History Repeats Itself
This morning I was listening to a local talk radio station's post-election garbbles about why things turned out the way they did. What shocked me was that out of all the issues that influenced voters (economy, "war on terror," health care, etc.), the one that trumped them all was "morality issues." The theory (according to the voice on the radio) as to why this was such an important thing was that after the World Trade Center/Pentagon attacks on September 11, 2001 most people became more religious. After this theory was explained, my initial shock turned into a sinking feeling that I was indeed a "pilgram in an unholy land."
At this point I thought about something I had seen on PBS the night before the election. It was one of those round table discussion shows that turns into a yelling match most of the time. One of the "fun facts" was that America's modus operandi more closely resembled Saudi Arabia and parts of Africa, rather than other democratic nations such as Japan and Europe. The more I thought about this, the more it made sense. Some middle eastern countries preserve their "values" by supressing the rights of women, while America preserves it's "values" by supressing the rights of homosexuals.
The past couple of days have been a bitter lesson for me. I would like to believe that most Americans have learned by now that stomping on the rights of a culture, or people, only leads to suffering. Apparently history has taught most Americans NOTHING.
At this point I thought about something I had seen on PBS the night before the election. It was one of those round table discussion shows that turns into a yelling match most of the time. One of the "fun facts" was that America's modus operandi more closely resembled Saudi Arabia and parts of Africa, rather than other democratic nations such as Japan and Europe. The more I thought about this, the more it made sense. Some middle eastern countries preserve their "values" by supressing the rights of women, while America preserves it's "values" by supressing the rights of homosexuals.
The past couple of days have been a bitter lesson for me. I would like to believe that most Americans have learned by now that stomping on the rights of a culture, or people, only leads to suffering. Apparently history has taught most Americans NOTHING.