local tradition a global one become imperialism? At what point does continuing to consider a previously local tradition that is spreading elsewhere local become imperialism? I do not know the answers. I'm not sure I know how to start answering. In part, this is because I know I do not know non-Europeans' relationship to classical European music, not even the Americans'. I will never fully know, because I know the European relation all too well. (Including the disinterest that most young people have in it.)

My best impression is that in the States, very few people are raised with anything resembling my experience of playing in a symphony orchestra in high school. Instead, as with so many things European and/or old, it seems to be something Americans use to declare themselves "cultural." I recently ordered coffee from Gevalia, who clearly has an excellent cultural advisory team for North American operations, because in their coffee catalogue they do not only sell coffee - but all kinds of other things (that Gevalia has no expertise in making, I have to note), including something called "Coffee Treats Recipe and Music Set", described as "A delightful duo: luscious recipes to serve with coffee and music to enjoy while baking them. Includes a CD (made in USA) of Bach's Branderburg Concertos Nos. 2,3,4 and 5, with recipes for ginger scones, lemon poppyseed bread, health nut muffins and more, a total of 16 recipes (imported)." Now, I've never been served lemon poppyseed bread anywhere but the US, and I certainly don't know a lot of Europeans who spend their days listening to Bach and making little coffee treats. The most European thing about this set is that it includes recipes insted of mixes or ready-made cookies. Gevalia is already pumping Americans' perception of anything European as "refined" for all that it's worth. I can't blame them, from a profit point of view. However, it may say more about Americans' ideas about European cultural traditions than it does about Europe.

At the concert and ballet performances I've been to in the US, it's obvious that many or most of the audience do not feel the finger of shame pointing at them for improper behavior. From the program selections, it is also evident that many or most of the audience has not been exposed to symphonic music or ballet to any great extent. I've gotten the impression that audiences here go for light entertainment or to be able to claim that they are "cultural" and/or "refined". This is rather ironic to me, as in the process of trying to be refined they are busy excommunicating themselves from the European tradition they are trying to belong to. It is also clear that there isn't enough people - at least not where I have lived, but I hope it is different in at least New York - that know the European traditions to pass them on to audiences and performers. There is nothing wrong with not knowing the European tradition - after all, where would one learn it other than Europe? - but pretending to be part of it is just silly. The European concert tradition isn't very flexible. Either you conform to it - and accept the judgements of others for improper behavior - or you do something else.

Here is where I am not sure what to think. The thought of accepting the behavior of some Americans (and therefore other non-Europeans) at concerts and ballets makes me wince. After all, this is a tradition we are talking about. Symphonic concerts are not a supermarket commodity you can order in any color you want. This music has a rich tradition, both of composers, virtuosos and of study and technique. Those who study, play and listen to it today are continuing the tradition, perhaps even as they change it. If you learn to play the violin, you will play in that tradition. You will be taught norms of beauty and of skill. You will be taught what to do when you want to applaud someone when you have a violin in one hand and a bow in another and have no more hands to clap with. You will be taught how to show the conductor respect, and will learn how s/he shows respect for you as a musician. As an audience member, you will be taught how to let the musicians know that you appreciated what they played. You will be taught how to ask the orchestra to play more after they are done. You will be taught how to welcome them and how to show any previous high expectations of them. You will learn how to let a particular solist know that they played well without interrupting the music. The norms of behavior also fill practical functions of communicating between a mass of people in the audience and the orchestra both as a whole and in parts. To throw out that communication in the name of diversity wouldn't help anyone.

However, as classical music is studied and played outside Europe, perhaps it's not fair to ask either musicians nor audiences to be familiar with the full European tradition. It is a tradition of the sort that is transmitted fully from person to person, not on paper or by general descriptions. It is also a tradition embedded in a larger general set of ideas of behavior. My parents attended a concert by Li Yundi - a piano prodigy that's probably the best pianist I've ever heard - in Chongqing. It was the first leg of a world tour, starting with several stops in China. Li Yundi is from Chongqing, and therefore he started his tour there. They said that the concert was breathtaking - my mother, who never liked Chopin very much, suddenly became a fan of Chopin when played by Li - but that despite requests for parents to keep their children in order, there were children playing and yelling at the very front of the hall, disturbing the music. Our reactions were to be appalled. Apparently this was also Li's reaction, because no children were allowed at any of the subsequent China concerts. I do not know where Li studied music, so I don't know whether banning children from the concerts came from Chinese or European thought, or both. But it is conceivable that he is part of the European tradition of classical music. In that case - what does it mean for a Chinese musician trained in the European tradition to ask Chinese audiences to conform, at least nominally, to European norms of concert behavior? Is this expansion of what was previously exclusively an European tradition into a more global and less exclusive tradition? Or is this cultural imperialism?

My practical solution, perhaps characteristic of the cultural switching I do anyway, is to apply the original cultural traditions, no matter who is edging into their territory or where those people are located. If European classical music is played somewhere, I expect all people present at the concert, European or not, to use the European traditional standard of behavior. I don't see it as being different from learning to play the erhu and sticking to traditional Chinese music, or following folk music traditions when playing folk music, or becoming part of the style of African traditional music. But what the ideological implications of my solution are, I'm not sure. Sometimes it seems declaring certain things to be Europe's way or the highway isn't accepted, and there certainly is a danger in doing so. But in a sense the tradition is a meritocracy - if you master the tradition, clearly you are part of it. Li Yundi and Vanessa-Mae (Chen Mei) are examples of ethnically and culturally (in the case of Li Yundi) Asian people who have been accepted and acclaimed as continuing European traditions. It is hardly the case that whiteness or Europeanness is a passkey; the system functions in fact in part to distinguish between some white Europeans and other white Europeans. It has developed during a time when almost everyone residing in Europe was a native, white European. Colonial and post-colonial (as well as revolutionary and post-revolutionary) debates about European classical music are recent and can perhaps be left behind, if not completely, then in large part for a more global and simultaneously inclusive and exclusive view of traditions. Perhaps one day, we will lose the epithet 'European', and it will just be one musical tradition among others that are widely practiced, but one that must be adhered to in order to be said to be part of it.

The End of Faith

2006-02-17T14:46:00.000-06:00

I finished Sam Harris's The End of Faith yesterday. His central thesis is that faith itself - the practice of believing something without proof - is extremely dangerous and ought to end. It was piecewise an extremely scary book. The book emphasizes that it is only by reason and evaluation and discussion of facts that we can obtain knowledge of the world. I have been moving in the direction of these ideas before - as a scientist, of course I believe that reason and "experiment" is the best way to gain knowledge of the world - and my main reason for not being religious is the line of thought in the book. Harris argues that once the truth of a religious text that claims infallibility in all its parts, as they all do, it then follows that one must be a religious fundamentalist in order to follow the religion. In my brief stint with religion, that was what I felt as well - to be logically self-consistent, I would have to be a fundamentalist. At that point, religion conflicted with my sense of reason and ethics, and I considered being moderate.

Harris continues to argue that religious moderates "betray faith and reason equally," in that they invoke secular knowledge as justification to ignore religious directives. As he puts it, religious moderation is the product of secular knowledge and religious ignorance. Why don't Christians actually kill everyone who "takes the Lord's name in vain?" Well, because it seems so crazy, right? You can't kill someone just for that, it's very Middle Ages. It runs against our current sense of ethics. But the Bible explicitly instructs Christians to do so. Harris gives the Bible quotes for punishment for breaking the Ten Commandments, for example: Leviticus 24:16 mandates that the punishment for taking the Lord's name in vain is death. I say "Oh god" as an expression of surprise or disappointment fairly frequently. Therefore, under Christian theology, I should be killed. The punishment for working on the Sabbath is also death (Exodus 31:15). If the Bible is the infallible word of God, everyone who's ever worked on a Friday night or a Saturday should be killed. Everyone who's committed adultery should also be killed (Leviticus 20:10). I doubt that any Christian today would advocate actually doing this. (If there are, I am very afraid, give that there is a high likelihood they're in the country that I currently live in.)

The intolerances built into Christianity, paralelled by intolerances in other religions, are to me ethically repulsive. Harris elaborates on this as a central part of showing why religious faith is dangerous. He does an excellent job of showing how beliefs lead to actions, and follows by showing that holding beliefs that compel people to commit murder and other atrocious acts of all magnitudes, which makes religious beliefs dangerous as they all contain ideas that encourage violence. As another example, the Bible also advocates having me killed for being an atheist. In medieval times, the Church logically noted that the Bible has several suggestions for eradicating heresy. Apparently, a literal reading (which is necessary if the Bible indeed is the infallible direct word of God) requires heretics to be killed. Even worse, Deuteronomy requires that anyone refusing to take part in such killings also be put to death. (Deuteronomy 17:12-13) These parts of the Bible caused the Inquisition, hardly a pinnacle of morality or good for either Christianity, Europe, or humanity at large. The wtich-hunts were caused and enacted similarly, along with persecution of Jews, and as we all know those were equally dark times for humankind.

He also delineates how similar problems plague Islam today. Harris goes through various demands that Islam makes of its adherents that make it virtually impossible for a Muslim who truly believes that the Koran is the infallible word of Allah to live in peace with non-Muslims, as well as that the acts of Muslim terrorists makes perfect sense if one accepts what the Koran and the Hadiths say: "Nothing explains the actions of Muslim extremists, and the widespread tolerance of their behavior in the Muslim world, better than the tenets of Islam." There is much to be said on that topic, but I don't want to type out all of it here. Readers who are interested are recommended to read the book.

In addition to religions, he also takes a side-swipe at secular ideologies that demand the abandonment of critical reasoning and proof. National socialism and stalinism are use as examples of terrifying movements where a key part of the movement was unquestioning obedience to a leader and taking the leader's word as truth.

I could not bring myself to accept large parts of Christianity on moral grounds, and as Harris points out, I was using secular ethics to reject it - and recognizing the strain on my psyche of accepting something without proof and the logical inconsistency in rejecting some religious teachings but not others on non-religious grounds, I could not bring myself to be religious on either ethical nor logical grounds.

Harris does not see religious moderates as benign, however. "The problem that religious moderation poses for all of us is that it does not permit anything very critical to be said about religious literalism. We cannot say that fundamentalists are crazy, because they are merely practicing their freedom of belief; we cannot even say that they are mistaken in religious terms, because their knowledge of scripture is generally unrivalled." (p. 20, emphasis author's)

Harris also anticipates some counter-arguments, many of which I would have used, in a section entitled The Danger of Wishful Thinking. He writes, "He [Paul Berman] notes that the twentieth century was a great incubator of "pathological mass movements" - political movements that "get drunk on the idea of slaughter". He also points out that liberal thinkers are often unable to recognize these terrors for what they are. There is indeed a great tradition, in Berman's phrase, of "liberalism as denial." [...] Because they assume that people everywhere are animated by the same desires and fears, many Western liberals now blame their own governments for the excesses of Muslim terrorists. [...] Berman observes, for instance, that much of the world now blames Israel for the suicidal derangement of the Palestinians. Rather than being a simple expression of anti-Semitism (though it is surely this as well), this view is the product of a quaint moral logic: people are just people, so the thinking goes, and they do not behave that badly unless they have some very good reasons. The excesses of Palestinian suicide bombers, therefore, must attest to the excesses of the Israeli occupation." (pp134-135) I have to admit, I think like that. I haven't considered the Israeli-Palestinian conflict in those terms, but I definetly have considered Muslim terrorists in that light. Surely, they must be crazy in the medical sense, some chemical imbalance or something that makes them different from "regular" Muslims, who surely must be as secular-minded as European Christians.

And this brings me to my great mistake. For most of my life, I have been immersed in a secular environment where going to church other than perhaps midnight mass on Christmas because the candles are pretty, if you can be bothered to sit through a long mass just for pretty candles, is seen as a sign of serious and unusual religious commitment. The kind of religious commitment that might be viewed as a barrier to serving in public office or in the PTA. The kind of religious obsession that might cause people to go through life with a hidden agenda, trying to manipulate people. When I was a kid in the US, my parents went to significant efforts to keep me away from American Christians, despite that they are religious themselves. In Sweden, the Church is most appreciated for maintaining pretty graveyards. My parents are religious moderates, and I suspect rather typical of Nordic Christians. And here is the root of my mistake: Nordic Christians either have substituted large parts of the Bible and previous Church teachings with secular humanism or cede authority on actions to secular humanism. I am completely mystified, for that reason, by the idea that religious people might actually be religious, in the sense that they swallow religious teachings whole. I did not seriously entertain the idea, prior to reading this book, that millions of human beings, millions of educated, otherwise rational human beings, could suspend all rational judgement when it comes to right and wrong. I even found out that the United States is far more religious in the fundamentalist way than I had understood or perceived, again because I could especially not imagine that a well-off, well-educated country could suspend critical thinking when it comes to right and wrong. My lens of the world included - and probably still does a bit - that people are basically secular. I am clearly wrong.

This ties in with another book I read recently called "Is Multiculturalism Bad for Women?" by Susan Moller Okin. The main thesis of the book is that granting group rights to minorities must be very carefully examined, as such rights run the risk of granting minorities rights to oppress women, effectively denying them their rights. That also relates to my experiences this past year with immigrants and expatriates from very sexist cultures in the West. Universal human rights supercede any religion and any cultural tradition. Religion is no excuse for oppression and immoral behavior, and neither is culture. My previous tolerance of intolerance can be dangerous. In protecting my rights as a human being and in being an ethical human being, I must judge faith and culture under the same criteria; neither can be worth respect unless they embrace peaceful, tolerant coexistence.

Irshad Manji's take

2006-02-13T15:12:00.000-06:00

As always, pretty funny and to the point. I especially appreciate this:

"To judge the root problem here, let us first determine how the cartoons became an international incident. Last September, these comics ran beside a story about the hurdles encountered by a Danish author in finding someone - anyone - to illustrate her children’s book about the Prophet. Every artist she approached declined the job out of fear of having to contend with Islamist extremists. [...] We Muslims love to lecture about the need to assess touchy matters - such as offensive Quranic verses - ‘in context’. The context in which the Muhammad cartoons first appeared suggests that frustration, not malice, was the motive."

Looks like the illustrators asked to help with the book were right. These riots certainly send the message that one ought to be afraid of the extremists. But just as with 9/11 and the London bombings, we cannot let extremists control our everyday lives with fear. That is giving them power. We - all of us, muslims and non-muslims - cannot let them control what we do.

Freedom

2006-02-08T17:17:00.000-06:00

The more I think and read about the cartoons, the more strongly I feel that there can be no case made for that the cartoons should not have been published. The same points are made over and over again in commentaries, and regardless of circumstances basic cornerstones of liberal democracy cannot be sacrificed by Denmark. It is regrettable that people got so upset, but no outsider has the right to tell Denmark to change its system of government, of which the cartoons are a small by-product. If it were acceptable for non-Danish muslims to require Danish press to conform to their ideas of right and wrong, we would have a world of chaos and oppression of all by all. What Denmark does is Denmark's business - and if Danish muslims wish to change their country because of the cartoons, they can, because they are Danish. It it their country to change. However, I suspect that most do not, because by being Danish they most likely also prize liberal democracy just as much as danish atheists and christians.

Neither does Denmark as a whole, which isn't even involved other than indirectly, speak for the entire West. No one has the capacity to speak for millions and millions of people of different cultures, different histories and different languages as a unified voice. As a Western TCK, I am actuely aware of this. There are huge cultural variations within the West, and a commitment to that pluralism is especially prevalent in the European Union, which could not exist without such pluralistic acceptance. Even within every western country, there are regional sociocultural differences of all kinds. A reality of globalization is, as Friedman puts it, that "No one is in charge." Everyone reading this has probably noticed that America and Europe disagree on a lot of policy issues, as well as have different basic value systems in many ways. (Not to mention Americans eat more crap.) There is no monolithic West any more than there is a monolithic set of muslims. The political leaders of Western nation-states do not even really speak for their entire populations, let alone one person speaking for all of the diverse Western countries!

It pisses me right off when people see the West as the US, the UK, Germany, Australia and France - there are many other Western countries that are distinct from the bigger ones! My ancestors were not in any way, shape or form involved with colonialism other then as initial explorers who got pushed aside by the bigger countries. My ancestors did not have anything to do with slave trade, holding slaves, building empires, smallpox, or any of the other atrocities committed by Western nations. They haven't got the bomb now either, they don't fund secret prisons or give guns to rebels they support nor engineer elections abroad. They have no military bases anywhere outside their territories and few within them. I'm not saying they were so noble that they didn't want to. They probably did. But their histories took other paths, because their countries were small and relatively powerless. Just as in the world wars. Finland fought a war of independence, because they did not have resources to do anything else. Sweden sold ore to the nazis because they knew they didn't stand a chance in a fight. Estonia got taken by the Russians because they did not have enough resources to fight them off, and no one assisted them. Poland has been split and occupied many times by neighboring countries. The perspectives of small countries are NOT the same as those of big countries! So how can little Denmark, which few of the people who are pissed probably can find on a map, suddenly be a spokescountry for the West? Small European countries get ignored and confused with each other by non-Euros all the time. I have yet to meet a Chinese who knew off the bat where Finland is. Sweden and Switzerland get confused all the time in both the US and China. I bet you about 1% of both Americans and Chinese know Lichtenstein even exists. But we all have our own national histories, languages, and traditions, which we take great care to distinguish from our neighbors. Part of the reason non-Anglo European countries reacted so strongly to America's stance on Iraq is exactly that - to make it known to both the Americans and everyone else that the US prez and the UK PM do not speak for Europe as a whole as well. We have our own voices, expressed in our own media, and we will use our plural voices to whatever end we think is right. If that doesn't please the US or anyone else, then too bad. We have our own national heroes, our own popular culture, our own fashion and music... our media reflect our debates, in our languages, for the benefit of no one but ourseves and our own democratic process. Small Western countries are not some sort of tack-on onto the larger ones. We do not just follow, we create our own destinies and determine our own actions.

Any Huntington-style reading of what's going on is supplying all kinds of assumptions that are not there. How can there be a fight between two entities that do not exist?

It gets more complicated...

2006-02-05T05:54:00.000-06:00

I wanted to see the cartoons for myself, and although I haven't found them yet, I did find some other interesting things...

"Earlier this week, imam Abu Bashir appeared on BBC World showing a caricature of Mohammed with a pig's snout and ears to representatives of the Arabic League. Bashir falsely claimed that the caricature was one of the 12 Jyllands-Posten drawings."

"Since then a number of offensive drawings have circulated in The Middle East which have never been published in Morgenavisen Jyllands-Posten and which we would never have published, had they been offered to us. We would have refused to publish them on the grounds that they violated our ethical code."

Die Welt has the cartoons, and of course, discussion. I found a very well-written commentary that makes the basic point: "Es gibt kein Recht auf Satireverschonung im Westen." [There is no right to be spared from satire in the West.] Asking for anything else is asking for special treatment. Period.

"In der westlichen Welt regt sich nach anfänglichem Verständnis Widerstand: Die Zeiten der Inquisition will man nicht in islamischer Form wiederkehren sehen." [In the West there is aaccording to initial understanding agreement: we do not want to see the Inquisition return in an islamic form.]

After seeing the cartoons, I see absolutely no reason for getting so upset. It may be my deficient sense of what will offend religious people, but I really fail to see what there is to even demonstrate peacefully about, let alone burning flags and embassies. I am confused and unsettled.

Addition: After thinking about it some more, I think because of Europe's religious past and the atrocities committed, we feel it is very important to be able to criticise religion openly and even harshly if necessary. (And therefore, we are angry that others reacted to violently - it was just a couple of semi-satirical drawings, not even serious - and we reserve the right to be harsh if we need to) Blindly following a leader - any leader - is dangerous. My mother has told me that when I didn't clean my room as our agreement was when I was a kid, she would sigh and think, "At least she doesn't blindly do whatever someone asks of her." We have specific, detailed, historical reasons to be suspicious of religious leaders' motives. After readon those commentaries and Smittenbyu's comment, I think we are seeing contemporary reasons to be suspicious of religious leaders as well.

Addition II: Found a blog written by an Arab-American who gets to the point quickly.

Addition III: Chirac is an idiot. I'm starting to agree with dad. "French President Jacques Chirac, however, focused on the European media, condemning decisions to republish the cartoons as an "overt provocation"." Also, this is the first time Condi's talk appeals to me. That alone makes me worried I'm making a big mistake somewhere. Must read more about what exactly she's saying.... but it's possible she's making good sense for once.

The Cartoons and Cross-Cultural Communication

2006-02-04T14:10:00.000-06:00

Yesterday, I was reading opinions on the Danish cartoons on BBC, and had some opinions that I wanted to write in my LJ. I sign on today, open BBC - and am greeted by this:

"Embassies burn in cartoon protest

Syrians have set fire to the Norwegian and Danish embassies in Damascus to protest at the publication of newspaper cartoons of the Prophet Muhammad. "

Say.. WHAT? I just finished writing a comment in shirou's LJ about the cartoons about whether or not Islam is more violent than other religions... and this really, really isn't the way to convince people that Islam is a religion they can deal with having next door. 1. No torching of embassies, for any reason, will make you look good. Especially, it will not make you look peaceful. 2. Torching of an embassy which isn't involved in the row REALLY doesn't make you look reasonable in any way, shape or form. Hey, look - if you can't keep straight which country you're pissed at, why are you expecting us to give your religious icons special treatment? Who knows if we can even be held responsible for telling them apart? Muhammad, Jesus, Moses, old guys in beards - who the hell knows who's who? Same shit, right? Especially in countries that are so secular.

Which brings me to the point I was thinking of yesterday. I think a root of the cultural miscommunication here is both sides not being able to imagine what living in a country that's very secular/religious is like. My experiences with the US have shown me that many Americans who are themselves secular have learnt, often by fear, to not offend Christian ideas. They have an uncanny intuition for what's going to piss them off, an intuition which I lack - because while I was here, my parents provided a buffer and in Europe, things are secular. Secular in a way I don't think Americans can really imagine, perhaps unless they've been expats for 10-20 years. (Or TCKs, of course, but then they're not American per se either.) If a European prime minister said anything involving "God, "bless", and the name of their country there would be a media frenzy and probably instant loss of re-election. Just for starters. I think in a similar but more extreme way, also supported by some other interpersonal intercultural encounters. I don't think that people who grow up in a socially controlling environment, especially where the control is done under the guise of religion, can imagine what living in an environment where that control is lacking, in this case being freedom of press.

However, that does not mean that both sides are equally confused. Au contraire. A large part of the democratic nation-states are (at least limited) universal human rights and freedom of speech, movement, press, etc. This is especially true in Europe. This has the consequence that we have countries in which all kinds of things get criticized all the time, including by children, by women, by ethnic minorities, by all kinds of people. No one is supposed to have a duty to shut up. Every day, major Western newspapers run political satire drawings. Every day, the leaders of the free world get made fun of by their citizens and each other. In the States, people are more reluctant to make fun of religious figures because it is a very religious country, as mentioned before. However, that is not the case in Europe, where the cartoons were published. One of the comments, by Dr Yunes Teinaz, was "We respect the heroes of other religions and we would expect the same from the followers of other religions and ideologies. No Muslim, for example, is allowed to portray a picture of Jesus." Let me be very clear: Europe cannot be criticizing some religion as compared to its own, because Europe is secular, not religious. I don't believe in either Jesus or Muhammad. Make fun of either, I don't care. Teinaz - and probably many others - are assuming that everyone is religious, which is blatantly untrue in the case of Europe. Just like I've said before: Muslims have a much better case to argue deliberate and unjust exclusion in the US, where Christianity enjoys such a prevalent, accepted and privileged status, than in Europe, where most people are thoroughly secular.

Sometimes the litte, everyday details make things more clear than the grand scheme. I remember standing around with a group of girls in 4th grade on the schoolyard, gossiping. (The kind of thing I eventually always got excluded from, but anyway.) One of the girls said, "Did you know that (name of boy) believes in God??" with that tone that little Swedish girls use when they are socially outcasting someone. (I know that tone very well.) We laughed at how silly he was to believe in something of which there is no proof. Later, in high school, I always knew who in my circle of acquaintances was Christian. It's odd, so you remember. They... go to church. They... pray. Like in the middle ages or something. Even so, they never mentioned it in conversations. If they hadn't admitted to it, (admitted is the word that first comes to mind) I'd never have known. My parents are Christian. I know, because my mother told me once when I was about 14. My parents thought that it was important that I make up my own mind. They asked me to get confirmed so that I would at least know what Christianity was before I rejected it. You will never know that my parents are religious from meeting them. They never say anything to betray it, because to them it is private, to be kept to themselves. I think a large part of it is that they know that if they talk about it, they alienate others - meaning they create conflict, dissonance, problems. They don't feel a need to talk about it, so why cause the problems?

We had religion instruction in school. In the beginning, it was Christianity specifically. The thought behind it was that because Christianity had historically been part of Europe, it was useful to know some of the key concepts and myths of Christianity. That was exactly what it was. In 4th grade, we started building little paper huts in the archetechtural style used in then Palestine around the time of Jesus' birth. We were told that Israel used to be called Palestine, which was news to pretty much all of us. I remember thinking, "why would you want to switch names for the same country?" We were told about the Roman empire a little bit. But we spent a lot of time making the huts. It was fun, because I liked arts and crafts. Later in high school, everyone had to take religion class to graduate. Religion class now being knowing the basic tenents of all major world religions. There was no religious religion class offered, ever, and no one ever mentioned the idea. It did not occur to me that religion might be taught as a religion in schools until I came back to the US. Looking back, anyone in the PTA who had brought something like that up would probably looked like a religious fanatic, trying to brainwash children. That's not wise in Sweden - you will be permanently outcasted for being antisocial for that sort of thing. People will talk, news of your fanaticism will spread.

Hell, you look a bit fanatic for going to church (As in, christian church) regularly, which no one except old ladies who want company does. No one's going to trust someone who's so obsessed with religion to be able to set it aside and be secular when they need to. And this is Europe's historical religion. Muslims may get some more flexibility out of concern that people are not accepting enough of multicultural differences, they may get less because they are Other - I don't know how it all works out, but I do know that religion is not close to Europe's heart. It's not part of people's lives, their concerns, their social undertakings, their thoughts... I know more about Christianity than most of my Euro friends. Laughing at a religious figure or leader is just like laughing at a secular figure or leader. After all - if there is no God, then all power religious figures and leaders hold is just as secular as that which politicians hold. People being religious and supporting one person (male, of course) or other is just like being an ardent political supporter of someone. Your choice, whatever, blah. Won't stop anyone from laughing at satire of that person. The cartoons was drawn and published in Denmark, for amusement of the Danish - and the cultural context in which that happened is not intended to offend muslims. Period.

And then conversely, I'm still not used to the very prominent political role that religion plays in the US. I guess fundamentally, I still hold it for so self-evident that for a non-uniform society to work, it must be secular that I expect religious people to adjust their behavior accordingly. They don't, a significant part of the time. I know I'm not capable of imagining living in an even more religious context, and especially not an extremely sexist and controlling religious context. I have no idea, and for that I am grateful. However, if muslims are anything like American christians, they take offense so incredibly easily on religious matters because the religious is political to them, and hence confusion over what the prime minister of Denmark could do about the row. (To me, clearly, the prime minister cannot and should not do anything to interfere with a newspaper's right to publish whatever the fuck it wants as long as it's not committing a crime.) Well, too bad for both the Americans and the Muslims - you do not have an universal human right not to be offended by people who don't share your religion, or even better, don't have a religion at all. The international community would only have a case to ask something of Denmark if universal human rights are being violated - and they very simply are not. If you don't like the cartoon, don't look at it. If you freak out easily, take some ritalin or something. If you can't handle being made fun of, justly or unjustly, you simply can't handle living in this world. You may be hurt, of course, but burning embassies and calling for the death of the cartoonists is just a little too far. And not to mention... Jyllands-Posten apologized for any unintended offense already. Don't be torching embassies when you got your apology! What else could you possibly, reasonably expect?

Race and Identity

2005-07-15T19:54:00.000-05:00

I'm reading an interesting book called Culture Moves about black identity and culture and how competing visions of it are expressed. It's very interesting, because the US is unique in that it has 'built-in' racial tensions like very few other places. In most other places, race lines conincide with nationality lines, which radically alters the discourse. It's an insight into a part of one of my countries that I cannot direcly experience, but that is such a big part of it that it's not really fair for me to say that I know this country without at least knowing the elements of that.

Deshi Men

2005-06-27T16:39:00.000-05:00

Interactions with people have made me think about patterns and deep-seated problems with sexism and very destructive ideas of masculinity. All but one of the deshi men I have had to work with or otherwise be in close proximity to have had obvious sexist opinions, ideas, and concepts, which they have not hesitated to express and act on. If the deshi women I've met have such ideas, they don't push them on me. It is not only degrading, it is also problematic in another way: what is the appropriate way to frame this situation against a background? I think my answer is my moral principle number one: sexism is always immoral, regardless of cultural context. And when the sexists left their countries to come to one of mine, the burden of cultural understanding is on them. I get to do something about this one, because they came to my culture. That's also part of what pisses me off, because these people come to my country and spit in my face. I'm starting to understand how the neonazis and the Republicans can build such support for something really stupid - if enough people feel threatened, they react instead of thinking. I knew that intellectually, but I'm experiencing it emotionally as well. I just want to slap people, because they should know their place - next to me, not above me. Man, if you try to stand above me all you do is make it easy for me to bite your ankles. Cause there will be biting. I'm thinking that deshi men need to be treated like men from the Middle East - proceed with utmost caution until they show themselves to be able to interact with women in a good way.

I'm seriously considering giving automatic bonus credits to Western European men for being more respectful. Thing is, they've pissed me off plenty too.. just not in the same, insanely ridiculously completely unapologetic ways as others. Including American men. I've heard some sick shit come out of the mouths of American men.

And I have to admit... it feels good to think 'go to hell' straight off, because then I don't have to go through the same thing I've gone through for most of this academic year: give them the benefit of the doubt, be polite when they're asses, be polite but curt when they try to make you their mom or try to order you around, and they stay the hell away from them because they're so annoying. Every time here so far. K at Knox was fine - never had any problems with him - but man. Every single deshi guy I've had to deal with more than in passing since then has been a needy, unaware ass of some kind. I'm sick of this shit. I'm sure there are nice guys out there but they're going to have to prove themselves first.

Understanding the World

2005-05-01T13:26:00.000-05:00

After writing that last post, I realize what exactly feels so incomplete about people with strong convictions about what the world is like - cynics, activists and optimists alike - that don't have a global focus. How can you claim to understand the world when all you've ever bothered trying to understand is a small part of the world? How can you be so sure when you're basing your conclusion on a small, rather arbitrarily selected part of the world and part of all possible human experiences? You may of course restrict your claim to the subset of the world you did consider, but I have yet to meet a person who does so.

To some extent it is human to assume everyone is like us - and on some levels, they are. Everyone can be happy, sad, melancholy, hopeful, distraught, anxious, scared, delighted, humorous, cynical, whatever. The chemicals running through our brains give us a lot in common. But as everyone knows, that's not exactly the end of the story. Circumstances create large variances in what being a human can be like. It just seems like this is a mistake we've made so many times that we should have learnt to spot it by now.

White, straight American men often write as if their experience is the human experience. Then white, straight American women point out that the white, straight American men are forgetting that being a white straight American woman isn't like being a white straight American man. And then black, straight American women point out that being a black straight American woman isn't like being either a white straight American man not a white straight American woman. And so on and so on, ad infinitum. Shouldn't it be obvious that after a few examples like this, you can see a more general pattern? What the world is like depends a great deal on who you are and who you were when you were born and where you were born? And therefore, making a claim to understanding how the world works without having at least tried to consider the range of human experiences is just silly?

Personally, I see the answer to how the world works as a piecewise solution. The differences in human experience are too great to say something in general that is valid for everyone, but if you do it piecewise (maybe groupwise is a better term here), you can have some hope to getting it all in, and different people can explore the different groups. Then when we've gotten the different pieces, we can put them together into some sort of overview, and probably go back to revising our first theories and so on. But the point is that every one of us only experiences one small slice of what being human is like - so how can anyone think they have it all figured out based on their own experiences?

Personal Belief System Belief #2

2005-05-01T12:50:00.000-05:00

Knowledge is not power in itself, but it is the root of power.

If you don't know what's going on, you can never be anything but a pawn at best. Controlling a situation requires understanding what's going and why it's going on as best as you can. Including when the situation you're trying to control is your life situation. If you don't know why things are the way they are now nor how you can change them, you have ceded control of your life to other people, entities and chance.

There is no such thing as too much knowledge or too much thinking. Thinking may not be easy and may be painful, but that doesn't mean it shouldn't be done.

Sudden Realization

2005-04-11T00:08:00.000-05:00

I just really realized something that I've heard said many times while writing a paper about deposition of thin ruthenium films using atomic layer deposition: gender relations really are much more relaxed in the Nordic countries than in the United States. Here, people make things so much more difficult in a very subtle way. And that's what you pick up on in the air, elsewhere too - the more tense everyday gender relations are, the more sexist a culture is.

So now I have to ask myself: If I ever have children, would it be immoral of me to raise them completely outside the Nordic countries, knowing that? Or completely outside wherever I think gender relations are the best, if that isn't the Nordic countries at that point?

Photos

2005-04-10T14:34:00.000-05:00

I recently set about putting my photos in albums, and as I was sorting through my photos I realized that taking photos is very important when you move.

My pictures of Beijing are of my Beijing. Pictures of my favorite parks, of the walkways I used all the time, of the bike lanes I used to rollerblade on. Pictures of my friends' apartments. Pictures of me and my friends where we used to go hang out, or out on a special occasion. Even things tourists would take pictures of are different - my pictures of Tiananmen are of me and my friends standing together, laughing, in front of the gate lit up at night, a memory of the night we went out together to say goodbye because I was leaving for college. I have a picture of the subway train arriving. I have a picture of my bus, silingsan lu. I have pictures of the little boats on Beihai lake I always loved watching. Other people's pictures will never be the same, and most other people here see Beijing as somthing remote and exotic and not really real in the same way New York is.

I used to feel the same about my parents' pictures of Frostburg when we lived in Sweden. Everyone else's ideas about America came from movies and TV. Their images were of a controversial big country far away. My pictures were of everyday life. My picture of the White House has me riding on dad's shoulders when I was 4. I have pictures of my kindergarten, pictures of our house and of me playing with my friends. No wild car chases and no Beverly Hills 90210, but my America. I still have Christmas tree decorations I made at Beginnings, by Montessori-oriented kindergarten. Now that I'm back, they don't play the same role anymore. Everyone knows what everyday life in America is like, because we're all living it. Now, they're just childhood photos, not exotic childhood photos, but I'm happy I had them when they were something to hang on to almost as proof. Kind of like I hang on to my Beijing photos now.

Beginners and Taking Advice

2005-04-09T16:55:00.000-05:00

It was recently suggested to me that a large part of my annoyance with a recent power struggle stems not only from the situation per se but also from the fact that the other persons involved are at a very beginning level of understanding cross-cultural life, despite extensive experience. I've realized that's absolutely right.

I'm sick of people talking about multiculturalism and multi-kulti and tolerance and all that, when only an extremely small minority actually has really thought about it. It's starting to seem like most immigrants and other migrants lack even the most basic intercultural skills, even after decades away from "home." It never occurs to them that maybe they don't get it, so they never will, because they won't try to learn because they think they've got it. And I'm sick of being understanding because they're so incompetent. Why is it my responsibility to always be the one understanding? Why isn't it in part their responsibility to learn?

In part I'm probably bitter because I became oppressively marginalized and these people just keep doing what they've always been doing like they have blinders on. How the hell is that possible? How the hell do you avoid noticing what's being shoved in your face every day? And how the hell can you be so damn sure that you get it? I worry about that almost every day! How can I know? I can't. And so the observation never ends.

Sometimes I just feel like smacking people when they just refuse to notice that their cultural norms and behaviors from somewhere else really don't work. And there just doesn't seem to be anywhere where people generally get it! Americans may be clueless in many ways but no one else seems any wiser when it comes to negotiating difference in their personal lives. Others may have more perspective on themselves as a country, but as members of a culture, not so much. Everyone thinks they do, but I'm lacking evidence that they do, while I have heaps saying they don't. People can spend the majority of their lives in a host country and never get that they don't get it. Some are always worse than others, though, and it would be interesting to see a study of which cultures have the most trouble learning a new one.

I just wish I could talk to someone who sees this too. The European Far Right has nothing to worry about - people can't change even when they want to. The immigrants can't change Europe asnymore than they can change themselves at a core level. The first step to recovery is admitting there's a problem, and everyone is agreeing that there is none.

What I want to do with my life

2005-04-07T22:25:00.000-05:00

I want to look forward. I don't want to look toward the past nor toward the sides to see what everyone else is doing. I want to make my own circumstances and make my own life. I want to create my own niche in life. And ideally, I'd like company on the way.

Open letter to migrants to the West

2005-03-27T14:26:00.000-06:00

Dear Foreigners From Non-Egalitarian Countries,

I have heard many people say that you shouldn't be allowed to come here. I have heard regular people - not just the extremists on the far right - say that you don't try to fit in here and you create your own communities within our community and don't understand the larger community you are part of. I have also heard people say that you are lazy, that you just want to mooch off of our welfare systems, and that you don't respect women - not those from your countries nor those from ours. I have always thought - and said - that these claims are not reasonable, that most people regardless where they are from are normal, hard-working, honest, respectful people who not only can be part of our societies but can enrich them. I have always thought that open borders make everyone better off in the end.

Both for society at large an in my personal life, I have assumed that a simple model of respect should and is followed. When a minority of people from culture A are trying to live among a majority of culture B, respect is shown for the minority by the majority by being patient with their cultural gaffes and explaining the basis for traditions and manners - by helping the minority understand the majority. Respect is shown for the majority by the minority by the minority trying to adjust and understand the majority.

Basically, I envisioned a simple contract - mistakes are forgiven, because the minority is trying to learn how the majority works, and both try to find common ground so that they can get along. The minority does not have to adjust completely to the majority in every way, but it does have to adjust in key cultural norms and behaviors. The majority does not have to accept all of the minority's cultural behaviors, but some difference in behavior and thought must be tolerated. However, if there is a clash of fundamental values such that the majority and the minority hold mutually incompatible values that are so fundametal that neitherwill give them up, then two options remain. Either then minority must choose to leave, or they must give up those cultural norms after all.

If the minority were refugees, relocation should be attempted, but refugees are a different case from the one that has recently irritated me immensely. When the minority has chosen to come to country B, they have simultaneously agreed to make these cultural adjustments to the country they have chosen to move to. If they have misjudged and realize that their cultural norms are incompatible with the majority's, they still have to adjust if they stay. Just like one cannot rearrange someone else's house to be like one's own when one is visiting, one cannot expect a host country to adjust to your ideas of how things should be run unless you are also prepared to rearrange your country for visitors or expatriates.

It's really very simple: if you choose to come to the West, you have also chosen Westernization. You cannot come here and be the same person you would have been if you hadn't left. For example, if you want a Western education for its academic excellence, you have to consent to cultural Westernization as well. If you try to reject Western cultural norms, you are both not using your experience to the fullest and are being very rude to your hosts, who are not under any moral obligation to let you come to their country. You don't have to bow and say thank you incessantly, but you do have to keep in mind that you are in someone else's home. You don't get to pull the shots. You have to adjust to them, though, when someone else pulls them.

One of the values that absolutely must be respected and practiced every day is egalitarianism. Secular humanism and its values are extremely important in all Western countries (even though American has its own peculiar Christian fundamentalists that reject many humanist values), but out of all its values egalitarianism is the one that underlies almost all human interactions. If you cannot make egalitarianism a value of yours, you should not come to the West at all, or go home if you are already here. The equality of women and men, poor and rich, white, brown, olive, and black, straight and queer, old and young, married and single, powerful and disenfranchised is a value that is completely non-negotiable. Sure, you can find plenty of examples to the contrary. In fact, we have many academic departments studying just how that much principle is violated in practice. But that should also tell you something. No one can argue to justify the discovered violations without being ostracized by society. Once someone says, "You treated me badly because you think I am not equal to that other person", you must defend yourself or accept condemnation by others.

The example that is closest to my heart is equality of men and women. Society has subscribed to egalitarianism for a long time, but it has collectively only slowly realized its logical implications. Women have pointed out for a long time that if all humans are equal, then women must be equal to men in value and humanity and importance, and therefore women must be respected just as much as men are. Or, looking at it from our side, men should be respected just as much as we are. Women have fought for a long time for what is only a logical consequence of a deeply held cultural value. We have been punished harshly physically and mentally for our resistance to mistreatement and abuse by men, but things have progressed. There is still a long way to go, but we can look back and see where we started 300 years ago a long way behind us. I am proud as a woman of my female ancestors, who fought for my freedom. I know my grandmother would be extremely proud of me and my mother, if she were still alive. The world holds so much opportunity for me - so much more than for my grandmother, who was desperately poor in her childhood and had no opportunity for education. I am pursuing a Ph. D. in a male-dominated, high-paying field, I speak five languages, and have legislation and more awareness backing up my right to exist, so to speak.

So, to you who have come to the West: Respect me or go home. I will not put up with your gender roles and your social roles that are based on that someone is always superior. You have no right - no right - to come here and use those values. If you insist on using them - go home. Pack your bags and go home, where you can treat people like shit in peace. Don't you dare come here and think you can talk down to me, order me around and sexually harrass me and call me a slut because you'd do that at home to a woman. When you came here, you agreed to egalitarianism. That it's your "culture" is irrelevant. You agreed to something different when you came here. And if you looked, women where you came from probably have a lot they'd like to change about your culture when it comes to oppression of women, too. Don't you come here and think you're so superior - don't you forget that I don't give a shit who your daddy is, I don't give a shit how much money you have, I don't give a shit how hot you think you are - if you can't treat me with respect, you're getting jack shit back. Simple. Adjust or go home. We didn't have to let you come here in the first place, and you chose to come. Tough shit if you can't handle it.

Personal Belief System Principle I

2005-03-13T19:58:00.000-06:00

The equality of men and women is universal and not culture-dependent. Therefore, any attempt to legitimize sexism or oppression of women, especially violent attacks on women because of their sex, through cultural norms is illegitimate. Being sexist is universally immoral.

Images of America

2005-03-05T12:29:00.000-06:00

America and the consequence of her foreign policy is an insitution of things to talk about, even when something else is the main point.

Ultra Bra - Kahdeksanvuotiaana

Kahdeksanvuotiaana tiesin
että maailma tuhoutuu
kaksintaistelussa suurvaltojen
kahdeksanvuotiaana tiesin
että ihminen murskautuu
silmänräpäyksessä
historiaan

Kävikin niin, että sodat ovat
monimutkaisia kansallisia konflikteja
joissa ammutaan
ja joissa kuolee
aina vähän ihmisiä kerrallaan
joissa kuolee
aina vähän ihmisiä kerrallaan

Kahdeksanvuotiaana tiesin
että maailma tuhoutuu
kaksintaistelussa suurvaltojen
kahdeksanvuotiaana etsin
kartalta kaukaista paikkaa
joka välttäisi
laskeuman

Kävikin niin, että sodat ovat
monimutkaisia kansallisia konflikteja
joissa ammutaan
ja joissa kuolee
aina vähän ihmisiä kerrallaan
joissa kuolee
aina vähän ihmisiä kerrallaan

Kumitossut ja huppari päälläni
otsa kurtussa
löysin Pääsiäissaaret Tyyneltämereltä
myöhemmin tuli ilmi
että juuri sillä merellä tehdään ydinkokeita
missä on Pääsiäissaaret

Translation: When I was eight years old

When I was eight years old I knew
that the world would be destroyed
in a duel between the superpowers
When I was eight years old I knew
that humanity would be crushed
in a blink of an eye
of history

It turns out that wars are
complicated national conflicts
where they shoot
and where a few people
always die at a time
where a few people
always die at a time

When I was eight years old I knew
that the world would be destroyed
in a duel between the superpowers
When I was eight years old
I looked for
a distant place on the map
that would avoid the fallout

It turns out that wars are
complicated national conflicts
where they shoot
and where a few people
always die at a time
where a few people
always die at a time

Dressed in rubber boots and
my forehead wrinkled
I found the Easter Islands in the Pacific Ocean
later I found out
that on the very same ocean they do nuclear tests
where the Easter Islands are

If you're American and hadn't realized this sort of interconnections exist all over, little children far outside your borders have worried about what you will do for a long time. In fact, if you're from any large country, your foreign policy creates reality for eight-year-old kids in a lot of places.

Blur - He Thought Of Cars

Moscow's still red, the young man is dead
Gone to heaven instead, the evening news says he was confused
The motorways will all merge soon, lottery winner buys the moon
They've come to save us, the space invaders are here

He thought of cars and where, where to drive them
Who to drive them with
There, there was no-one, no-one

There's panic at London Heathrow
Everybody wants to go up into the blue
But there's a ten year queue
Columbia is in top gear, it shouldn't snow at this time of year
Now America's shot gone and done the lot

He thought of planes and where, where to fly to
And who to fly there with
Where, there was no-one, no-one

He thought of cars and where, where to drive them
Who to drive them with
There, there was no-one, no-one

So part of the craziness of the modern world is that America just goes nuts with its army. I will not insult my audience by pointing out the obvious connection to current affairs - this song came out on The Great Escape in 1995.

Ultra Bra - Lähetystyö

Panama, Panama, ihana maa
siellä saa palvella Jumalaa
oi lordi, saanko mennä juoksemaan
kohti kaukana siintävää Ameriikkaa

Voi sitä mekaniikkaa, toimintaa
mitä Ameriikka harjoittaa
ei ole muuta valtakuntaa
jossa taivaan valtakunta kajastaa

Panama, Panama, ihana maa
siellä saa palvella Jumalaa
oi lordi, saanko mennä juoksemaan
kohti kaukana siintävää Ameriikkaa

Haluan asua Ameriikassa
haluan kastua Ameriikassa
haluan paisua Ameriikassa
haluan vaipua Ameriikassa

(Translation: Missionary work

Panama, Panama, what a lovely country
you can serve God there
oh lord, can I go running
towards the dimly visible America in the distance

Oh all that mechanics, activity
that America practices
there's no other realm
where the realm of heaven shimmers

Panama, Panama, what a lovely country
you can serve God there
oh lord, can I go running
towards the dimly visible America in the distance

I want to live in America
I want to get wet [or baptized] in America
I want to swell [up and become fat] in America
I want to sink [into the ground or sink down] in America)

Heavy association with fundamentalist Christians. Note to Americans: Europeans don't really use "Lord" about god, certainly not in the Nordic countries, at least. That's an American thing.

Also, public religious expression isn't very socially acceptable. The line of reasoning is, crudely, that people who feel such a compelling need to shout out their religion and their religious beliefs could easily be compelled by said religion to do all kinds of objectionable things, because if you see yourself so strongly in terms of religion you are less likely to consider others and societal harmony. Unlike the US, there are no laws (except for France, now) against religious symbols, prayer, whatever in public places or schools - people will just wonder if you're a bit of a religious nut if you want to be public about your religion.

For devout American Christians, here's a little more explanining for why that is. There's history, of course. People were forced to go to church for a long time. Priests held an extraordinary amount of power, and many of the darkest and most immoral days of Christianity happened in Europe. Freedom from religion is very important, to the point where people want to see signs of it every day, not just in a law book. However, before you feel too sorry for your religious compatriots, (whom, by the way, you may have a lot less in common with than you think in how you interpret your faith) the worry is mostly with respect to Muslims. There have been some spectacularly gruesome crimes committed by male immigrant Muslims from very sexist and socially repressive societies against women in their own families which are at the very least linked up with how Islam is practiced in the country they immigrated from, like honor killings and organized serial rape of women as punishment for being too secular and living like girls in the host country. I don't want to get into what Islam really says and all that, but the common view is that some of it is culture, but that Islam is also culpable because it hasn't condemned the practices to the point of disappearance and because they often invoke "Islamic" ideals of behavior for men and women to explain their behavior (being the most generous to Islam here). So, people get nervous about religious people who can't keep their religion to themselves - you have to wonder what happens behind closed doors.

I guess what I'm saying is that for various reasons, Europeans tend to suspect you might not be able to play fair with others, be understanding toward others who are not like you, that you might have views that are incompatible with the views of society at large, and in the extreme case, not obey the laws of the country, if you insist on public expression of your religion. European Christians seem to have no problem. It's the immigrant Muslims' problem, not your religious compatriots'.

Blur - Magic America

Bill Barrat has a simple dream
He calls it his Plan B
Where there are buildings in the sky
And the air is sugar free
And everyone's very friendly
Well, Plan B arrived on a holiday
He took a cab to the shopping malls
Bought and ate till he could do neither any more
Then found love on Channel 44
La la la la la
He wants to go to magic America
La la la la la
He'd like to live in magic America
With all those magic people
Bill Barrat sent his postcards home
To everyone he'd ever known
They went
"Fifty-nine cents gets you a good square meal
From the people who care how you feel"

Rammstein - Amerika

We're all living in Amerika
Amerika ist wunderbar (America is wonderful)
We're all living in Amerika
Amerika
Amerika

We're all living in Amerika
Amerika ist wunderbar (America is wonderful)
We're all living in Amerika
Amerika
Amerika

Wenn getanzt wird will ich führen (When there is dancing, I will lead)
Auch wenn ihr euch alleine dreht (Even when you are turning alone)
Lasst euch ein wenig kontrollieren (Let yourselves be controlled a little bit)
Ich zeige euch wie's richtig geht (I'll show you how to do the steps right)

Wir bilden einen lieben Reigen (We'll make a lovely round dance)
Die Freiheit spielt auf allen Geigen (Freedom is playing on all the violins)
Musik kommt aus dem Weißen Haus (The music comes from the White House)
Und vor Paris steht Mickey Mouse (And in front of Paris stands Mickey Mouse)

We're all living in Amerika
Amerika ist wunderbar (America is wonderful)
We're all living in Amerika
Amerika
Amerika

Ich kenne Schritte die sehr nützen (I know steps that are very useful)
Und werde euch vor Fehltritt schützen (And I will protect you from missteps)
Und wer nicht tanzen will am Schluss (And whoever doesn't want to dance right now will in the end)
Weiss noch nicht dass er tanzen muss (Just doesn't know that he has to dance yet)

Wir bilden einen lieben Reigen (We'll make a lovely round dance)
Ich werde euch die Richtung zeigen (I will show you the direction to go)
Nach Afrika kommt Santa Claus (Santa Claus arrives in Africa)
Und vor Paris steht Mickey Mouse (And in front of Paris stands Mickey Mouse)

We're all living in Amerika
Coca Cola
Wonderbra
We're all living in Amerika
Amerika
Amerika

This is not a love song
This is not a love song
I don't sing my mother tongue
No, this is not a love song

We're all living in Amerika
Coca Cola
Sometimes war
We're all living in Amerika
Amerika
Amerika

Just in case any deshis are reading this, the mixing of languages is symbolically important - Europeans are very touchy about anglification of their languages, which is seen as cultural imperialism. Mixing English and an European language upsets people a lot because it's seen as treason and/or "those damned yanks with their damned imperialist ways are here in our back yard!"

Another thing that might need clarification: EuroDisneyland was not a popular project, and it's as far as I know never made a profit. It was at least making losses every year for the first five years or so. It is a symbol of crap imperialist pop culture to a lot of people.

Blur - Look Inside America

Good morning, lethargy
Drink Pepsi - it's good for energy
The bath's on, smoke in the bedroom
Sore throat, and on my neck a nasty bruise
And where it came from
Well I don't know
But we played last night - it was a good show

Got to play a second rate chat show
A nationwide deal, so we gotta go
Jeff from the Company says it'll be alright
Got an ad on KROQ
And there's an in-store tonight
Well I build things up
Then I let them go
Got to get time share on the radio

Look inside America
She's alright, she's alright
Sitting out in the distance
But I'm not trying to make her mine
Looking for America
With its kookie nights
And suicides
TV says its alright
Cos everybody's hung up
On something or other

Stepping off in twenty
So the driver says
I should sleep tonight
But I think I'll watch videos instead
Annie Hall leaves New York in the end
Press rewind and Woody gets her back again
And the whole world could have passed through me
But I don't know that it means much to me

Look inside America
She's alright, she's alright
Sitting out in the distance
But I'm not trying to make her mine
I'm looking for America
With its kookie nights
And suicides
TV says its alright
Cos everybody's strung out
On something or other

And the whole world could have passed through me
But I don't know that it means much to me

Some more explanatory notes to Americans: Your way of denoting radio stations with four wacky letters that are impossible to pronounce and mean nothing is unique to you. In Europe, they have proper names. The national state radio stations are frequently simply numbered: Radio 1, Radio 2, etc (UK), P1, P2, etc (Sweden - short for Program 1, Program 2..) NRK1, NRK2, etc (Norway - NRK is the acronym for the national radio and TV corporation), YLE1, YLE2 (Finland - YLE is short for yleinen=common). Commercial stations pick whatever they like - like NRJ, which sounds like "energie" (= energy in French, but fits better on the car radio LCD displays), or Vinyl 107 (Obviously oldies station), Kiss FM, or Radio Mafia. So, the four letter radio station means it has to be a portrayal of life here, and Europeans hate memorizing the call letters.

Also, soda doesn't come out of the tap in Europe like it almost does here. In fact, it's common knowledge it rots your teeth and it's generally bad for you - so again, the positive connotation to Pepsi is not natural from an European point of view.

Everyone has a relationship or image of America. Like I said.

Blurring of cultural boundaries

2005-02-25T16:10:00.000-06:00

Studying French in America is pointing out to me, bit by bit, how much more blurred cultural boundaries are in Europe than probably anywhere else, at the very least as compared to the United States and China. It certainly doesn't seem that way when you're there, because there are plently of things to mark the differences: local traditional cheeses as opposed to imported traditional cheeses, local traditions of design, glassware, architechture as opposed to foreign traditions of design, glassware, and architechture. But right there, the word "foreign" tells me something. Foreign isn't the right word. They're not foreign, they're.. from another European country. Logically, foreign is a completely acceptable choice, but the English word foreign has a feeling of.. far, far away and unknown and not understood. Not self, not familiar, not here.

Of course, Europeans express the idea "from another country" all the time - especially in debates about the EU. So what do they say, then? Well, they sometimes use words that I have to translate with "foreign," but they lack the feeling of far away. In fact, they're often used about things that are very common, very familiar, well-known and here right now. It has more of an essential overtone of origin, often invoked in slogans for intra-national products like "Suosi suomalaista!" (Favor Finnish [products/stuff/whatever]!) They put the focus more on the national rather than the Otherness of the foreign.

So in other contexts than exhorting consumers to pick local products to support local enterprises or farmers, what does one say? Well, European, for example. European as opposed to national. With the general discussions of the relative roles of the EU and nationstates and the on-going transitions toward integration, the relationship between central EU government - the European - and the individual nationstates - the completely Self - is in the back of your mind. Since one can't well mean European as opposed to us, whose country is in Europe but is not European, "European" has come to refer more to European as a whole, as a unified concept, as something more general that any nationstate is part of but no more than that. It is both Self and Other, and so its connotations - the way you feel when you say it - is very different from "foreign."

This type of language usage where region labels are used because there isn't a neat split between Self and Other is hardly new. Scandinavia and the Nordic countries have had passport-free travel for around 50 years between them for citizens of each other's countries, and their histories are heavily intertwined, as are their languages with the exceptions of Finland (Finno-Ugric language tree) and Icelandic (From the same tree as the modern Scandinavian languages, but retains many language features that are dead in the others, making it extremely difficult to understand. Think sort of like middle English). Switzerland has always had language diversity within its borders as well as fierce loyalty to a particular valley, creating both strong ties to the very local (the central government is very weak, and always has been) as well as to other countries via language in addition to the nation-state. For someone in a French-speaking valley in Switzerland, France or Belgium cannot be "foreign" in its English sense, even though they are different countries, there are different accents, and all such. When you already speak the language of a country, it is difficult to feel like a complete outsider the way you can if you can't even separate words out in speech and can't read a single thing. (Similarly, Americans seem to feel more kinship with other Anglo countries for the same reason, but America is far removed from it's sisters in a way people in Europe are not.)

Similarly, it seems that for Chinese, there are foreigners and Japanese. "Foreigner" seems to mean non-east Asian but including southeast Asian foreigners. However, there is a a bigger difference in perception between Chinese and Japanese than there is within Europe. Chinese food is Chinese food, Japanese food is different. Their tea is different. Their manners are different. Their culture is different. Although their histories have intertwined, they have not been as intertwined in terms of languages and movements of people as Europe's countries have been.

Food is, in fact, a good example. Ethnic restaurants in Europe tend to be non-European, like Thai, Chinese, Lebanese, Indian, kebab places, whatever. You won't see a German restaurant in France or an Austrian restaurant in Spain. Why not? Well, why would you want one? Local restaurants will serve dishes technically from all over Europe, in general, and it's just food. Wienerschnitzel is a very unremarkable lunch dish, despite a locality being in the name. Cheese is made everywhere - so buying cheese from France is not really different from buying cheese made in Denmark. For a purist, it may matter in terms of quality, taste, and tradition - but my point is that one does not really register a technically foreign cheese as foreign, it's just cheese. That it comes from all over Europe has more to do with modern cooled transportation than anything else. Wine has no origin, it's just wine. Some regions drink more of it than others, but some regions drink more milk than others. It feels more like a collective regional preference difference rather than Other. It's we. We drink wine, we eat cheese, we eat sausages and mash and coq au vin and moussaka and souvlaki and calamari and veal medallions in marsala sauce and schnitzel and beef stew and borscht. We cook with creme fraiche and roux and gravy and butter and olive oil and cream and tomatoes and herbes de provence and herbes, ce ne sont pas de provence. There are, of course, national and regional dishes - but they are few and not as common as all the dishes that are very similar. Those are the things we lift forward as separating marks, maybe with some things that are predominantly eaten in one region, because you don't notice all the similarities. It's just taken for granted.

In other ways, too, there is much more mixing than elsewhere. Food is relatively shallow; if that was all there was, one could argue America is very integrated with Mexico. What really has struck me in French class, to return to my starting point, is how little my classmates know about France, how foreign it is to them. La Sorbonne, for example. Le Quartier Latin. Expressions like "C'est la vie." But even more than that - l'esprit critique, the political discussions, all that. Still more familiar are some fantasy figures, almost icons, like Pierrot. One of my favorite toys as a small child was a turquoise silk Pierrot with a fine porcelain head and hat, sown to a pale yellow silk moon, crying. I so admired and felt sorry for Pierrot - why was he so sad? And why was he on the moon, all alone? But I envied him for sitting on the moon, something I had never done.

Later, in literature class, I did see a Self/Other split - but between European literature and non-European literature. We studied Baudelaire, Rimbaud, Proust, Brecht, Kafka, Ibsen, Voltaire, Strindberg, Shakespeare, all kinds of literature, poetry, and plays, all of which were considered something that one ought to know if one wants to pretend one graduated high school, because it was your literature. Later in the class, we were more free to pick what to study, and in a collective brainstorm we were naming famous authors and books they've written. I named almost every single American author and book on the board. Most of them no one had ever heard of except the teacher, who clearly considered them unnecessary. No mention of African, South American, Australian, or Asian literature.

Maybe Europe is the birthplace of one type of cosmopolitanism without being aware of it - a lack of black and white distinction between nationstates that is becoming generally integrated into identity conception, so subtly embedded in society that you don't even think about it. People like me do so to a completely different degree, and we do so consciously - but maybe Europeans can be the first people to society-wide identify with more than one nation-state. The circumstances are certainly favorable.

Score 1 for null hypothesis

2005-02-09T09:23:00.000-06:00

Opinion voiced at panel discussion on global fundamentalisms: Europe isn't seeing a rise in religious fundamentalism in part because Europe doesn't feel as threatened by globalization. One piece of support for my null hypothesis.

One of the things I have the most difficulty understanding and sympathising with in the US is the excessive religiosity and especially the fundamentalism. The longer I've been here as an adult, the more it bothers me. Seems to be a general pattern for people. The mroe of it you see, the less you can stand it. At some point, you being public and vocal about your religion starts, in essence, pushing your religion on me, and I don't appreciate that. Especially, I dislike the idea that I ought to be behaving according to religious morals from a religion I don't believe in. It also sets up the scene for clashes and conflicts. That alone ought to be a good reason to keep your religion private. What you do in private is no one's business, assuming you're not breaking any laws. What you do in public, however, is subject to cultural and societal opinions, ethics, and restrictions. And, as far as I know, no religion considers it holy to self-aggrandize your piety. If you are pious, you can be perfectly pious without anyone knowing about it. If you don't feel satisfied unless you can show off how righteous and pious you are, then that has nothing to do with religion.

I still have trouble understaning why abortion and evolution are so controversial, especially evolution. None of the arguments I've heard explain to me why these issues, why now. The two seem rather randomly picked to me, really. The principles invoked to explain why these two issues are so crucial apply to all kinds of things where there is no similar outrage, and I can't figure out what has led to these two things being singled out for outrage.

I guess I've been gone long enough from Europe to start properly sorting out as an adult what is European. I saw many of the problems and the differences between the countries very clearly, but now I'm starting to see what is truly unique about Europe as a whole. Relative lack of insecurity about globalization is a pretty good trait to have.

Reality, realiteten ja todellisuus

2005-02-01T10:06:00.000-06:00

Something even expats seem to have trouble grasping sometimes is that every place on Earth is real. Rather, I'm not saying that people think that some places are made up, but it does seem like many don't understand that everything they hear about, the news they see, it's right in front of someone. If they were that someone, it would be right in front of them.

For example, when you hear about people talking about snow skiing, they're thinking of old memories and resorts they've been to that you can touch, look at, live in, and be part of. If you snow skiied, it would all stand out in 3D to you too: all the smells, the sunlight, the kinds of trees, the cold, the types of snow, the mountains, the effect of the wind on the snow, the snow blowing into the air and into the light and glittering like a million little weightless crystals, the smell of food cooking when you walk into a restaurant... The fact that you've never done it or seen it doesn't mean that it's not real, that people aren't doing it or living it as I type. And anything that's real could one day be part of your life. Anything that is real really exists out there and is part of the collective human experience. Even though you don't deny that it's real - have you really affirmed to yourself that it is? That one day, you could be on a pair of skis, metaphorically speaking?

Tolerance for the Other

2005-01-27T22:49:00.000-06:00

Even though I have tried imagining that I'd lived all my life in every country I've lived in, I'm starting to come to the conclusion that I never have and never will understand completely what life is like when you've only lived in one country. I can project and imagine, and that works well for most people, but then there's those people who are unsettled by change and/or globalization so much that they go to extremes in one way or another, and my abilities to emphathise nearly disappear. And then there's the odd mundane moments I can't imagine life without: I just watched two BBC shows on PBS. An air of... Europeanness came out of my television, and I couldn't imagine what it'd be like not recognizing that so intimately. The same thing used to happen with American shows in Europe. I can imagine not knowing many cultural norms, but I can't imagine not knowing many cultures. So, in this my tolerance comes to an end: when people are assertively close-minded enough, they are Other to me. This puts me in the classic dilemma - should I or should I not try to emphathise? Can I call myself open-minded if I don't? Where does the limit go? I'd say that neo-nazis are past the limit, but what I consider regular religious people are on the right side of the line. The current political situation here and elsewhere is pushing me to define the limit. I'm not sure it can be defined very well at all in the first place.

National Unity

2005-01-27T09:33:00.000-06:00

I can't help but acknowledge that part of the identity shift I mentioned yesterday is due to the fact that it is becoming difficult for me to see myself as fully American in the current political situation. Part of it is due to the foreign policy and the propaganda circulating to support it, which I reject completely on both ethical and political grounds. Another part is due to the essentialism proposed by the extreme right (in an American context that never means the neo-nazis or associated groups, it means super-duper-conservatives and sometimes neoconservatives). Another is the militant religiosity that is so common here. And I'm not alone. I've seen a lot of LiveJournal posts lately voicing sentiments of alienation, from all kinds of people. So much for national unity.

Slowly changing identity

2005-01-26T21:42:00.000-06:00

I am realizing that I am switching more and more to considering myself primarily a TCK, simply because it's easier. I can point to concerns in my life and say "Oh, it comes up from time to time for most TCKs" or "It's common for TCKs to feel that way". I can't say that very much for any other identity. Seen in terms of national identities (although I without a doubt retain them to some extent - I feel addressed when people speak of "my" countries), I am never typical of anything and I'm always somehow in the fringes - oh, look, another common property of TCKs.

In addition, this apartment and what it contains and why it's there puts me face to face with my need for the third culture. Next to my laptop is a pint glass with Paulaner, and my Paulaner is delicious and it makes me feel connected to... myself, really. European (especially German and English) beer is my beer. Clearly, in my apartment there should be my beer, not someone else's beer. There is a small tier of lucky bamboo on my end table, because lucky bamboo can be bought in our supermarket and it sits on our coffee table in spring. There are modern birch bookcases and a modern birch desk, because our houses and our apartments were always decorated with modern furniture, like most people's. There is a laughing Buddha, because it reminds me of dad. There is a scroll with a poem about long life that I bought downtown. My plates and utensils are some of the pinnacles of national design.

You see, when I say "in our supermarket," I mean Yansha Wangjing Wholesale Warehouse in Beijing. When I look at my lucky bamboo, I see something from Beijing - from home - not something I bought at Lowe's looking for something else. I see something from our family home that is also in mine - a tradition of sorts. Similarly, when I say "downtown", I mean "downtown Beijing." But it feels so close by when I look at the scroll. And when I say "national design," I mean "Finnish national design." I have the same plates as we did in Europe, the plates that my mother insisted on having. All these things make me feel closer to some other part of the world or something that is far away. I have pieces of everything in my apartment, and that's why it feels like home. And that really should tell me - or anyone else - that where I really feel at home is the third culture.

It's just that I've spent 19 years of my life before knowing what a TCK was thinking I was from one country or another. It's taking some time to fully realize that I am, in fact, a rather typical TCK. I realized this quickly upon reading about it, but emotionally, the realization hasn't set in quite as fast. I think it's starting to sink in now, three years later.

Building the Future

2005-01-26T13:54:00.000-06:00

I'm in a cafe, doing homework, listening to the same drum and bass I've been listening to on the bus and walking around buildings. When I listen to it, I feel like the world is different.

When I listen to techno, the world is moving forward together. We - generation e - are growing into the ages when we and our worldviews will start to make an impact on society. The world is constantly moving and turning, but we have learnt how to not only live with it, but how to make the best of it.

We have created a system to both protect people from the excesses of capitalism and harnessed its power to generate income. Our societies are becoming more diverse and international, but our self-image is changing to fit. We have left our past behind and have set on a course to make ourselves better, so that the world can be a better place. And we all come together in the music, the music of our generation and the future.

I feel like part of the future. I feel like part of a global society. But I do not know if those I see around me at these tables, on the sidewalk, in the cars driving by want to create the future with me or not. I try not to think about it, because I have a sinking feeling that they do not. Ad if we don't build the future, who will?

My Graduate School Task

2005-01-26T13:28:00.000-06:00

I have heard a lot of statements to the extent that the future does not belong to America lately. I have to seriously ask myself whether that is true. If the future does not belong to America, then it may be in my best interest to leave after my Ph. D.. My task must therefore be to read books from various disciplines in order to project whether America is not stepping forward as it should, so that in three years' time when I have to start making decisions of where to live I know where the future is.

Null hypothesis: America is not moving forward into the future as well as Europe is.

We shall see what some reading might do to the null hypothesis.

New Languages

2005-01-20T19:09:00.000-06:00

Learning a new language is learning new ways to express yourself.

Becoming part of a new language and culture is to make yourself more than you were.

At the heart of true multiculturalism lies multilingualism.

The New Imperialism

2005-01-20T18:05:00.000-06:00

My current book is The New Imperialism by David Harvey, and it seems very interesting and well-written (in an academic tone, even!) but above all question raising. A number of things have caught my attention already.

In the course of examining hegemony and how hegemony is exercised, Harvey naturally examines the particular case of the United States as a hegemon. Harvey's conception of hegemony is "fashioned out of and expressed through and ever-shifting balance between coercion and consensus." (p. 38) He mentions a number of specifics that really made me stop and think of my own identity and self-image. He summarizes his examples with two brutal sentances: "The US has frequently relied upon domination and coercion and has not shrunk from the liquidation of opposition. Even internally, it has a history of ruthlessness that belies its attachment to its constitution and the rule of law."

Harvey explains the disparity between the examples and the perceptions of the American public by a combination of the American public living in denial and the American public passively saying c'est la vie. Of course, anyone with a personal connection to the United States has to ask him- or herself what personal implications this has, if Harvey is right.

I have heard criticism of US hegemony and imperialism for a long time. I have even had friends who found my emotional attachment to the US troubling in light of US foreign policy. Somehow, I still feel like I'm answering to them, because I'm reading similar things on the pages of Harvey's book.

Of course, there is one level of pure emotional attachment, an attachment of coincidence. When you've been part of a country, especially as a child, you can never divorce it completely. But actively regarding a country as good is a different thing altogether, and so I think that everyone with ties to the United States might benefit from thinking about the ethics of foreign policy. After all, if you support a regime across the board, you also support its foreign policy. If you do not know what your country is doing in other countries, you could be supporting a killer inadvertently. Extreme example, but it illustrates the principle.

I think I've been in denial at least to some extent, simply because it's not pleasant to discover that before you were born, your country was involved in staging coups to replace democratically elected leaders with a dictator more favorable to your country. That's not really the kind of history you want your country to have. I wanted to believe that the US had changed since then. Now that I'm presented with evidence to the contrary, that's becoming increasingly difficult to sustain. Maybe it is essentially the same mechanism that creates the denial in the first place. It's just not something you want to be true about your country.

If Harvey only dwelled on these rather manipulative facets of hegemony, I would maybe not take him that seriously, since the world is never that black and white. However, he points out something else that I can see; namely, that consent and cooperation are also essential to hegemony. He goes on to cite a number of specifics where the US has gotten general warm fuzzies from other countries for its actions.

While all this plays an important role in understanding the informal empire of the US, I think that there is another thought that begs to be thought out. How do you know that you have a reasonable view of your country, both historically and in current politics? How do you know when schools leave out parts of history that made a difference or when schools overfocus on something, giving a distorted view? Of course, systematic erasure of politicians in the Soviet Union and in China are the extreme examples.

However, Harvey mentions a more subtle and therefore more worrisome example: apparently, the US would like to believe that "it and it alone liberated Europe from the Nazi yoke, and it erases entirely the much more important role of the Red Army and the seige of Stalingrad in turning the tables in the Second World War." (p. 40) I remember being vaguely surprised in history class that the US involvement was so small in Europe - so little and so late in the game. I had an image of much grander and more decisive help - an army of Americans rushing ashore in Normandie. Not so at all. But how would Americans know?

I believe there is an answer, an answer that has been tested in practice since the Cold War: Cross-checking between countries. Every country presents some things in a skewed way. If you compare other countries' perspectives to that of the country you're in, you can spot it. That in turn means that international news is essential to both information and education. If you only know the point of view of one country, you will never know if what people are telling you is reasonable. The best way to ensure you have the full picture of politics in proper historical context is to check from the point of view of another country.

I have arrived

2005-01-18T22:10:00.000-06:00

I have been playing with the idea of getting a blog outside of LiveJournal, because I write in my LiveJournal a lot, but most of it isn't really personal as much as it is political or contemplative. The reason I got a LiveJournal was to stay in touch with my old college friends. In a similar vein, I recently found out that some other college friends have blogs here and have disabled anonymous comments. So, therefore, I have arrived. If I like this, I might make this my main medium for thoughts.

Life from the other side of the looking-glass

2005-01-17T12:14:00.000-06:00

I'm reading my daily round of news on the Globalist and on BBC News. In light of what I read yesterday and the day before that, I can't help but wonder what these backlashers make of news items like that the UK will help pay some of Africa's debts, that the train fire that prompted rioting in Gujarat a few years ago was an accident most likely caused by people cooking on the train, or that two of the main figures in the Srebrenica massacre were convicted today. What role could such information play in a world where they are victims of a vast liberal conspiracy play? Where is there a space for ethnical cleansing, civil war, and poverty? I don't see one. Maybe that is because I do not understand this worldview and just can't explore it very well. On the other hand, maybe that is why people like the Daily Illini columnist I mentioned a few days ago lose the big picture. Maybe it's simply because the information that builds the big picture doesn't have a place in their worldview and thus doesn't quite register.

Now that I am old enough to have been alive/there for some of the recent historical background of news, my personal level of involvement has gone up a lot. I remember the news of Srebrenica, and the civil war in general - especially the news of the ethnical cleansing. Ethnical cleansing is to me one of those words that everyone learned through the news - kind of like tsunami is in many countries now. I remember the political discussion about whether visas should be required of refugees, of numbers cited of which countries took how mnay refugees, the high school cafeteria discussions about NATO's intervention, seen as unilateral action on the part of the US.

I also remember the cliqueishness of my junior high school along nationality lines. The Turks kept to themselves, the Iranians kept to themselves, the Swedes - as which I counted, because I was a hidden immigrant and because there were really no other white foreigners - didn't show interest in letting the foreigners join their social hierarchy. But as related to the news item, I remember the Bosnian refugees, especially the girl in my class. She was tall and thin and so sad. I wished that I could do something to help her, but all I knew about what she'd been through was from TV - and that's not a patch for anything. Besides which, it would have been difficult for me to win trust in the first place.

One of my early friends in Sweden was the daughter of some Iranian intelligentsia refugees. When I hear news of the democracy movement there, I think of her sometimes. When I attended a talk on islamic feminism two years ago at Knox, I thought of her. When I hear news of parents jailed for abusing their daughters in order to keep them from mixing with secular societies, I think of the women I know who were in the general setup and how furious I would be if they had been abused at home for hanging out with me.

In relation to all this, I also remember the rise in neonazi activity in response to the refugees. I remember the graffiti and the debates on what to do. But above all, I remember the neonazis in junior high. One of them was in my class. He was the ringleader of the badheads in the whole school. He had the standard attire of black bomber jacket, shaved head, Doc Martens, and violent attitude. I'd arrive for class and he'd be sitting there outside the classroom, flicking a butterfly knife in and out. I always would wonder if he'd actually stab someone - like me or one of the refugees or immigrants - if he got pissed off. He had this aura of unpredictability and instability that made you tip-toe around him, lest he decided that you were shit and got on your case. He was friends with one of the neonazi leaders for the whole region, who happened to be my Swedish teacher's son. This was a shameful secret whispered around the halls.

The moral of this long-winded parenthesis is that such news items draw my attention, because I think of people I've met and what this might mean for them. In my worldview, international news has a place to fill. I feel that it concerns my personal sphere because it concerns people in my personal sphere if not myself directly. You can find a link of most world regions pretty easily within your circle of acquaintances, in addition to just putting yourself in their position. Maybe this victim mentality focuses attention on themselves to such a degree that not even large news like the tsunami can jolt their eyes upward, toward the rest of us. That would be very unfortunate.

Identification reality check

2005-01-16T19:51:00.000-06:00

Still reading What's the Matter with Kansas? and I am again simultaneously enlightened and confused. Enlightened, as to what has happened in the US on the grassroots level domestically. Confused, as to how I can understand so little of the emotions and perceptions that have given rise to this backlash and as to how I should relate to that fact. I alternate between a few views that are not very flattering to my claim to being tolerant of others who are not like me. Maybe I am not, actually, very tolerant; maybe I just feel like I can relate and understand most people so that I see very few people as actually not like me. For various reasons, I decide 'similarity' very much based on cultural interactions and/or similarities. If we can share a culture or subculture, third or otherwise, I consider us 'similar.' Of course, this gives rise to a large continuum of how similar, but the basic identification doesn't take that much.

Many of my friends who have some fact about themselves that make them different from me in some way society deems/has deemed significant doesn't really go into the 'similar' calculation, it plays more of a role like clothing choices or what music you like. It is a difference, just not the sort of difference that really matters when it comes to important stuff. Many of the readers on my Friends list may guess that they may be one. (Heck, in an extended way, everyone is. Even gender doesn't really register as an important difference in the sense that I don't see guys as fundamentally different from myself.) If you start saying that people are different from you because of any factual difference you are going to be a very lonely, bitter person. Therefore, it is not difficult to accept that they are not identical to myself - it's rather unavoidable and we're still basically similar, so... *shrug*

However, the people who are really dissimilar to me in the way turks are dissimilar to neonazis in the eyes of the neonazis and gays are dissimilar to homophobes in the eyes of the homophobes I am not so tolerant of; local people who don't care about the global, backlashers, or why not neonazis. Neonazis, however, are a special category, they need special discussion because they're such a test of the value of free speech and how far it should extend. I do not feel too bothered by my lack of tolerance for neonazis. However, people who live in one of Rosenau's Local or Isolated worlds are dissimilar to me in a very important way sometimes - I have trouble putting myself in their shoes. I can't really imagine it very well, especially the Isolated worlds, where it seems that many of the neocons live. In the end, I don't really want to, because if I'm honest with myself, I find it very difficult to respect their opinions enough to bother. I also feel that my reality checks are much better than theirs.

For example, it's difficult to believe in the "liberal media indoctrination" when you've actually seen old propaganda or news you know isn't covering the whole story/and or is propaganda. (Interesting related fact: the Chinese still haven't seen the pictures of the Tiananmen massacre. They know what happened, of course, but they haven't seen the pictures or video.) It's difficult to believe in a left-wing conspiracy when you've lived in one communist country and another so grassroots socialist that some call it the last bastion of communism on Earth. On the other hand, I have trouble believing capitalism is the root of all evil and that the US has a grand plan to take over the world for the same reason. I also know that Americans aren't all fake and shallow the way I know that all French aren't arrogant. I've seen things with my own eyes that keep my feet solidly on the ground - or at least so I'd like to think. I have an obligation to make sure I'm right - or to make myself right if I'm not.

Marginalization

2005-01-15T19:40:00.000-06:00

I strongly recommend What's the Matter with Kansas? How Conservatives won the Heart of America to anyone who is as confused as I am over how the political situation can be what it is. Today's dose of reading was very explanatory again, and I'm starting to realize that a lot of things have happened domestically while I was gone that were too domestic to get reported elsewhere. Not surprising, in the view of Kosovo and all the following concerns and debates and actions, and the fact that there are terror attacks semi-frequently byt the ETA and the IRA among others. The book is suggesting that the right is using the tactics that the left has traditionally used for getting attention and generating support among the common people, only with economics stripped out, giving the curious result that the working class vote for policies that help the rich. This is a very interesting proposal. However, some of the tactics involve rhetoric that I, unfortunately, recognize.

One of the examples of this inversion of who is trying to gain the support of the common people cited is Johnson County in Kansas City, KS. Everyone's Republican; however, the posh neighborhood where people have Ferarris is the realm of moderate Republicans, and the parts of the county where the pain peels off the houses and there's car wrecks in front yards is the most fanatically (neo)conservative. Frank points out that the moderate republicans fulfil many of the "liberal" (which I know now why it is used in such a strange way now) "evil" stereotypes.

"The Mods are plenty conservative in their economic views, as noted previously. But they also fulfil the liberal-elite stereotype, if all you consider are the cultural attributes of liberaldom made famous by the good-natured loathing of commentators like David Brooks. There are moderate Kansas Republicans who drink chardonnay and who put Martha's Vineyard stickers on their Saabs. There are Mods who insists on European-style coffee and whole-grain breads and high-end chocolates. There are Mods who shop at Restoration Hardware and Whole Foods and who look down on those who shop at Wal-Mart. There are Mods who listen to NPR and who insist on speaking French tot he waitress when at a French restaurant. There are Mods who go to gay-friendly, super-Waspy Episcopal churches and who disapprove of the Patriot Act and who rally in support of immigrant rights. And there are Mods who assume that all working-class whites are racist. But such people aren't liberal. What they are is corporate."

Other than the new use of "mods" (fashion anyone?), what this sort of stereotype tells me personally is that combined with an emphasis on authenticity, I don't exist to the backlashers. My parents have driven a Saab for the past ten or so years. I learnt to drive in the one they still have, which has heated leather seats and a turbo. This is simply because my dad's company had a contract for corporate cars with the local Saab dealer, and it's not an exclusive car in Sweden. It is a car of the people, like American cars here try to make themselves out. (If you're American and hadn't thought this through, your national cars are the imports everywhere else, and buying what to you is a foreign car is the patriotic choice.) Half the freaking country drives a Volvo. I insist on whole-grain bread because European whole-grain bread was what my European mother bought and baked from scratch in Europe. I drink wine because my European parents sat me down when I was maybe 17 and said, 'You need to learn how to drink wine before you move out of home.'

See a pattern here? The stereotype is implying that people who drink lattes and drive foreign cars and drink wine and insist on quality foods lack some magical, essential American authenticity. In other words, it's implying that certain lifestyle traits and political beliefs are incompatible with being one of the people - the true, authentic, American people, because these people have to be putting on airs to live the way they do. I don't think they're putting on airs either, but for me personally, how could I possibly be what they think is authentically American? It's a factual impossibility. It rather implies that I and other Euro-related TCKs or even expats or European immigrants or their children can't be American. (shirou already seems to have been indirectly told so.) It seems rather clear that they have not thought this through in a 'global movement of people' perspective - and again, I don't exist for purposes of political debate, or at the very least I and they way I feel is irrelevant in the wake of some movement that's all about standing up for the people.

The irony is that up to now, I've always had to try to show that I'm one of the People - to the left. But then it wasn't about culture and nationality, it was about economics. So if Frank is right in his analysis, I'm going to get the same crap here for being inauthentic, just on another topic. And again, we return to that essentialist identity constructions really have to go.

Quality of life

2005-01-14T12:33:00.000-06:00

After reading an op-ed piece in the Daily Illini, I find myself wondering what life is like for conspiracy theorists, anti-globalists, and other people who see the world as full of evil and decay. Constantly fighting everything and everyone must be completely and utterly exhausting. It must wear you down and significantly decrease your quality of life. I feel exhausted just thinking about it.

The columnist was arguing that although the United States is, as predicted, very generous and does not pay attention to nationality or religion in its great generosity (in this case for the victims of the tsunami), the United States must be prepared to pull out all help efforts when Islamic terrorism rears its ugly head in the region - which it will, because "our enemies" are always vigilant and ready to strike. I don't think I can follow the argument very well (how can the US be so generous when Europe has far outdonated the US? And how can the US be so generous when stopping all help is even discussed as an option?), but what exhausts me is the idea that enemies are everywhere. To live in a worldview where everyone is out to get you is not something I'd wish upon anyone. Why would one choose it voluntarily?

Imagine... after one of the most disastrous natural catastrophes in history, where citizens of many countries were affected, where the news spread like never before, via SMS and email in addition to traditional news, after the world united in aiding like never before... this man sees enemies in the bushes. And enemies of one country alone. He sees only one country and its problems. How sad. Normally, I'd get irritated, but somehow I just pity him. The real news of what happened and its implications has all passed him by.

Nearly 150, 000 people dead, rescue efforts, so many stories of people's lives shattered and loved ones lost, stories of the generosity and warmth of the locals toward the tourists, the aid pledges, the organization for evacuations, for identification of the bodies with forensics, the global questions of whether we could have done more to prevent death and to help immediately afterward... and all he can see is the "war" against terrorism. Being a part of global humanity seems to have passed this man completely by, and that too must be an incredible burden to bear. He must feel so alone - only some 250 million Americans as his company. 250 million cornered, hunted Americans. I couldn't live that way.

US in crisis?

2005-01-13T11:16:00.000-06:00

"In regions in crisis, nostalgia for the past and religious fundamentalism appear as shelters from the storm. In a globalized world, not paying attention to this is tantamount to paving the way for the clash of civilizations." -Jaques Chirac in the Globalist, 01/13/05

If nostalgia for the past is a major divider of American society as some would argue, then does that mean that the United States is a region in crisis? Or is it that nostalgia for the past and fundamentalism appear as shelters from the storm even if you're merely uncomfortable?

Either way, I don't think I've appreciated just how deep-seated resistance to globalization can be. Rather interestingly, that matches Rosenau's description of affirmative globals.

I also have to confess that part of my lack of sympathy - and thus lack of notice and understanding - comes from 'their' lack of sympathy for me - the oppressive marginality that I've lived under most of my life. I am being asked to conform to a local world, where everyone is from one single place that has a special place in their heart, where only local things matter and where I am just being unnecessary, annoying, superfluous, and weird in taking an interest in the rest of the world. I have been told not to speak languages other than the language of the host country by teachers, peers, and scout leaders. I have been told I've made things and facts up about other places just to make myself special both indirectly and directly. So when people feel that there is no place for them in globalization, I have a hard time sympathizing. There is no place for me in their local world and they let me know that very clearly. Now that the tables are turning, why should I feel sorry for them? After all, they can adapt in theory in a way I could not. If they just don't want to adapt, that's their problem. I've been trying for years and years to adapt to them. I know this is childish and immature, and so it's not something I like to acknowledge even to myself. Maybe if I dare think the thought through, I can get past it. When such ideas are in the light, their flaws often become immediately visible. After all, if I want a claim to being the bigger person - indeed, a cosmopolitan person - I have to be able to put myself in their shoes, difficult as it is.

Soul-baring

2005-01-12T16:38:00.000-06:00

Inspired by smittenbyu's courage to reveal herself, I decided to take a little leap of my own. I posted a question asking if others had been thrown out of or rejected by a home... and I got almost an immediate response. I am not alone at all. The part of me that I have always been the most reluctant to touch upon, that extremely few of my real-life friends know anything about I actually share with others. That part of me I've only properly been able to share with Kary. I got a Christmas card from her saying that she was leaving in a few months, and I am very happy for her.

We both just thought that it is impossible to explain to an outsider who hasn't seen it themselves. It's not a secret per se, but it's both very personal but above all incomprehensible to most people, it seems. I've simply found, like my mom and a lot of other people in the third culture, that if I explain too much about life stories and citizenships and feelings and moving, I cease to be a person and become a misunderstood zoo specimen. I am a person. Therefore, I present myself in such a way that I know I will be met like one - I use the cultural chameleon property most TCKs have.

I feel almost like I felt sophomore year when I found a link to www.tckworld.com - I laughed and I cried and I couldn't believe that I could be described by an acronym rather than a life story with lots of points that were essentially incommunicable in practice. I'm actually very typical. And now I know that it's not just Kary and I, there's people out there who might have gone through the same things we have! I still can't believe it. Now, if people just knew what all these terms were...

Update: An email later, I realize that we're all third culture kids. This seems to be a problem stemming from being a hidden immigrant. Kids who are moving back into possible hidden immigrant-ness urgently need support and attention and above less hiddenness. Expatriates raising or thinking of raising children really have to get this kind of information. Really, really, need this kind of information. It's being discovered by trial and error, but there's no need for kids who are growing up today to discover what we already have.

This is an reference group orientation exploration milestone for me, I think. (An opportunity for me to explore how other TCKs see things.)

Afterthought: Maybe I do not cross cultures as much as I never exit the third culture. Maybe one can never truly leave one's culture - including the third.

Backlash?

2005-01-12T12:38:00.000-06:00

logodaedaly pointed out to me what the culture wars are, and in my happiness over a new-found word I googled for it. I found something interesting: an article that argues that the divide is over modernity, not politics per se. This made much more sense to me than the culture wars as apparently usually thought of. The author, David Brin, mentions enlightenment ideals and how they are in decline here. This is very in keeping with my last post from yesterday. I really should re-read Distant Proximities again. If this is backlash to globalization, I think I and many, many others have vastly underestimated just how threatened the masses can be.

What's more, this could explain why on Earth the US uses old technology when the rest of the Earth is moving on. How many Americans even know what 3G is? Or know what NTSC and PAL are? (Not the people at my local Best Buy, apparently. That was weird.)

And it could explain the depth of emotion and the lack of rationale and the urgency which which arguments are made.

And why shirou got yelled at for speaking French. It was a reminder that the world is moving too fast.

This also fits in with something I read recently - that the world's only hyperpower has a sense of hyper-vulnerability of its people. You could see some of that after September 11 - of course it was a shock and it was unimaginable, but... the world has seen much worse. It's a cliche, but it really seems like Americans don't quite know how to react to trouble physically located in their country and seem to have trouble assessing the risk and the danger.

And it also explains why I am completely not understanding what is going on - I think globalization is ultimately a good thing and I'm counting on it. A mass emotional reaction against globalization wouldn't register on my radar other than by critical mass - which could well be what just happened, and here I am, dazed and confused like a drugged cat wondering what happened.

And it's reasonable in the sense that it doesn't require millions of people to be stupid or ignorant.

This fits. I should do some more reading and write something more rigorous to check if this really could be the explanation. Others have clearly tangented on the same ideas, I should find out what they've already said.

Update: Already reading stimulated new thoughts. I am reading What's the Matter with Kansas? How Conservatives Won the Heart of America by Thomas Frank, and a line stood out at me. He argues that the neocons have successfully shifted focus from economics to authenticity. He writes, "What divides America is authenticity, not something hard and ugly like economics." In other words, an essentialist identity construction. And that explains where all this un-American business came from. This is all coming together - this is what Maalouf was talking about in some of his examples in In the Name of Identity: Violence and the Need to Belong. You can see it - the admonishment of moderation, the exclusion of multiple allegiances, everything.

Addenum (01/14/05): What's the Matter with Kansas just gave me another part of the puzzle. One of the reasons that I do not remember this ideological fighting and general craziness, in addition to being a kid and as such relatively politically unaware, is that these phenomena apparently started popping up after we left or right around the time we were leaving. I just ran across an account of how things shifted - and all key events are after 1989. That's why it doesn't feel familiar at all - it wasn't there last time I was living here.

Putting the finger on it

2005-01-11T18:31:00.000-06:00

The post-Cold War world is one of speed and change. It requires constant re-evaluation, assessment, and flexibility. No set of ideas, religious or not, will be a floating device. You actually have to learn how to swim. And the world is more complex now than it was, so understanding what is going on and even simple information sorting is much more difficult. Maybe what we are witnessing in the United States is a backlash toward globalization rather than reason and other enlightenment ideals, maybe the red states do not want to live in a complex, fast-moving world.

I was stirring my soupe goulash when I realized that I'm shopping for a country to live in after I complete my Ph. D. like one might shop for a car. I am actively planning my life set against a rapidly changing backdrop, and I am actively thinking of how to make myself essential to companies on a global plane. In short, I am preparing for this fast-paced, global lifestyle. (I intend to start the journey toward becoming fluent in French, so I'll speak all three major European languages.) My identity formation leaves me little to lose. But people from the red states maybe think that a successful backlash is possible, that we can turn back the clock ot when things were slower and they had to work less hard to make themselves needed.

I will re-read some of the material I read for my Honors. Maybe that could help me make sense of what is happening the the US and why there is popular support for the current foreign policy. Maybe, somewhere in there, I will find the explanation that will help me feel like this can still be a place I can call home without feeling that its values are in conflict with another home's.

Foreign Policy

2005-01-10T14:46:00.000-06:00

(Rant warning: I am generally unhappy with the way things are and seem to be going through a mild bout of reverse culture shock combined with uncertainty of where I could be happy.)

I think that the US is seriously misreading where the future is going and I think the US is seriously forgetting where the past came from. CNN said yesterday that the Euro is the strongest currency on Earth compared to the dollar. The EU would have been thought a miracle 50 years ago. Cooperation, dialogue, and negotiation to secure real peace in our time have been shown to work in practice - it produced the world's strongest currency, among others. It has produced what hundreds of years of war couldn't. The future does not lie in soldiers and occupations. The future does not lie in attacks, terror, or mobilization. The future lies in openness, negotiation, and peace. Let the mission civilicatrice begin, then.

The reason peace is the future is the past. Humanity has seen centennia, if not millennia, of war, terror, and oppression of different kinds, that culminated in the deaths of millions of people in World War II and then in the gulags. Millions of people have disappeared during the night never to be seen again in the name of security. At least all of Europe has to live with the collective memories of the war. It doesn't seem that it has touched the US nearly in the same way. I hear news of things like Guantanamo and Iraq and no matter how I try not to think about it, the associations to the war come up, and it seems like no one else remembers here. We swore never to forget, but are we forgetting? Or, are Europeans remembering, but no one else? But how could anyone forget? One of our family friends was rescued by the Red Cross from a concentration camp. He still had the serial number tattooed on his arm. Part of our family lived behind the Iron Curtain. Another part had to fight for independence. Is it really so that without the personal connections to what happened, one doesn't care? Could it really be so? That others haven't learnt what can happen? That others maybe don't even know exactly how everything happened, how it could end up this way?

If this is so, I am afraid of what might happen here. It seems so ridiculous to make a comparison, but I seem to know very little sometimes. And it was unthinkable for it to happen in the first place. Our graduation speaker said that we live in interesting times, and I thought it an exaggregation. I sincerely hope he was wrong.

Irrational fear, hopefully

2005-01-07T12:01:00.000-06:00

An opinion article in yesterday's Aftonbladet by Jan Myrdal argues that holding people who are not informed of what they are accused and against whom the government has no proof prisoners has no place in a civil society with rule of law. He mentions some old examples of when rule of law has not been upheld: political prisoners in France in the 16th and 17th century; Feb. 28, 1933, the new Hitler government decided that to protect the people and the state, no proof or trial was necessary to take people prisoners. Having just read a book about an Estonian child refugee and having seen some of my mother's old photographs, I think of all the people who disappeared during the night - both during Hitler's regime and during Stalin's. Trains full of people, some or most pretty arbitrarily taken. All the stories I heard as a kid about the Soviet Union and what happened to the people behind the iron curtain, people who we had belonged together with either by blood or by culture and tradition. All the letters with codes to sneak past the censure. And the immense pride that Finland has in having stayed independent - and all the sacrifices that people have made for their country to keep it that way.

Every time we go to visit my grandfather, we go to the graveyard. He shows us the family graves - there's two - and the graves of more distant relatives, even though we know where they are. And then we go to the war memorial section to look at our relatives who are buried there. The Winter War (Talvisota) and the Continuation War (Jatkosota) killed some of my relatives and hurt others. My great-grandfather was one who died. Afterwards, my great-grandmother couldn't afford to feed her six children. My grandmother and her siblings had to become huutolapsia, children who were auctioned off to the family who promised to take best care of them. Huutolapset often had to work hard for their food and most of the time didn't get a lot of love. They were at the bottom of society. My great-aunt Anni, the youngest, was lucky and ended up in a good family who treated her well. I don't know what exactly happened to the rest, because still is very shameful and painful for my family to talk about. Even my mother didn't know until for about five years ago, after my grandmother's death. Finland lost Karelia and had to take care of thousands of refugees. The Finns had to seek help from Hitler Germany to keep Stalin away; they had to seek help from a regime almost as feared as the one they knew they would have to fight. But Finland is independent. Estland, almost like Finland's sister country, was occupied first by Hitler and then by Stalin. Both did basically the same thing - got rid of anyone who might in any far-fetched way sometime in the future maybe possibly be part of the resistance movement. Killed or deported to Siberia or concentration camps.

The Finns were the primary means of smuggling information past the Soviet censure, because of the close ties between Finland and Estland. I heard stories as a kid about the efforts and the danger involved. My grandfather was asked to mail something by an Estonian stranger, someone who approached him in a very scared and secretive way in Helsinki. He did. Someone must have been told some very sensitive information thanks to him. The Estonian must have smuggled the letter - very dangerous - with her on an official sanctioned trip. I heard the stories of the watching and the eavesdropping and the poor Finns who crossed the border to join the Revolution. Most of them ended up in Siberia or killed. When the wall fell, everyone's first though wasn't political - it was happiness for the people on the other side. In the happy naivete that followed the tearing down of the wall, we all thought that now they could have what we had, that torn families could re-unite, that we could all be free and prosperous together like we should have been.

Although I know that such a fear is not warranted right now, there is a part of me that immediately thinks back to all this when I hear about things like holding prisoners without proof or trial. As a child, I often felt very grateful for having had such luck to have been born outside the Soviet Union when I heard the stories and felt the fear turned into action and later pride from my family. Both my mother and my father could have been inside the iron curtain if things had been different, my father more likely than my mother. I could have been born a Soviet citizen. My childhood could have been full of the fear and scarcity and corruption that my third cousin's was. Even though it is - I hope - irrational and I try not to think about it, sometimes I can't help but imagine a world where the US is like a rich Soviet Union, where not even being a model citizen and pledging your loyalty and belief in the System can save you, because that's just what a good terrorist would do to hide. And that just gives me a lump of cold ice in my chest. It's just too much. And it just can't happen. There must be a law of physics preventing it from happening.

I don't know what to think, what to really realistically think, when I hear things like that, that prisoners can be held indefinetly without accusation, prrof, or trial. I don't know what to think when I hear the propaganda touting the glory of fighting terrorism at any cost for the safety of the people. We've heard that argument before. Many, many times before. As soon as the safety and well-being of the people at any cost is on the agenda, innocent people start disappearing and dying. Nothing scares me so much politically as a Strong Leader who Only Wants My Best. And that's what I have. I just can't reconcile that with history, not at all. My solution seems to be to not think about it too much, but in some moments I think, "I have a foreign passport. If it starts happening, I'm leaving everything behind and I'm driving to an airport and I'm flying to safety." That's what worked last time, leave before the borders close. But I also can't bear the thought that this could happen in the US. It's just so unimaginable that it could be happening again, it's ridiculous, it's ludicrous. But I can't get rid of this irrational fear, as much as I would like, I can't reason it away. It makes my feelings toward America very complicated right now. I can't feel the solid foundation of being critical and patient and diplomatic like I do in Europe. I trust Europe. I trusted America, too. I don't know what to do now - I want to have faith in the way the country is built, in the people, even more or less in the politicians and the arms of government. But... faith is exactly what propagandists want. If I just have faith in that it will work out, I could be putting the gun in the hand coming to shoot me. As the old saying goes, "When they came for the blacks, I didn't speak up, because I wasn't black. When they came for the Jews, I didn't speak up, because I wasn't a Jew. When they came for the Catholics, I didn't speak up, because I wasn't Catholic. When they came for me, there was no one left to speak up." Faith killed a lot of good people. I feel kind of like I might toward a loved parent that suddenly, unprovoked, hit me. How could it be? And what should I do?

Globalization, uncertainty, and the far right

2004-12-17T17:54:00.000-06:00

Ferdinand Celine was an anti-Semite. This may be a bit surprising, because his estate refuses to reprint his book on facism, Bagatelles pour un massacre. Celine derived his racist and fascist beliefs from the idea that civilization should be founded on the differences between groups or individuals.

I am re-reading Nichlas Fraser's The Voice of Modern Hatred: Encounters with Europe's New Right. I've read it before, but due to what's been on my mind (Other than finals) certain aspects of the book are standing out to me in a new light. The idea that civilization and/or culture is or should be founded on differences between people can be found in many places, not only in the writings of anti-Semites. It can be found in Huntongton's The Clash of Civilizations. And most alarmingly, it can be found in identity formation.

Celine's ideas seem very familiar to me now. Fraser writes, "Celine was sufficiently well educated to understand that the race theories implied by German anti-Semitism were nonsense - indeed he found the seriousness of Germans ridiculous. But culture was important to him, and he believed that a culture could die as easily as any other organism. Looking around him, Celine announced that France was mortally threatened. The last vestiges of Frenchness would be extinguished in the next war. The 'bagatelles' of which he wrote were a form of consolation offered before the imminent prospect of Armageddon, and they consisted of telling fellow Frenchmen that it remained the obligation of every Frenchman to hate Jews. For Jews were the founder members of the international class of capitalists. (...) Jewishness found expression in the English language, which had been annexed and destroyed in much the same way as French shortly would be. Above all Jewishness could be identified in the mass, homogenized multiculturalism of America, which would sooner or later destroy France." (Fraser, p. 26-27)

These opinions, with France substituted for some other country or sub-culture, can be heard a lot, sometimes with Jews substituted for the IMF or the WTO or something similar. In his book, Fraser mentions a study by Max Horkheimer and T.W. Adorno in the suburbs of southern California on Nazi and fascist sympathisers. Their conclusion was that there was, in fact, such a thing as an 'authoritarian personality.' People who has authoritarian personalities tended to be male, not very well educated, and had patriarchal attitudes to family authority. They found "Conservative embattled" to be their general motto. Most interestingly, they found that "those who felt threatened in their jobs, or who were worried about a world changing too rapidly for them, were particularly affected. The armed forces appeared to provide a testing ground for such types." (Fraser, p. 30)

Again, we've heard this before, not just from fascist sympathisers. These cries of cultural extinction, this distaste for multiculturalism, for change can be heard all around the world. The intense dislike of globalization and mixing of people bordering on hate can be heard from left, right, and center, not to mention the strong feelings that the concept of Americanization evokes. The two are, of course, interwined and one and the same for many people.

All this suggests that there may be a closer link between the foundations of Nazi and fascist ideologies and resistance to globalization than we may care to think. Although it is very clear that only a minority of people who feel this anxiety become members of the far right, the basic premises of the resistance ought to be more strongly questioned. Some far right groups even call on these ideas to evoke sympathy from society and to make their ideas sound like self-defense - the Vlaams Blok is quoted in Fraser's book to say just that: "They defended themselves against charges of bigotry with the assertion that it was the project of 'multiculturalism' - the world was never defined - and not the existence of individual Arabs, Turks, or Africans in Europe, which caused all the trouble." (Fraser, p. 36)

This brings up some very important subtleties. When does cultural preservation stop and a racist, nazi, or fascist systematic erasure of anything 'unauthentic' start? How clear lines can one reasonably expect to draw around a culture to mark off Self and Other? How much cultural change can one expect people to put up with?

I see in all this something unique that the neonazis need to appeal to their volk, to appeal to others' discontent and fears, to attempt to claim legitimacy for merely wanting to 'preserve' their culture - essentialist identity construction. If there is no essence of Europe to be infused with, then there is no volk bound together by bands of pure bloodlines. Then, you cannot kill their culture. If there is no essence of Europe that requires being white, then the Arabs and Turks can't be a threat. You can't threaten something that doesn't exist.

I don't flatter myself with thinking that I have discovered the solution to the problem of what to do with the far right, nor explained the far right. I do not pretend that changing identity construction is a practical solution to anything. However, I do think that this is yet another reason why it is extremely important that we (as in, everyone on Earth) abandon the idea that identities come from some inner "essence" that undeniably makes us who we are, passed down from our ancestors and culture. Reading The Voice of Modern Hatred again, I hear echoes of Amin Maalouf's In the Name of Identity: Violence and the Need to Belong. The far right could have been another interesting chapter in his book.

The elephant in the room

2004-12-15T16:37:00.000-06:00

I just finished reading a book called How Race Is Lived In America, a complication of an article series in the NYT. It was very interesting and well-written, and of course prompted thinking on my part. However, I realized something tangential as well: for me, the elephant in the room isn't race as much as it's nationality, cultural imperialism, and other related attempts of perceived outsiders to change culture. That also creates slurs, prejudice, distrust, and even outright hatred. It complicates friendships, business, all human relations. Those in positions of power don't see it and think everything's peachy and simple. Those are often the people who historically have used force to have things their way, who have oppressed and manipulated other countries, or those who are part of the hegemony.

I would feel more comfortable talking about race candidly than about cultural imperialism candidly, maybe because the basic facts of my race are clear, whereas the basic facts about what culture I am part of is not as clear. Therefore, I expect to be dismissed as inauthentic or 'tainted' or something, and therefore not worth listening to. Somehow, in those discussions, I get defensive about opposing ideas equally, and they get emotional and I get emotional and everyone demands that since I don't like what the other 'side' is saying, I ought to stop being wishy-washy and clearly agree with everything they're saying, the whole thing breaks down. Or arguments surface along the lines of the recent ideas on what is 'un-American.'

At least if I'm a racist bigot, I will only be accused of being an ass, not of both being an ass, stupid, disloyal, hysterical, unrealistic, and inauthentic at the same time. In reality, I most probably understand and have self-reflected on national power relations better than race power relations. That doesn't mean I feel more comfortable talking about it really honestly. I'd rather be accused of being mean than having my very method of identity construction - betweening - derided. I can stop being mean, but I can't stop others from mishandling my social identity. In terms of worst-case scenarios, I'd rather look deep into myself and see a mean, evil racist hidden under blankets of bullshit and denial than have my identity erased and denied and dissolved by others and being told that no one will claim me. Both would be very unpleasant, but only one would destroy me.

I noticed that I could identify on a personal level the most not with the white people in the story, but with the article on a biracial man. And that identification has nothing to do with race, it has to do with labels and identities and betweening. His just happen to be racial, mine are national and cultural. And like him, I find myself in a position where histories of other people collide head-on, and I am being asked to make an artificial choice on which 'side' I want to be on. Maybe there is a more general pattern here, of which racial tensions and power politics as well as identity politics are only examples instead of unrelated issues.

Open letter to my fellow Americans

2004-12-04T19:24:00.000-06:00

Dear Americans,

The world is watching you. The world always has been watching you. They watched you far before 9/11, and they're still watching. People watch what your President does, how he negotiates, how he smiles, what he has to say to them. They watch to see what you're wearing, where you shop, how you talk, how your society is portrayed in your TV series, in your movies. Unbeknownst to you, you are all on a country-sized stage with the spotlight on you. You don't look up often, and when you do, you never sense the eyes watching you from the side of the stage, trying to elucidate what's going to happen next from the muscle movement in your face, from your choice of words, or from your clothes.

You cannot turn the spotlight off, you can't step down from the stage. And while you're up there giving your performance, people are reviewing you as you go. Everyone's whispering and talking to each other, pointing, commenting, keeping track. Arguments arise, sometimes very heated ones, in the audience. Not infrequently, one section of the audience will only continue watching from the corners of their eyes and focus their attention on a bitter argument about what you just did, and whether it might be a good idea to do the same, or whether it would be treacherous and stupid. Some of the audience is paying attention because they want to be on stage too, they want to be up there giving the performance of their lives, flicking people they didn't like off and pretending to be just as unaware of the audience as you are.

Other parts of the audience feel threatened by you and how you are so flippant, even though you are on stage and everyone's watching. They don't know that when you're up there, you feel like you disappear into this mass of people and that your actions are only your own. Some in the audience have learnt how to play off of people's feelings about the whole play and can rally people around them to throw tomatoes, in addition to the individuals who spontaneously throw rotten fruit. Everyone has their own reason for watching. But everyone's watching.

I know, because I can slip off the side of the stage when only a few people are watching (like on a plane) and sit quietly in the audience, and no one will be none the wiser. And now that I'm back on stage, I'm telling you - don't pick your nose, don't pull out that wedgie, don't make a face you think no one will notice - there are so many people watching what you do that someone will see it. And the audience doesn't know you personally, they don't know who you really are - all they have to go by is your actions on stage. And there is nothing you can do about that. All you can do is learn to make big movements that are clearly visible from far away, act out what you want to communicate, and smile. Don't forget to smile. People know that under the stage is the biggest, most destructive army the world has ever seen, and the last thing they want to see is upset people jumping on top of bombs. That's why most of them are watching. Their fate is tied up with what's going on on that stage, but they can only influence what happens in indirect ways.

If you feel the urge to act on the audience's behalf, keep in mind that because everyone's watching, there is no single thing that they want or expect. You have to pick a part of the audience to focus on. And furthermore, shut up and listen whem they speak - you can't speak for someone you haven't heard speak at length. I am not saying this on behalf of the audience - I am saying this to alert you to that you are being scrutinized. Do with that information what you will, but don't forget it. And please think of your country and its reputation before you do anything at all.