Letters to the Editor
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A desperate time produced better people.
A life of sipping cappucino and making hateful remarks about one's readers does not make an incisive political commentator. Or a TV critic, for that matter. Ms. Havrilesky, you may wish to learn from the example of Dennis Miller, another soul who was so full of himself that he thought he could tackle politics willy-nilly without danger. He's so despised by his former fans that only George Bush can love him, and that is a fate I wouldn't wish upon anyone, even you.
Interesting that in this column, the mockery of present-day Americans - apparently you're saying we're not French, so we're crap - segues into a discussion of Ken Burns's World War II project, the one instance in the twentieth century that showed how good Americans could be in a crisis. Which is why that war keeps returning in our popular culture; there hasn't been a decade since the 1940's where it hasn't been the setting of popular movies or TV shows. Even before A&E (formerly "The All-Hitler Channel" before the spin-off of The History Channel) produced endless documentaries about airplanes and secret weapons, CBS's The Twentieth Century ran hours of Allied and Axis footage. Not to mention fiction shows like Combat! and Twelve O'Clock High.
One reason why that time is so compelling is that people really risked their lives in that war. Men who had starved in the Great Depression, some with almost no reading ability and no comprehension of cappucino or brie, stepped in front of Nazi bullets to die for something greater than themselves. And that's the real difference between them and the people of the present day, who don't think there can be anything greater than themselves. (A point that was made perfectly well by Bill Maher in his bin Laden book.)
Those Americans were better than the SUV-driving, mall-shopping, and (yes!) cappucino-swilling dodos in this land today. And maybe if people are reminded of that, through documentaries, they might become better themselves.
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I love Heather
I rise to defend Heather. I am impressed at how she captures the zeitgeist so deftly. You go girl.
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@polly
You still make me laugh. This time, though, I sense a little ironic jujitsu. Some responses to your article expound on how stupid we Americans really are. No surprise, no ironic twist, just dull.
No, the jujitsu is that you sucker some people into demanding that not every American loves gw, fried food, and wet naps. They then give a little vignette to differentiate themselves from the stereotype. This, as per your plan, unbalances them (further). Still, you don't cleverly snap them down. No, the best techniques encourage people to throw themselves to the cobbles. Which many do in other threads by painting all republicans/conservatives/christians with the same broad brush and assuming complete homogenization. Then one day, when the irony thumps into their perception, they'll curse you. Well taught, sensei.
Hey, what ever happened to terry colon?
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'completely mediocre'?
So let me get this straight - Stanford, Harvard, Yale, MIT and Princeton - not up to snuff. John D. Rockefeller, Frank Lloyd Wright, Thomas Edison, Henry Ford - totally mediocre. Venus and Serena Williams and Tiger Woods -just average, their wins are just what, given in the spirit of goodwill for their mediocrity? Jonas Salk would get a "C" in your book? Edith Wharton and Mark Twain and Walt Whitman should have be mid-listers? And you really believe, really truly believe, that all the people who play jazz and R&B and soul and have influenced generations of musicians worldwide are just, yawn, not very good. Mediocre, really.
It's ignorant to say that Americans are completely mediocre - or completely great or completely bad. No population is completely anything - that's sloppy thinking and lazy speech. No country can paint its people accurately or fairly with a single brush stroke.
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Thank You
Thank you, Sandra M. Well said!
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Generalizations are such a bitch...
>Those Americans were better than the SUV-driving, mall-shopping, and (yes!) cappucino-swilling dodos in this land today.<
Yeah, they were all about women and non-whites having equal opportunities. And they were all about individuality instead of conformity--and later on forcing everyone to live up to the 50's ideal of kinder/kuche and white-bread suburbia. And any number of WWII veterans thought those "drugged-up, screwed-up" Vietnam veterans were "real" soldiers. Suurrrrre...
>And maybe if people are reminded of that, through documentaries, they might become better themselves.<
Maybe--if "The Greatest Generation" hadn't been used by Bush and "I love my authoritarian daddeh" jerks like Tim Russert to denigrate every generation since. :P Comparisons like yours are ridiculous, for people of every era face different challenges. As well, isn't one of the reasons people succeed in America is so that their kids can have it easier than they did? Then, why blame the kids for supposedly being "soft?" For all the problems kids don't have to deal with today, there are just as many more contemporary ones that they do.
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Odd
Ms. Havrilesky,
Why do you prostrate yourself in front of every pretentious, posturing pseudo-intellectual in Europe and elsewhere? Your loathing of the US seems pathological.
Many facets of our culture (movies, television programs, music, clothing style, food, language) are adopted by freely-thinking and freely-acting consumers throughout Europe (and the world for that matter); do you believe those people are "dumb"?
By your logic, the very fact that these folks are not American should bestow them with a magical touch of worldly enlightenment which would steer them from anything American. This must drive you insane; which could explain your latest installment.
Americans are dumb and like fried food, fresh and bold commentary
Today was the first time I read the "I Like to Watch" section. I thought it was meant to be a movie/television review. I hope the content doesn't prove as lazy and tiresome in the future or I'll avoid it.
Also, Heather, I assume you spend time in France and I assume you truly enjoy the country. But I must ask, do you enjoy MDMA with your cafe and croissant each morning you wake there. Your section on French lifestyle was weird.
P.S. Salon, please keep publishing infuriating and intelligent Leftist news and opinion; it offers some of us much-appreciated balance. However, I think you're better than Ms. Havrilesky's silliness.