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We are the Dead
Tuesday, February 19, 2002
By Anthony J. Aschettino
Researcher – Middle East Studies

It is not enough that the rest of the world obeys us. It is not enough that nobody is willing to challenge us. It has gone beyond that. It is now a matter of love. They must love us.

"Tell me, Winston - and remember, no lies; you know that I am always able to detect a lie - tell me, what are your true feelings toward Big Brother?"

"I hate him."

"You hate him. Good. Then the time has come for you to take the last step. You must love Big Brother. It is not enough to obey him; you must love him."
-- George Orwell’s 1984

If anything has happened to me personally since the events of September 11, it has been that my consumption of reading material has increased so drastically that it now rivals my consumption of food. At times I go hungry, yet I am never without a book or paper easily within an arms length. And if there is any book that never leaves my grasp, following me closely wherever I may be, it is 1984 by George Orwell. I suppose it would not be going too far to say that I have read this book at least a dozen times in the few months that have followed those horrific events.

But why mention this? Certainly, the book has a merit in that it stands on its own as one of the greatest pieces of literature of the 20th century. However the worries of Orwell are over, aren't they? Communism, the "evil empire" has crumbled like a house of cards. Capitalism and Democracy are spreading throughout the world, brought under the glorious banner of the United States of America. Whenever the forces of wrong have risen up, the United States has led the world in a courageous effort to smash this neo-fascism and restore the rule of the just. She has employed the concepts of jus bellum more nobly than any state before her. She stands as a power unmatched: any who contest her or try to attack her are met with swift, overwhelming power. As the Colossus once bestrode Rhodes, now she stands over all other nations as the greatest power the world has ever known in history.

You may wonder why I included the opening quote in this essay. I did so because if one could have pried into my mind, as O'Brien did to Winston, in the days after the United States started her unrelenting assault on Afghanistan it would have read like the above. Only one may replace "Big Brother" with "America." It is true that I am an American; there have been plenty of times when I have been proud of the way that my country has acted and the way that her people have risen to challenges almost unthinkable to most and yet swiftly conquered them. However, lately there has been a more sinister aspect to what we can best term "American neo-Imperialism." We are no longer merely satisfied with forcing states into submission. No, we now demand not only submission but also that the states love us, want us, look up to us.
(More: Islam-Online.net News Source)
2002 © Anthony J. Aschettino.

Dan