'Death to America'

The hypocrisy of the anti-west brigade

I recently came across a website called the Islamic Pulse. It was full of fun stuff and pearls of wisdom, but I was particularly interested in a video labelled ‘People everywhere are chanting Death to America’ with the following copy:

“Revolutionary spoken word from a sister, accompanied with thought-provoking graphics. Imam Khamenei has said: ‘Death to America’ means Death to Trump, John Bolton and Pompeo’. People are globally burning the American flag, calling out for an end to the global tyranny and pointing the finger of blame and shame at the vile American regime. The slogan which unites us all is “Death To America”.

The girl in the video goes on to say ‘death to America’ a lot—with a lovely poetic voiceover that mentioned all the horrible, ‘war mongering’ things that the US has supposedly done, and at one stage calls for, of course, death to America, with accompanying graphics labelling the US ‘capitalistic, militarised, racist, barbaric, satanic’, and last, and probably least offensive in this list, ‘dangerous’. This lovely girl then goes on to say the solution is the total removal of the system we know as America (didn’t know America was a system—but I digress), then there as some wonderful AI assisted images of American landmarks exploding into oblivion.

Let’s face it, the faceless girl behind this propaganda video is not alone. What was once almost universally condemned by almost all corners of United States, the burning of the American flag, is now happening with impunity at protests every other day in multiple states. And the US is not alone, the Australian flag is burning in Australia, Swedish flags are burning in Sweden and so on. Social media commentators like Clementine Ford who thinks anyone who doesn’t agree with her is a ‘right-wing fascist’ while making a living in a free country selling her averagely written books, calls for the destruction of our current society, which always makes me wonder, what do they intend to replace a democratic society with?

Pro-Palestinian protester burns American flag in NYC, some chant ‘death to America’

If the ‘Death to America’ video on the Islamic Pulse video are anything to go by, you would assume they would prefer Sharia Law. I’m not sure about you, but I would take Capitalism any day over being forced to wear a Burqa, being told who I have to marry when I start menstruating, being beaten by my husband if I don’t obey, not being allowed to refuse sex and a plethora of other Islamic patriarchal medieval laws.

I find it interesting that ‘racism’ is mentioned, like it’s only an issue in the evil West. In countries like Egypt and Jordan you see billboard after billboard with images of women with fair skin, blue eyes, and Eurocentric features. Racism is, and always has been, deeply ingrained into Arab communities. Racism and Xenophobia in the Arab community doesn’t stop at anti-blackness, the racial bias includes South Asians, Europeans, Jews, Americans, non-muslims, the wrong types of muslims, and a gender apartheid that is so heavily entrenched in the cultural hegemony, that most women don’t know they are being oppressed.

In the video she called America barbaric, really? Barbaric is marrying girls off in their teens, performing genital mutilation, punishing women because they have shamed the family honour by going and getting themselves raped. Barbaric is the Pakistani grooming gangs in the UK, or the Islamic State’s genocide of the Yazidis characterised by massacres, genocidal rape and forced conversion to Islam, or the 276 Chibok schoolgirls taken by the terrorist group Boko Haram, punished for daring to seek an education The girls endured forced marriages, religious coercion and physical and sexual violence at the hands of their captors—to this day around 100 are still missing. How about the barbarism of the Palestinians slaughtering entire families in their homes, still in their pyjamas, then gang raping a girl while stabbing her in the back with a knife when she screamed, inserting nails into women’s vaginas and slicing off their breasts? I think it would prefer the barbarism of my barista getting my pronoun wrong any day.

What small minded people like Ford seem to gloss over, is living in a democratic country affords us a list of freedoms. The right to vote, the right to protest, freedom of speech, freedom of education, and a judicial system that will support your right to equality. If the government currently in power is not to your liking, it means that the majority of your countries citizens don’t agree with you. Are western countries perfect? Of course not, humans are not perfect—but a free and open society gives you the opportunity to speak your mind, write, object, join a political party, move to a different state, change jobs, the list is endless.

Now to my personal favourite from the video list, ‘satanic’. Now poor old Satan gets a bad rap in my humble opinion. One of my favourite organisations in the USA is ‘The Satanic Temple’ who’s logo tagline is ‘empathy, reason, advocacy’—no arguments from me so far!

“The Mission Of The Satanic Temple Is To Encourage Benevolence And Empathy, Reject Tyrannical Authority, Advocate Practical Common Sense, Oppose Injustice, And Undertake Noble Pursuits.”

Some of the exemplary work they have done includes publicly confronting hate groups, fighting for the abolition of corporal punishment in public schools, pushing back through legal means the religious installations on public property, fighting for bodily autonomy, exposing quacks in mental health care and as well as offering support groups for those struggling with addiction. Sign me up!

Maybe Ford and the anti-west brigade would prefer to live under a system of communism, fascism, dictatorship, totalitarianism or anarchy? Those regimes have gone well in the past! Maybe Ford in all her “Kill all Men'“ wisdom and political experience has a better idea of how to set up a society other than with a system of fair voting? If so, I haven’t heard it yet.

If America, Australia, Canada, Europe are so bad, why are there more immigrants trying to enter the west than every before? With wars and economic and social instability in many parts of the Middle Eastern and North Africa, the number of immigrants has been on the rise, growing nearly three times as fast between 2010 and 2022. Job opportunities, access to healthcare, social services, housing, education are all considerably improved from the countries they are leaving—so why leave a country for a better life, then hate the country that has afforded you that opportunity?

So I am going to start a new movement, the ‘I love my Country—if you don’t you are welcome to leave’ movement. You are all invited to join my movement, there will be no blockades, no student encampments that restricts the learning of others, no violent protests, no calling for the annihilation of others and definitely no bullshit allowed. We can change the world one adult conversation at a time. We can share research, recommend podcasts, listen to each other, offer solutions to problems, hell, we can even start up our own political party—why? Because we live in a beautiful mother fucking democratic country!