Pardon my American-ness

I have an aunt who is from Peterburough, about 75 miles north of London. She married my mother's brother when he was in the US Air Force and stationed here in England. I always thought it was so cool having an English aunt. Still do! However, there were some members of my extended family took pleasure at poking fun at her. I never understood why they did this, but I suspect it was because they are bigots who are prejudiced against everyone who is different from them. Fortunately, not all of my family are like this. I can sympathize with how she must have felt. I am in a similar situation.

One of the things that keeps surprising me is how common the anti-American sentiment is here in England. I would expect to find anti-American sentiments in certain parts of the world ranging from resentment to fanaticism (especially in the Middle East). But I didn't expect to find it so much here in the United Kingdom. It's not necessarily overt, but it isn't subtle either. Let me be very clear about this: it isn't hostile, and not everybody shares the same sentiments! What is interesting is the variety that it comes clothed in.

Some people think that because the United States did not ratify the Kyoto Protocol, we must be a bunch of anti-environmentalists. For those who don't know what the Kyoto Protocol is, it is a UN treaty that provides a framework to limit global warming. Like most folks, they don't understand the particulars about the treaty and why it hasn't been ratified in the United States. They just accept the story that Americans don't believe in global warming and because of this, the treaty isn't acceptable to the United States. When I try to explain that the United States objects to certain details about the structure of the treaty, or that the United States has led the way on environmental issues for many years, their eyes often glaze over with that "don't confuse the issue with facts" look. But to give others credit, this often opens up a meaningful dialogue about global warming or other environmental issues and what both our separate countries are doing or not doing about it.

Another form that anti-American sentiments comes in is that many people here feel that America wrongly led the United Kingdom, and to a lesser extent, other countries, into the war in Afghanistan and Iraq. As in any discussion about war, there are about as many opinions concerning the rightness of the war as there are people in the discussion! I will not discuss the merits of either the rightness or the wrongness of the current conflict. But I will, on occasion, offer the opinion that we in America do not have the authority to commit the United Kingdom to any war, right or wrong! The people here have to look to their political leadership for that and I refuse to accept blame, on behalf of America, for the decisions of the British government!

Along similar lines, we Americans are looked upon as people who condone torture of the POW's held at our military base in Guantanamo Bay. When this topic comes up, I asked how I feel about the issue. I tell people here that I do not condone torture, nor do I condone the treatment of the POW's held at Guantanamo Bay! I know that some of my family and friends will not like my stand on this, but I also think that the vast majority of my family and friends will agree with me. On this issue, I disagree very much with the policy that was taken and defended by the Bush Administration. I feel that the prisoners should have been treated as POW's according to the accepted Geneva Conventions including the protocols adopted in 1949, 1977 and 2005. To do otherwise reduces us down to the same level as those we fight against in the current conflict!

The reason I feel so strongly about this particular issue is because my father suffered in a German POW Stalog when Germany paid lip service at best to the Geneva Conventions as they were written prior to WWII! Thousands of Americans, both military and civilians suffered untold pain and cruelty in camps run by the Japanese who did not recognize the Geneva Conventions at all. And most recently, one of our presidential candidates represents those who suffered at the hands of the North Vietnamese who also blithely ignored the Geneva Conventions. To ignore the Conventions in our present conflict dishonors all the Americans, alive and dead, who suffered because the Conventions were not adhered to in the past. Not only that, it smacks of the philosophy the end justifies the means! Some of my countrymen will argue that the means of questioning that is at issue is not really torture. But I must counter that if it is not acceptable to question an American during normal times in this manner, then it is not acceptable to use these methods on others in this present time. It matters not that they are seen as the enemy!

I'm sorry . . . I get wound up on certain issues and climb up on that soapbox a little too easily. Back to the matter at hand. There are others here who resent Americans because they feel that we think we are better than everybody else or that our way is better than everyone else's way, or that we invented it first (whatever it is at the moment), or that whatever they have - we have one better, or bigger, or whatever. You get the picture, I'm sure. While some of these things are true - much of what we have is bigger than pretty much everything over here (except bureaucracy - the English have been growing theirs for over a thousand years!), we Americans don't need to rub it in. I try to be sensitive to these things. But invariably, some of this is going to crop up when I try to engage in conversation, especially when people here ask about things back home. In this area, I just have to accept that I am suffering from having followed too many loud-mouthed Americans bragging about all the above things. And on this, I have to admit that often all of us Americans come across as loud-mouthed braggarts when we travel in other countries! It could be said that many of us Americans suffer from verbal diarrhea as the expression goes over here.

But on the whole, the vast majority of people over here do not let these things get in the way of making friends with any American who comes across their path. Whatever their feelings are on these issues, they still show an inordinate amount of hospitality to us Americans whether we deserve it or not. And so it goes in my continuing journey of discovery here in England.