A Good Political ReadFollow

"Some People Push Back" By Ward Churchill

A very good read, thought I'd drop it here for those interested in a good Political Read. Read and Discuss, enjoy ^^

Hey look, it's a illiterate Hall & Oats fan!

GFY, Red...while your humor exceeds my expectations with the stupid link, your intelligence doesn't by crackin on a piece of literature worth reading that you obviously can't handle since it's got a few more words than your Leap Pad can handle.

I'd rather wait to see if someone other than a jerkoff like yourself would want to take part in the discussion. That said, I'll continue to wait while you continue to find redundant webpages to throw at me. I wonder how it didn't take you long to find a "Social ******" web-test...take it a few times yourself, Red?

Do us all a favor and crawl back inside the *** you were born from...

On a side note, to kick it off...I specifically like his comparison on "Good Americans" to "Good Germans". He's obviously looking from a point of view 'against' the current leader. This guy took a serious hit reputation wise by letting this Essay go public, yet he did it anyways despite the backlash he would receive for doing so. He makes a lot of good points throughout his Essay, although it would appear of course he holds quite a bit of angst towards Bush's in general. Makes you wonder why a guy would drag his name through the mud...

Edited, Wed Feb 9 14:28:47 2005 by Ryneguy

If you two lovers want to make out, please take it somewhere private, like PMs or a journal.

Hmmm... Well, I'll ignore the silliness and address the topic.

It is an interesting read. The guy is a bit too far whacko-left for my tastes, but that's just my position on his writing. My real problem with the work is the it's loaded with language designed to arise feelings, but almost gleefully ignores facts and the "real world" in the process.

It's the kind of writing style that polarizes people. Those who already agree with him will sit back and say "Yeah man! You tell it!" (perhaps while clicking their fingers in approval), while those who disagree will just think he's a moron. I'm of the opinion that this kind of dialogue isn't really dialogue at all. It's certainly not persuasive, since only those who already agree with him will listen/read something like this and think it makes sense. I suppose it'll appeal to the simpleminded who don't bother to ask questions but just assume that if someone says something with enough authority (like an ultra-liberal professor type), that what they say must be "true".


The piece itself is full of contradictions. On the one hand, he condemns the US for taking military action against Iraqi soldiers and Iraqi infrastructure (which he painstakingly calls "US" actions, even though the UN was calling the shots on that one), and paints the results of those actions (innocent civilian deaths) in the absolute worst light. But then he turns around and states that those killed in the WTC were not "innocent civilians" because they participated in the corporate/economic machine that feeds the very military/industrial might that the terrorists (excuse me: military strike forces) are targetting.


I'm just curious how he can say that it's "wrong" to kill Iraqi soldiers deliberately, and Iraqi civilians accidentally during an officially declared war conducted in the most above ground way possible, but it's "less wrong" to deliberately target civilians in what can only in the most lenient terms be called a "sneak attack".

It seems as though Ward Churchill's PhD education did not include the basic idea that a nations people ultimately bear the responsibility for the actions taken by their nation. Or maybe he is aware of it (since that seems to be part of his whole theme), but only when the negative result of that responsiblity is targeted back at US civilians? This works both ways. Certainly, when our government takes actions that provoke a counter action by other people, that's something we as citizens have a level of responsibility for. But he seems to imply that the reverse simply doesn't happen. Iraqi families bear no responsibility for the damage their leader caused. They apparently should not expect any risk or death during a war directly resulting from their country invading another neighboring country.

That's a nice idealistic concept, but it has never been true. What's amazing is that he mentions all the big past events, but seems to not get what he's talking about. German citizens were killed in large numbers during the Allied bombing campaign. Japanese citizens were as well. But one can argue that they were being "pushed back" against as a result of their leaders actions towards Poles, and Jews, and Russians.


He also seems to have a particular hatred of white people. It's like if you have brown skin, you're somehow a saint, always a victim, and never at fault. Note, that he does make a point to mention Germany's killing of Russians (and the citizens apparent lack of care), and Jews. But when talking about Japan, he seems to ignore events like the Rape of Nanking, and the generally brutal treatment recieved by anyone who fell under the power of that particular regime. Perhaps those facts simply don't match with his personal viewpoint (or in this case, he can't figure out a way to blame white people for a brown skinned people killing other brown skinned people so he ignores it).


Maybe if he lifted the racially biased chip off his shoulder, he'd become aware of the fact that *all* people do this. All people have always done this. One can sit back and list the actions and reactions of who did what to whom back to the dawn of time. It's a pointless excersize. All you can realistically do is deal with the reality right in front of you. And sometimes that means that you take actions that might result in a "push back" at some future date. That's just part of the deal...

Actually... brace yourselves... I agree with gbaji on this one. The writer does have a point, but he could have made it in a much less sensationalistic way.

Whew! Almost fainted there. I'm ok now though...;)

That's exactly what I'm talking about here. I can respect just about any point of view coming from any person. And at a very basic level, he's making a reasonable point: That actions by a government have consequences that may adversly affect the citizens they govern.

The problem is the totally haphazard way he goes about it. In his zeal to point the finger of blame at the US government, he totally loses sight of the point he *could* be making. He could have talked about how push causes push and ultimately generates a cycle of violence between two peoples. But he doesn't. He could have made a very nice comparison between civilians killed as a result of military actions in Iraq (and other areas of the world), and civilians killed in the WTC. But he doesn't. He could have even maybe presented an alternative course of action. But he doesn't.

He doesn't delve into those issues because in order to do so, he'd have to include the fact that our actions don't occur in a vacuum any more then anyone else's. The death of those Iraqi civilians was the "pushback" of their government deciding to invade Kuwait in exactly the way he's stating that the deaths of US civilians in the WTC were "pushback" from a set of US government actions. Of course he'd have to compare the relative "badness" of our actions to theirs and explain how "meddling" and/or following the decisions of the UN justifies such a pushback, but an outright and unprovoked war of agression does not. And to do that would only distract from the purpose of the piece which is simply to paint the actions of the US government in the worst way possible.

Kind of a waste if you ask me.

I like the way you put this, saying the point he "Could" be making. That's the thing that got me thinking on this, and how 'controversial' it is (so to speak), is while it was written with the intent to get a message across (and a good one at that)...it's overrun with a Writers sensationalism and 'zeal' as you put it. It seemed more in the beginning that he might go on the right track, but as you read, his sarcasm and words in general became much more opinion-based and biased the further he went into it. It strikes me as odd that a well-regarded person (like I said before) would take such a bold step as to release something like this public when it's obviously riddled with opinions. While trying to make a good point, he turned out to be nothing more than the sensationalist Michael Moore is with his movies. The 'logic' of such a move eludes me...

Edited, Thu Feb 10 09:00:40 2005 by Ryneguy