I don't have much time to post (class at 11), but something happened last night that really bugged me. I was having an online discussion with a girl who lives in a freshman triple, and she was complaining about her roommates and basically looking for sympathy--which I can understand, given my freshman experience. I'll abridge the conversation somewhat for clarity's sake:
Girl: they personify about 95% of the things that I dislike, esp. about this country
Girl: some Americans don't bother me
Girl: but the ones who do...
Girl: I'm sorry if that offends you at all
Me: it doesn't offend me
Me: I just like this country
Me: one Indian guy put it this way
Me: "America is a place where the poor people are fat"
Girl: please, please don't sell me propaganda right now, please
Girl: I know, home of the free and the brave
Me: so you're allowed to bitch about Americans, but I'm not allowed to say good things about them? is that it?
This is something that just PISSES THE HELL out of me. I don't get angry very often, but for God's sake, whenever I express any slightly patriortic opinion to assclowns like this, the knee-jerk reaction is that I'm a liar and a blasphemer, and that I've been fed standard party line by RNC-installed neural implants that get updates from NeoCon HQ every hour. I don't think it ever occured to her that my opinions are well thought-out, or that I arrived at them for the most part by myself, or that there are things about America worth liking--and that there are things that are worth liking about this country that outweigh and precede the things that are worthy of dislike.
The epilogue of this story: I opined that propaganda was deliberate disinformation, usually on a campaign scale, which I found insulting, especially in light of the fact that I was not deliberately trying to mislead her. To which she responded, "You could have fooled me." At that point, I realized there was nothing further to discuss and stopped talking to her.
I still wonder, though--why is she still studying here? Why not study at a school in a country where the people don't spout propaganda and piss her off?
Girl: they personify about 95% of the things that I dislike, esp. about this country
Girl: some Americans don't bother me
Girl: but the ones who do...
Girl: I'm sorry if that offends you at all
Me: it doesn't offend me
Me: I just like this country
Me: one Indian guy put it this way
Me: "America is a place where the poor people are fat"
Girl: please, please don't sell me propaganda right now, please
Girl: I know, home of the free and the brave
Me: so you're allowed to bitch about Americans, but I'm not allowed to say good things about them? is that it?
This is something that just PISSES THE HELL out of me. I don't get angry very often, but for God's sake, whenever I express any slightly patriortic opinion to assclowns like this, the knee-jerk reaction is that I'm a liar and a blasphemer, and that I've been fed standard party line by RNC-installed neural implants that get updates from NeoCon HQ every hour. I don't think it ever occured to her that my opinions are well thought-out, or that I arrived at them for the most part by myself, or that there are things about America worth liking--and that there are things that are worth liking about this country that outweigh and precede the things that are worthy of dislike.
The epilogue of this story: I opined that propaganda was deliberate disinformation, usually on a campaign scale, which I found insulting, especially in light of the fact that I was not deliberately trying to mislead her. To which she responded, "You could have fooled me." At that point, I realized there was nothing further to discuss and stopped talking to her.
I still wonder, though--why is she still studying here? Why not study at a school in a country where the people don't spout propaganda and piss her off?
1 Comments:
She's here to practice being a professional victim...and in the fact that she's female and you double your chances for a permanently offended, suspicious, and not very pleasant person.
We have native professional resenters, too. Many on the *extreme* left are pro resenters. Say, Momma Sheehan, who basically wants America dissolved. Some of her rants are incredible. And Kennedy is getting there, but he's so far gone in his alcoholism that he's a lightweight (I mean in credibility, not his avoir dupois).
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