To Kill An American

[Bruce Cohen]

To Kill an American

You probably missed it in the rush of news last week, but there was
actually a report that someone in Pakistan had published in a newspaper an
offer of a reward to anyone who killed an American, any American.

So an Australian dentist wrote an editorial the following day to let
everyone know what an American is ... so they would know when they found one. (Good one, mate!!!!)

"An American is English, or French, or Italian, Irish, German, Spanish,
Polish, Russian or Greek. An American may also be Canadian, Mexican,
African, Indian, Chinese, Japanese, Korean, Australian, Iranian, Asian, or
Arab, or Pakistani or Afghan.

An American may also be a Comanche, Cherokee, Osage, Blackfoot, Navaho, Apache, Seminole or one of the many other tribes known as native
Americans.

An American is Christian, or he could be Jewish, or Buddhist, or Muslim.
In fact, there are more Muslims in America than in Afghanistan. The only
difference is that in America they are free to worship as each of them
chooses.

An American is also free to believe in no religion. For that he will
answer only to God, not to the government, or to armed thugs claiming to
speak for the government and for God.

An American lives in the most prosperous land in the history of the world.
The root of that prosperity can be found in the Declaration of
Independence , which recognizes the God given right of each person to the
pursuit of happiness.

An American is generous. Americans have helped out just about every other
nation in the world in their time of need, never asking a thing in return.

When Afghanistan was over-run by the Soviet army 20 years ago, Americans
came with arms and supplies to enable the people to win back their
country!

As of the morning of September 11, Americans had given more than any other nation to the poor in Afghanistan. Americans welcome the best of
everything...the best products, the best books, the best music, the best
food, the best services. But they also welcome the least.

The national symbol of America, The Statue of Liberty , welcomes your
tired and your poor, the wretched refuse of your teeming shores, the
homeless, tempest tossed. These in fact are the people who built America.

Some of them were working in the Twin Towers the morning of September 11, 2001 earning a better life for their families. It's been told that the
World Trade Center victims were from at least 30 different countries,
cultures, and first languages, including those that aided and abetted the
terrorists.

So you can try to kill an American if you must. Hitler did. So did
General Tojo, and Stalin, and Mao Tse-Tung, and other blood-thirsty
tyrants in the world. But, in doing so you would just be killing
yourself. Because Americans are not a particular people from a particular
place. They are the embodiment of the human spirit of freedom. Everyone
who holds to that spirit, everywhere, is an American.

God Bless America

Bruce

[DUD]

So True Bruce, Thanks, Bill

[gmack5]

Bruce, your friend forgot one thing.
You NEVER want to piss-off the american people, cause if you do, you won't survive for very long.

[Bruce Platt]

This is one more of these urban legends, it isn't true. Although it sounds nice.

check it out here:

http://www.snopes.com/rumors/america2.htm

[rickd]

seems to be a lot of this 'urban legend' stuff going around lately. the 'kill an american' article was actually published as follows:

Ferrara, Peter. "What Is An American?"
National Review 25 September 2001.

some joker decided to spread the story as written by an australian dentist instead of mr. ferrara who is an american and teaches at george mason university school of law in virginia.

does that change the substance of the article because of the trickery? i don't think so - one just has to remember it was written only 2 weeks after the 09/11 attack and emotions were pretty raw - not only in the u.s., but in many countries who consider america a good and loyal friend - inlcuding mine(canada).

[Hoyden]

legends

Too bad they can't just quote the person who wrote the article. It is good and very true.

[430752]

Yeah, but the underdog!

Hey, as american's we root for the underdogs and not the overdogs. I'm so confused now that we're the overdogs. Also, what will I do when Snopes.com jumps the shark and becomes too big for its britches?

curt j.

[monte]

Thanks for posting it Bruce.

[Bruce Cohen]

Fellow members,

When I received, "To Kill An American", the last thing that crossed my mind was if the attribution was correct or not.

To me, and I think . the rest of us, what's important is the message, and not who wrote it. As far as I'm concerned, it could have been wirtten by a serial killer or an Archbishop. It's the words that sure as H**l ring true and as far as I'm concerned, its about time someone verbalized what a lot of us (people who care about the USA) are really thinking and feeling.

I'm getting really d**n tired that a good part of the world blames us for everything from bad weather to every current misundering.

In fact, there are some European countries ( fill in the blank(s)) that would probably be speaking German if it wasn't for us. Trying to be the "Good Guy" to everyone on this planet really doesn't seem to work.

As for me, my thoughts are "if you can't appreciate our help, the screw you.

I realize that this an overly simplistic answer, but one just has to look at a lot of our country to realize that "Charity Begins at Home". For once, let's spend our, yes OUR money where it really counts and is appreciated.

I'm not saying that the U.S. is without faults, God knows we've made more than our fair share of mistakes. But in most cases, our hearts began in the right place.

I'm just sick and tired being the world's scapegoat and getting kicked in the teeth for this planets ills.

Sorry if this sounds angry, but unfortunately its meant to be.

No matter who was the writer of the "American" piece, it conveys a lot of our feelings and although it was correct to point out the attribution error, does it really matter (except for not giving our Canadian brothers credit).

I see this country trying not to offend others who couldn't care less (for the most part) about what we say and do, except for propaganda reasons.

I could go on for at least another hour, but I'm late for work. Yes Americans do work, and not spend their time thinking up ways to bomb stuff and blame it on us.

Major league pissed-off,

Bruce

[jhart]

Amen!!! I'm with you Bruce. It's a crazy world right now.

[onedash]

It doesn't bother me to much what other countries say or think. Hatred is taught. If you were brought up to hate something its hard to change your mind espcially if the majority feels the same way. MOst is based on lies anbd propaganda but they don't know for sure. When Marines went in to Okinawa, the locals killed themselves en mass because they thought Marines were going to rape and torture them.
What bothers me is Americans that are so full of hate for their own country. Sure they are free to disagree and hate everything about it but if it bothers them so much why don't they move somewhere where they have no freedom and can not disagree with their government. Then at least they have a good reason to be mad. I just don't know why so many liberals have become so extreme and what they hope to accomplish other than disagree with our President no matter what he says or does.

[Russianwolf]

Please stop!

This is getting way to political of a topic, which goes against the policies of this forum. Look up at the top of this page.

[Bruce Platt]

I agree, going way into unchartered territory.

Bruce pointed out that the attribution doesn't matter, but it becomes more opinion than fact when presented in an untrue light.

[stewchi]

I am not sure we have crossed the line yet, no mention of foreign policies or administrations or political parties etc, mostly about perceptions between cultures. It is no coincidence that we are allied with other English speaking countries, we speak the same language which makes it easier to share cultures, which leads to understanding of cultures. Its the lack of cultural understanding that allows propaganda to thrive and misunderstandings to flourish. I have lived in non English speaking countries and gotten a glimpse of how others perceive the USA and its very enlightening. I also witnessed first hand several examples of what my Kiwi friends refer to as OTT Americans (Over The Top). I have seen American tourist be loud, obnoxious and occasionally offensive, but being an American I also recognized that it was with the best intention and they were trying to be interested or polite, but going about the wrong way. A few of these interaction and people will form an opinion of Americans. What many other countries also don’t realize is the vast diversity of Americans as the essay points out. Most countries are not diverse at all in race or religion or very large. And many oversees are often only exposed to certain types of Americans, those that can afford to travel oversees or part of a ministry etc. Or they have first hand knowledge but have only visited California or New York. My Luxembourgish friends had visited the US several times but only Los Angeles and the surrounding area, no offense to you Cali folks but I would not say that visiting LA gives a full and complete picture of what Americans are like. So now you have people all over the word with very different impression and experiences with Americans leading to more confusion and lack of understanding. Same thing goes for us, we all know at least a few people from other countries and collectively we form opinions on this, now we are free to debate them and my friends experience maybe different from you friends and therefore our solutions (Politics) will be different etc. To me the real problem is we get to much information about too many things we don’t know anything about that will never affect us and we form opinions about all of them or at least I do. I am never going to work in a West Virgina Coal mine, but I have opinions on what safety measures that should or shouldn’t be adopted, I will never get a subscription to a Dutch or Iranian newspaper but I have opinions on what they should or should not be printing, but yet I know nothing and have no opinion about my local school board or planning and zoneing committee or things that really affect me. It would be great if I learned from the media as much about my local school board as I know about the Iraqi interim government.
That’s what I like about this forum the real sensitive and emotional issues are kept at a respectable distance. I am glad we don’t talk about politics here and if this too close please delete it, because I for one get all my info though family, freinds and media which is all second, third, fourth hand etc and I am sure I am not getting the full story on anything but of course I have strong opinions on all of it the way everyone else does, and I would rather get spun up about what water heater is better or why non-“belivers” should not bad mouth HF.

Maybe Hank or Rod or some of the other folks from other countries could chime in a give a good perspective