November 03, 2004
You can take the boy out of the country, but...
Just when I think I've become comfortably settled in that strange expat never-neverland that isn't the country I was born in, nor the country I live in, I hit a snag.
I like belonging nowhere, it suits me. I know I'll never be a Swede, even though I have Swedish citizenship. At the same time, my identification with the U.S. continues to grow more tenuous.
Or at least, I always think it's growing more tenuous, until something big and ugly and American comes up and hits me on the head.
Like the current election.
By 10 a.m. this morning, I was juggling a set of feelings ranging from frustration to depression to rage to disgust. Eight hours later, the feelings haven't changed.
Sure, living here in Sweden has changed my perspective ever so slightly: I'm looking from the outside in, and I can see firsthand how the rest of the world is dismayed by the U.S.
At the same time, I know how people in the U.S. give little thought to how their actions affect the rest of the world, beyond what TV news throws at them every day.
So, at this point, I should have a little distance, considering I live outside the U.S. and what happens there has minimal direct effect on me*. But it seems to affect me emotionally as much as if I were inside, which is, it feels like a kick in the stomach.
I guess I haven't really left the United States behind at all.
* Yeah, yeah. I know. What the U.S. does in fact affects even Swedish culture and government policy, not to mention the economy.
Posted by Francis at November 3, 2004 04:47 PMPlease remember that 48% of us do care how our politics affect the rest of the world. 48% of voters represent a lot of folks who don't like what's happening here.
Posted by: Karan at November 3, 2004 07:04 PMYes - please remember this. And further: that 48% are the ground troops in the domestic struggle that will take place over the next four years. We have to win it back.
Posted by: mk at November 5, 2004 08:02 PMAnd please realize that some of us 52% also care how our politics affect the rest of the world. We just don't happen to think the rest of the world means just Europe. We have a different opinion about how to run the country, specifically, the war on terror. And this is from an American ex-pat living in Germany. :) We're not all rednecks who can't think outside the box, thank you.
Posted by: Anna at November 7, 2004 11:10 AMHmmm. I seem to have hit a nerve here. My own experience from living 36 years in the U.S. was that people, including myself, were not nearly as focused on what happened outside the U.S. as what happened inside. It makes sense, it's a huge country and it's hard enough to keep track of merely what's happening inside, plus what other countries do doesn't have the same impact on the U.S. as the U.S. has on other countries.
(As an aside, what information I've read says that a significant portion of those 52% voted for GWB more because of his stance on so-called "moral issues" - the three Gs: gays, guns and God - and not because of how he's handling the, um, "war on terror," or his foreign policy.)
Posted by: francis s. at November 7, 2004 12:08 PMAnd what kind of a country needs to sell its foreign policy with a marketing slogan like "war on terror" anyway? What exactly is a "war on terror"?
Posted by: K at November 8, 2004 02:58 PMAs an American ex-pat living in England, I know exactly what you mean. I felt disgusted and embarrassed and like I needed to make apologies to those around me the entire day, by reminding everyone that 51% is by no stretch an overwhelming majority.
Posted by: Redlilocks at November 8, 2004 07:36 PMI waited to comment on this in the hopes I would think of something smart to say. Oh well. People here ask me why Bush was elected and I just don't know. I assumed he had them on the fear issue, but if Francis is right it was just as much the "moral" issues, which gives you an idea how deeply 52% of the voters in the U.S. like to think if they elect Bush on moral issues.
A commentator here mentioned the conservatism and puritanism of Americans as a reason and I thought she was just ignorantly rehashing the old cowboy image America has in Europe (and to which Bush contributes) but I guess she was right, at least in part.
Posted by: mig at November 9, 2004 01:29 PMHere's an interesting link with a different perspective:
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,2089-1347653,00.html
I've been reading a few political blogs (for the first time) during this election, and I'm amazed at how clueless both right and left preprogrammed thinkers can be in (and outside) the USA.
For a pretty balanced read (from a blogger who voted for Kerry), I'd suggest scanning through Andrew Sullivan's Daily Dish:
http://www.andrewsullivan.com/