I feel like I don't know how to go about this reflection since the format of class was radically different from our other classes. In addition, this was the first piece of social science that we read. It wasn't about time travel to the end of the world or colonizing the Moon. Stephanson presented us with some of the basic U.S. history we learned in high school and then some. In Prof PTJ's reflection, he noted how none of the groups took on the entire claim, instead focusing on specific parts. I'm still not sure whether I think Stephanson's claim was right, but I do believe that it does conform to the way we think. Manifest destiny has become common sense as Kristen mentioned in her reflection. I think it has sunk into the American mindset to the point that we are unaware of it today until an outsider (like Stephanson) brings it to our attention. Also I think the average American won't challenge history, since America has typically been on the side of writing history.
As to why the class didn't disprove Stephanson's claim, I blame the Macbooks. By the end of class I was certain that a Mac was never meant for me. How do you play Minesweeper without a right-click?
Showing posts with label Manifest Destiny. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Manifest Destiny. Show all posts
Tuesday, February 12, 2008
Sunday, February 10, 2008
Reflection on 2/5
I have been pondering this post for a while now, and I am sad to admit I still have not come up with anything especially insightful to say. I think the format of Tuesday's class threw me off a little. For some reason I had a hard time getting my head around evaluating Stephanson's claims, at least not in the improvisational internet manner. It would be one thing to study speeches, opinion pieces, and articles in search of a trend supporting or disputing his claim, but the brief internet searching bothered me a little. Especially given the ease with which I could alter Wikipedia (My little chunk is now gone, so someone did fix the page). I do think Stephanson's piece has opened my eyes to just how disturbing our rhetoric must seem to other countries. It's hard to reason with people who believe themselves predestined to Global Congquest (or, at least Global Conquest light). Especially if we consider just how much the claims of Manifest Destiny mirror the claims of the Borg, again, the ideas we spread may be different, but our methods and rhetoric are exactly the same as the Borg.
Tuesday, February 5, 2008
Reflections on Class Discussion 2/5
While the discussion in class was nice I felt that something was overlooked. I will agree Manifest Destiny is mainly American, however it has existed in humanity for much longer than the term was coined. I'll go back to the beginning when man's most prized possession was land. Countries in Europe and elsewhere went through constant struggles over land, religion, and everything else war could fall under. When man has shelter, man feels safe. In order to be safe one must know enemies, or "others" are far away. The best way to do this is to increase the space between you and your neighbor by acquiring land. Why else did castles have trenches filled with alligators? Germany wasn't a united country until Bismarck came around, and before that it was nothing but over 100+ principalities in constant land-grab struggles. On religion, Europe went on numerous Crusades to try and reclaim the holy land. I feel what we defined as Manifest Destiny is a universal trait, not solely American but not truly universal.
Professor Jackson mentioned when my group was looking for counterpoints to Manifest Destiny, as described by Stephanson, that it is hard to argue against something dubbed as common sense. Why did manifest destiny become common sense? We all know that the whole thing centered around going from coast-to-coast. Yet again, Americans wanted more land, and who wouldn't with the "savage" Native Americans, the British to the north, the Spanish to the south, and the French to the west. America fought numerous wars with all, and what better way to legitimize war with "aggressive" neighbors than by creating a mandate from God to expand West. We found some data showing that not all Americans bought the idea, but the masses still did.
Professor Jackson mentioned when my group was looking for counterpoints to Manifest Destiny, as described by Stephanson, that it is hard to argue against something dubbed as common sense. Why did manifest destiny become common sense? We all know that the whole thing centered around going from coast-to-coast. Yet again, Americans wanted more land, and who wouldn't with the "savage" Native Americans, the British to the north, the Spanish to the south, and the French to the west. America fought numerous wars with all, and what better way to legitimize war with "aggressive" neighbors than by creating a mandate from God to expand West. We found some data showing that not all Americans bought the idea, but the masses still did.
Manifest Destiny
Even though it was considerably shorter, Manifest Destiny wasn't as quick a read as The Moon is a Harsh Mistress because it was full of historical detail. But I had more fun reading this than my U.S. history textbook in high school, so that's a plus. Stephanson did a good job condensing American history into 130 pages. There were the characters we knew like Theodore Roosevelt and Andrew Jackson and then the men I've never heard of before, like O'Sullivan who coined the phrase "manifest destiny." I never thought of manifest destiny going beyond the wild West in the 1840s, so it was interesting how Stephanson covered all the way through the Cold War.
Every American schoolchild knows that the colonies were formed by those fleeing religious persecution. After the American Revolution, the idea of church separate from state seemed to push religion out of my mind when thinking of politics. I never thought of America as a Protestant nation until reading this book where Stephanson gives numerous examples of politicians and presidents using religion to influence politics.
Also I thought it was interesting how during the Cold War we turned to "containment," the opposite of expansionism. If American couldn't expand, then they weren't going to let the USSR either. This idea of containment emerged out of the belief that the Soviet Union needed to expand to survive (123). But this was not the case, because expanding only increased tensions in the multi-ethnic empire. America assumed that it's rival superpower was similar to itself in that a growing empire has more confidence and feels righteous. However, there could not be two chosen lands so America had to point to the Soviets and say "You're wrong, we're right."
Every American schoolchild knows that the colonies were formed by those fleeing religious persecution. After the American Revolution, the idea of church separate from state seemed to push religion out of my mind when thinking of politics. I never thought of America as a Protestant nation until reading this book where Stephanson gives numerous examples of politicians and presidents using religion to influence politics.
Also I thought it was interesting how during the Cold War we turned to "containment," the opposite of expansionism. If American couldn't expand, then they weren't going to let the USSR either. This idea of containment emerged out of the belief that the Soviet Union needed to expand to survive (123). But this was not the case, because expanding only increased tensions in the multi-ethnic empire. America assumed that it's rival superpower was similar to itself in that a growing empire has more confidence and feels righteous. However, there could not be two chosen lands so America had to point to the Soviets and say "You're wrong, we're right."
Manifest Destiny
I thought that Manifest Destiny was a very insightful book. However, after finishing, I wanted to read a postscript from the author written now. It seems to me that events over the last ten years have completely invalidated his claim that a sense of American destiny is in jeopardy. Before the final chapter, I often found myself thinking that really all that was needed for his quotations from the 19th century to be coming from politicians of today was some slight political correcting, and the substitution of "democracy" for "anglo-saxon empire." While our current democracy spreading endeavors are couched in much prettier language with regards to those we are interested in converting, it amounts, in my opinion, to much the same thing. We are now in an age of ideological expansionism as far as the US is concerned.
Outside of that I found several things in the book disturbing, although not necessarily new. Some of the rhetoric Stephanson quoted was disturbingly close to German rhetoric pre-WWII. The section that really stood out to me was on pg. 81; where the "extinction for the inferior races" was referred to as "God's final and complete solution." While the term "final solution" obviously didn't have the same connotations in the 19th century as it does, reading the phrase coming from an American statesman was really disturbing. Also, I found the comparison of American patriotism to a religion, again while not necessarily new, very insightful, especially in light of our current mission of democratization, as well as the puritanical and protestant roots of the concept of manifest destiny
Outside of that I found several things in the book disturbing, although not necessarily new. Some of the rhetoric Stephanson quoted was disturbingly close to German rhetoric pre-WWII. The section that really stood out to me was on pg. 81; where the "extinction for the inferior races" was referred to as "God's final and complete solution." While the term "final solution" obviously didn't have the same connotations in the 19th century as it does, reading the phrase coming from an American statesman was really disturbing. Also, I found the comparison of American patriotism to a religion, again while not necessarily new, very insightful, especially in light of our current mission of democratization, as well as the puritanical and protestant roots of the concept of manifest destiny
We are the Borg...Resistance is futile.
It occurred to me about halfway through the book that the American destinarian determinism Stephenson describes, this inevitability of the spread of Anglo-Saxon civilization (Manifest Destiny if you prefer) is essentially the philosophy of the Borg. Much like the Borg American's have historically presumed that ourselves, our civilization, and our ideas, will prevail. The Borg have a certain nonchalant, matter of fact, attitude about the whole thing "resistance is futile" you may not be completely assimilated today, but eventually you will. This is the idea of manifest destiny, resistance to the spread of Americanism is futile you will be assimilated. There are numerous ways we come to this conclusion from rationalized social Darwinism to simply believing it is the will of god, but ultimately we believe that _________(insert current label for the ideal American trait here) will prevail.
Also like the Borg we make two interesting assumptions. The first is that we assume everyone wants to be assimilated. The Borg seem to figure that they are in such an ideal state of existence, that the way they live their lives is so much better than everyone else that everyone want to become part of the collective (oops, did I say Borg, I meant Americans). The second is that all other ways of living are inferior to our/the borg's way of existence. This ties in closely with the above idea, but the key is that this makes up for those groups who do not want to be conquered, allowing us to force ourselves upon them because they are essentially "children" and don't really know what they want.
I have to thank Dr. Jackson and the class for this insight. I have seen a huge number of political parallels in Star Trek, but had I not read this book with science fiction in mind this one may never have occurred to me. By giving the Borg a different ideology and making them the bad guys we are separated from them, there is no direct accusation of the US in the Borg's expansionist ideas, but the means and pretexts they use are essentially the same, destroying entire people's without even realizing the harm they are causing is essentially an American Ideal.
Also like the Borg we make two interesting assumptions. The first is that we assume everyone wants to be assimilated. The Borg seem to figure that they are in such an ideal state of existence, that the way they live their lives is so much better than everyone else that everyone want to become part of the collective (oops, did I say Borg, I meant Americans). The second is that all other ways of living are inferior to our/the borg's way of existence. This ties in closely with the above idea, but the key is that this makes up for those groups who do not want to be conquered, allowing us to force ourselves upon them because they are essentially "children" and don't really know what they want.
I have to thank Dr. Jackson and the class for this insight. I have seen a huge number of political parallels in Star Trek, but had I not read this book with science fiction in mind this one may never have occurred to me. By giving the Borg a different ideology and making them the bad guys we are separated from them, there is no direct accusation of the US in the Borg's expansionist ideas, but the means and pretexts they use are essentially the same, destroying entire people's without even realizing the harm they are causing is essentially an American Ideal.
Sunday, February 3, 2008
Manifest Destiny
I found Manifest Destiny a really good read. It wasn't as exciting as the other two, but being the history buff I am, I enjoyed it nonetheless. I had always known about the heavy undertones of the Puritans, but Stephanson does a great job pointing them out, along with the Manifest Destiny aura that continues somewhat to this days. I guess I have just been taking history as it is, and not really thinking critically or about the religious significance of certain things. Seeing how America is as separated from religion as possible I never thought about the religious fervor of our founders. I also renewed my reasons why I don't like Andrew Jackson, but that's just me.
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