When Did Hate Become Patriotic?

I have a confession to make: I'm a Craig's List junkie.

I spend at least an hour a day reading the politics board on the Los Angeles Craig's List site, and occasionally posting my two cents. Before that, it was the Rants and Raves section. I confess I ran out of use for Rants and Raves quickly, as it's nothing more than bunch of mindless hate from the “Who’s Who in Racist Idiots” most elite. All rants, no raves. No joyous ebullience at the small fortunes of life. No crowing over good fortune, accomplishment, or blessings. All that negativity began to cloud my own view, and so I went to the politics board, hoping to find less hate and more intellectual discourse.

I was not wowed.

What passes for political debate on Craig's List would not be tolerated in any government studies class in any school. No civics teacher would stand for the racist droolings on that site. True, the occasional voice in the wilderness cries forth suggesting tolerance and the need for change, but its rarity only goes to draw attention to itself as being just that - a rarity.

And yet, these are the people in my neighborhood, in my neighborhood, in my neighorho-od. These are the Angelinos I live with. I share the freeways with them. I work alongside of them. I shop in the same grocery stores, I breathe the same air, I drink the same water. For all I know, I live next to them. And yet I have to remind myself that it is not my place to consider myself above them. Still, I cannot bring myself to think of myself as one of them either. It would be safe to say I have no tolerance for their intolerance.

I'll given you a moment to digest the irony.

Ready? Okay, let's move on.

I already know the answer to my initial question: it became patriotic to hate on September 11, 2001. I remember watching the news in the days that followed. I was living on the east coast then, and there was a story about local New Yorkers' reaction to the idea that Middle Eastern terrorists had carried out the attacks. Okay let me just state the obvious: the terrorists, or whoever was flying those planes, died that day. Hating them will not undo what they did, and hating people with the same ancestry is just plain stupid. But I digress. There was a shot of a local New Yorker in this report, leaning out of his window as he drove past, yelling at the camera "round 'em ALL up! Deport all those Middle East bastards!" Fist pumping in the air to give this sentiment additional gravity, he rumbled off into the sea of New Yorkers, presumably feeling right at home with his new-found xenophobia.

Okay - so the idea of not liking people from the Middle East wasn't exactly thought up on 9/11. I get that. I remember the Iran Hostage Crisis - 444 days' worth of bad news about angry Muslims who hated us and wanted us dead. The images have, suffice it to say, stuck.

We've seen countless images in TV and films of the crazy-eyed Middle Eastern dude, hell bent on destroying us godless infidels in a sea of holy fire, usually surrounded by like-minded loonies. They fire their machine guns in the air and ululate in a frenzy that falls somewhere between psychosis and religious fervor. The American viewing public has been systemically groomed to accept that at some point these yahoos were going to leap off the screens and into our lives. 9/11 seemed to contradict our worst fears, that lots and lots of Middle Eastern guys were pissed at us and were willing to die to bring harm to us.

But the paranoia borne of that day should have dissipated. The anger should have cooled. If there was one thing I thought we could count on, it was the forgetfulness of the American people. But in the weeks and months following 9/11, you couldn’t turn on the television for more than a minute without seeing images of the Twin Towers under attacks. The American public was eager for revenge, seething with an impotent rage because those 9/11 baddies were already dead, and we had yet to get our hands on anyone remotely responsible. I remember watching a concert of all-star rock stars and movie stars, with proceeds benefitting the victims of the attacks. Richard Gere came out and talked for a few moments about the need for peace and understanding. He was the wrong guy in the wrong place at the wrong time. That crowd was more willing to take up torches and pitchforks and storm the village looking for Muslims than join hands and sing Kumbaya with this well-meaning Buddhist. He was promptly booed off the stage, and the Who were brought on to sing a well-received "Won't Get Fooled Again". You get the idea.

At that point I realized that this was to be one of those periods in American history where the common citizenry just lost its fucking mind for a while. In World War One, we actually passed a law making it legal to lock people up for speaking out against our participation in the war. In World War Two, we rounded up Americans of Japanese ancestry and threw them into camps. In the 50's and 60's, we turn high-pressure water hoses on black Americans uppity enough to try registering to vote. These things happen. I remember reading about these events and thanking the gods that I was born in a more modern and civil period of American history, where we had evolved beyond the need for mob mentality legislation and institutionalized prejudice.

Then somewhere along the way, someone started equating illegal immigration with national security. One of the shills on Fox News, no doubt. They had been complaining about all the damn Mexicans forever, and this new issue of National Security (which no one dared question) seemed the perfect way to create stronger legislation aimed at picking on immigrants. The theory goes something like this: if Mexicans can sneak across the border undetected and find their way into large cities like Los Angeles, what's to stop a terrorist cell like al Qaeda from doing the same? See how that works? Soon, we're imagining "sleeper cells" planting in our very communities. Every Middle Eastern cab driver has bombs strapped to their chest. Every woman in a headscarf is a jihadist, most likely bent on killing the Great Satan.

I’m going to state the obvious here, because I’ve spent too much time already trying to see things from the other side’s perspective: it is NOT patriotic to hate. It does not demonstrate your love for your country by bashing people from other countries. Picking on Mexicans does not make you a better American. Muslims in American, people of Mexican heritage in America, all immigrants, whether here legally or not, are entitled to be treated civilly. They are entitled to the protection of the law. They are not our enemies.

Someday, this war will end. Someday we will have to kiss and make up with the world. I remember my father having disdain for Japanese people decades after the Second World War ended. I knew then that it was stupid and pointless to harbor grudges against people for such a flimsy reason, for so long. I remember thinking then, as I think now, “Please don’t let us become that”. But, my fellow Americans, I see this generation heading down the same path, and I wish I knew how to stop it.