Agh, I can't resist Howard Zinn!
Feb. 19th, 2004 03:24 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
prof_pangaeaI really need to focus on this essay so I can just get it done with, but I can't help but post this little bit from his essay, "The Problem is Civil Obedience":
But America is different. That is what we've all been brought up on. From the time we are this high -- you tick off one, two three, four, five lovely things about America that we don't want disturbed very much.
But if we have learned anything in the past ten years, it is that these lovely things about America were never lovely. We have been expansionist and aggressive and mean to other people from the beginning. And we've been aggressive and mean to people in this country, and we've allocated the wealth of this country in a very unjust way. We've never had justice in the courts for the poor people, for black people, for radicals. Now how can we say that America is a very special place? It is not that special. It really isn't.
But America is different. That is what we've all been brought up on. From the time we are this high -- you tick off one, two three, four, five lovely things about America that we don't want disturbed very much.
But if we have learned anything in the past ten years, it is that these lovely things about America were never lovely. We have been expansionist and aggressive and mean to other people from the beginning. And we've been aggressive and mean to people in this country, and we've allocated the wealth of this country in a very unjust way. We've never had justice in the courts for the poor people, for black people, for radicals. Now how can we say that America is a very special place? It is not that special. It really isn't.
