Fans For Peace Book Club
September 2003 - Why Do People Hate America?
By Ziauddin Sardar and Merryl Wyn Davies

What do you think are the three most important points in this book?

Ellie | Zuzana | Rose | Rockin' Robin | Judy
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If what the book says is true about the WTO, then I think that it is one of the biggest causes of "hatred" and distrust towards America. There are places in the book where it speaks of the WTO putting small businesses in other countries out of business, causing the country to go into further poverty, leaving it majorly in debt, and with no way to pay the debt off. Now if that's not a reason to have angst towards America, I don't know what is. The WTO is a worldwide organization and affects many countries, with the US being mainly in charge of it. Imagine you're a small country in South America, and you produce some crop that the United States wants. The WTO steps in and before you know it, you're having to pay more for what you grow in the first place. Your family is moving to already overpopulated cities to find work so they can survive. Now imagine someone steps up and decides that they've had enough. Maybe it won't be as organized to declare war on the US, but think of how many people you would be able to convince that America is "evil".
--Ellie

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reason no .1: AROGANCE .. Well, when I came here I felt so small because of people telling me how great America is and that there is no better country in the world. You know what ,it made me so sad and at times it still does. Who are americans to tell foreign people that their little country is not worth anything.

reason no 2: LACK OF EDUCATION AND COMMON SENSE .. let me explain.. Again , people asking me if I know what a washing machine is or how to work an iron, if we have a vacuum cleaner home. Excuse me but we are not living on the trees you know. It gets me so angry. How country so big has no clue about the outside world reality.
Another example is the geography matter, why is the majority of americans placing Czech Republic next to Afganistan ,Pakistan and Czecznia . Well, I mean I do not expect you to know everything but if I am not sure I just say it and ask for an explanation . That's how it should be right cause nobody is perfect.

reason no .3 TO RULE THE WORLD
This is probably the hardest one for me to see how people here are living in either uncounted wealth or just unbelievable poverty, nothing in between ,that's what is going to cause major fiasco soon in my opinon . Anyway, the administration of this country is trying to sort out the world's problems, I mean the Iraq war , fighting in Czecznia and Bosnia but there is so much to be done in your own neigborhood you know. Let's just fix that first. People in other counties know how to handle their problems ,after all they 've been living in it !!!
--Zuzana

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America and it's people suffer severely from "knowledgeable ignorance" especially towards Islam and Muslims... we "think" they are a certain way because we really don't "know" or understand them or their beliefs... we just compare what we do "know" or "perceive" to ourselves and rank them as "different" which is incorrectly assumed as being "bad"

America "preys" upon weaker and developing countries by imposing unnecessary and unfair trade sanctions, which increase the poverty levels of those countries... the resources of the world essentially belong to us, and those that do not as of yet, soon will...
"This predatory behaviour not only deprives people of what is rightly theirs, but could also have devastating consequences for their future."

America abuses its "power" by trying to control others and force them to see that a "free" democratic society is best... instead of minding our own business, we send in our troops to bring "order" to what we consider to be a chaotic situation, when in fact we are creating chaos by dissarming their governments and forcing democracy on them... we do not know enough about these people to try to rebuild their governments, and are probably doing more harm than good.
"The problem is that America's behaviour, its insistence to be free to do as it chooses, is not only placing serious constraints on the freedom of others to choose their own way of life - it is actually placing their very survival in jeopardy."

One final note... picking just THREE important points from this book was extremely difficult... I am also in agreement that America has a horribly blind self-perception... and until we see ourselves as others do, we will continue to have the rest of the world in a love/hate relationship with us....
--Rose

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1. Wealth and power lose thier value when they are used irresponsibly, which I believe America has done in the past and continues to do today. It's made us look like the "bully on the playground" for far too long.

2. Americans need to educate themselves. Americans need to understand ALL the reasons why we are hated. In the book the authors published the results of a poll that stated that 90% of all Americans believed that the reason we are hated so much is because of our wealth and power. While I believe that there is some truth to that I think it's a pretty superficial answer. I think most Americans believe that because they don't know any better or don't care to find out what the real reasons are. I think the authors referred to this as "knowledgeable ignorance".

3. "Stereotypes make hating easy"....that is a direct quote from the book and when I read it it really stuck in my head because of how true it is. Because Americans are bombarded everyday with images and news stories coming from the Middle East of people killing and bombing and screaming in the streets I think Americans get the wrong image of Arabs and Muslims...."ah, they're all religious fanatics". Not true. And it's also not true that most Americans are self-absorbed, superficial, vain, money hungry, war mongering people. But I'll bet if you read foreign newspapers and watched their news that's how we appear right? We all need to get past the images and remember that we are ALL human beings with the same wants and needs no matter where we live.

Well that's my take on it. I just want to add that for all our fuck-ups, warts and pimples...I LOVE AMERICA. There is no place on this earth that I would rahter live. And I love that I can come to this message board and say whatever I want.
--Rockin' Robin

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1. We are hated because of our freedom. We are free to speak out against what we feel is wrong and not have to worry about being killed for doing so.

2. We are hated because other countries feel are country is trying to americanize other countries. We are hated because americans are greedy.Not all are greedy,but that the way it sounds.We are a powerful country.

3. We are hated because are country wants controll of oil.We inpose sanctions on countries if they don't do just what the American Goverment wants them to.We are hated because we interfer where we are not wanted. In all reality we are hated because are Goverment wants every country to be like america.
--Judy

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