[ExI] LA Times: Rehabbing militants in Saudi Arabia (Meta)

[Stefano Vaj]

On 12/29/07, Gary Miller <aiguy at comcast.net> wrote:
> I agree 100% Eugene, but how about we don't wait until we're 10 or 15 posts
> into it and only the anti-American sentiments have been expressed.
>
> Such one-sidedness creates a strong impression in the reader and potential
> donor's mind that such topics are allowed as long as they are sufficiently
> Anti-American.  And that by presenting a counterpoint that they are subject
> to ridicule or moderation. Intelligent reasonable disagreement does not
> require ridicule and aggression.

As a relativist, I think that expecting or demanding Americans to be
anti-American (or unAmerican, as senator McCarty liked to put it)
would be naive and stupid.

On the other hand, I am always surprised how many Americans -
including and perhaps above all the American "Left" - blindly believe
in their Manifest Destiny and "moral superiority by definition".

In other terms, there is nothing wrong in the fact that the US, and
their citizens, try to look after their interests as well as they can,
or are fond of their identity and constitutional system and way of
life. This is why their fathers emigrated there in the first place,
after all.

Only, they cannot and should not expect other peoples to do and to be
any different in this respect, be they Chinese, Muslim, or...
European.

And in any event, I would expect from transhumanists anywhere in the
world some higher-than-average ability to put things into perspective.
Especially since identities and old-style political splits are going
to be profoundly redefined by any kind of posthuman change.

Stefano Vaj