You Are Not To Be So Blind With Patriotism....

"You're not to be so blind with patriotism that you can't face reality. Wrong is wrong, no matter who does it or says it." Malcolm X

Today, June 7th 2006, marks the first anniversary of the London bombings that left 52 people dead and more than 700 people injured. In September, America will soon recognize the 5th anniversary of the 9/11 attacks, which killed more than 2,000 people in all.

Our days, our lives have been separated into pre-9/11 days and post 9/11 days. Sometimes many of us wish for simpler days. Those days which we could be oblivious and turn a blind eye to the suffering of others at the hands of terrorists. Those simpler days when we felt comfortable, safe, and complacent. When it was easy to turn our heads cause we didn't think something "like that" could happen "here." I'm sure many Brits feel the same way.

After 9/11, I was one of those people who jumped on the "oh hell yeah, bomb the hell outta them muthafuckas" bandwagon. I won't lie to you. Anger is perhaps the easiest emotion to feel. You don't have to tell yourself to feel angry. It just comes naturally. And it clouds your vision in red. And in our case, red, white, and blue. I had the flag in my clear school-supplied and sanctioned bookbag, on my window, and any other place I could put it. Me, the person who always made fun of black folks who sung the National Anthem with feeling. Me, the person who always vowed that I'd leave the U.S. as soon as I could. The last person who you'd thought would be patriotic was, all of a sudden, America's biggest patriot. "My country tis of theeeeeeeee, sweet land of libertyyyyyyyy. Of thee I singgggggggggg!"

Whatever.

It didn't take me long to be yanked back to Earth. I was snatched back to the reality. I was still black and America was still grand ole America.

However, as the time passed and I learned more and more about these extremists who had wreaked havoc on my country and my mind, I began to feel an emotion and come into a realization that I hadnt expected; I felt compassion and I realized that America was not blameless in this situation.

America is a big ole bully. Let's just be real. And what happens to bullies? They pick, and pick, and pick on people. They make peoples lives miserable. They laugh at the pain of others while reaping the benefits of their suffering. And then one day, they get a taste of their own medicine. Maybe its just one person. Maybe its a group of people who have planned and plotted. But they get a taste of their medicine and it often involves the taste of their own blood in their mouth. Maybe they stop bullying, or maybe they retaliate and reclaim their righteous place in the grand scheme of manifest destiny. But they never forget that day. They day when they were the victim.

America, for one day, tasted an ounce of the blood that we had forced other people to taste for a long time. England felt it too. A bit of the terror. A bit of the fear. Desperation. Confusion. Sadness. Whether we'd like to admit it or not, we created our attackers. We created them by attacking them economically, physically, and emotionally. We created them and then had the nerve to be shocked when they retaliated.

I remember sitting in a class with a woman whose son was stationed in Iraq. She was whispering to someone about how "those barbarians are cutting off people's heads over there." Of course, I understood that her emotions, sentiments, and language were probably being ruled by a sense of fear since her son was away from her and in a place of danger. However, I turned to her and said, "I'm going to be praying and hoping for your son's safe return. However, what 'those barbarians' are doing over there is no more barbaric than what America has done for centuries. We've exterminated whole ethnic groups for land. We've enslaved millions. Killed more in wars for resources that simply don't belong to us. Turned our heads through countless genocides because the victims had nothing to offer us. Spoke of equality to other nations while inequality still remained and remains in our laws. America is a blood-thirsty, greedy, money-hungry beast. We're the barbarians. All they're doing is mimicking us."

(Disturbingly, even as I was searching for the official death count of 9/11, I came across several sites that listed the numbers of the Americans who died. They hadn't added in the lives of "the foreigners" who also lost their lives. I often hear, on the news, when a disaster occurs, how many "Americans died." Americans think only of ourselves, and it's quite obvious and extremely inhumane.)

However, even out of my understanding for how people could be pushed to such limits and extremities, I have to fall back on an old cliché for my final answer. "Two wrongs dont make a right." Yes, America was/is/will be wrong. But to kill thousands of people, who were just doing their jobs, trying to feed their families, and living their lives, was heinous and inexcusable. I'd be willing to bet that many of those who died didn't vote for Bush, and didn't support the policies that created the terrorists who took their lives. I'd be willing to bet that many of those who died in England didn't approve of their country joining this current illegal war. These were innocent people. Just like those that America and England have killed were innocent. And why must innocent people shed their blood for crimes theyve never committed or condoned?

We, as conscious Americans and Britons must speak out against the wrongs that our countries' are guilty of committing. Shaking our heads when Bush tells lies is not enough. Not voting for the next flunky in line is not enough. Bitching and moaning on Myspace about "big brother" is not enough. We must speak OUT and ACT. For the right reasons and for some selfish reasons. The right reason being that we should never stand for our government's mistreating others. We should never condone that or turn a blind eye. All of us could've easily been born somewhere else in another time and place. Wouldn't we want someone to hear our voices? Stand up for us? The selfish reason being that we have seen what happens when we stand idly by while our countries' rape others and we all profit from the spoils. People, quite expectantly, get pissed and they get even. This is basic human behavior.

I've never been a person who believes in utopias, but I certainly wish for a day when people respect the lives and wellbeing of others. Simply because they're people.