Note: long post, but I think this has great relevance to understanding who hates Bush, and why!

See this thread for discussion leading up to this one.

----------------

See this page for a good summary of liberal and conservative approaches, in general.

I don't think all conservatives or liberals are mean-spirited, but to the extent that either group has become strongly attached to its ideology, you will find strong emotions. Ann Coulter on the Right is about the same as Michael Moore on the Left. Don't expect to find much truth from either.

But now I will tell you where I think the hatred of Bush is coming from, and I have hinted above: it is from liberals who are strongly attached to their ideology. Put even more succinctly, it is in liberals who are infected with what the Spiral Dynamics people call the Mean Green Meme.

I know what the MGM is like; from 1978-84, I had a bad infection of it. Then one day, during a break from a workshop I was giving, this elderly nun who worked with the homeless told me she was voting for Reagan instead of Mondale because she thought his optimistic attitude had turned the country around and she thought things were improving all around. She said she felt good about being an American again, and that it had been a long time since she felt that way. I couldn't believe it, but it was as though I had somehow "snapped out of it" and my brain began to work right again. Maybe Reagan wasn't the monster that the National Catholic Reporter had made him out to be! Maybe providing social services wasn't the most important thing for a President to do? Then what? And did I love my country? No. I felt guilty about being an American. It hadn't always been that way. In my younger years, I was proud to be an American, but I had lost that. Viet Nam, Watergate, Jimmy Carter's negativity, anti-American Catholic social justice advocates, the NCR, etc. . . they had soured me on my country. I have, happily, moved on . . .

- - -

Understanding the Mean Green Meme will entail a somewhat general understanding of Spiral Dynamics. Do a search on this board and you'll find plenty of info. The web page I cited has some info as well. I think we can all understand the attitudes of the MGM, however. I'll violate my rule about not posting long quotes here, as it seems to be from a BB rather than a copyrighted pub. It's worth the read as you can see how a MGM would hate Bush. I'll highlight the significant parts in bold for skimmers.

Note that the Green meme itself is healthy: the realization that everything exists and functions contextually is profound, and the desire to honor other cultures instead of annihilating them with military might (Red-Blue) or buying them out (Orange) is compassionate.

However, Green walks a perilous balance. All of the other prior memes make value judgements based on an implicit, unstated absolute that is assumed to be universal. Blue makes value judgements based on whether or not something agrees with its theology, because after all who wouldn't want to be a part of this religion ("No Jesus, No Peace")? Orange makes value judgements based on whether or not something turns a profit or is logically valid, because after all who wouldn't want to be rich?

Now Green comes along and says that none of the prior bases for value judgements are in fact absolute. This is really really new, and in and of itself is a Good Thing, an amazing insight. Green realizes that people and cultures are different enough that, when one tries to impose its truth upon another, only carnage results. More specifically, Green is the first meme that even thinks of this as carnage. The term "Cultural Genocide" doesn't make any sense to anybody but a Green -- Red sees its neighbors primarily as target practice, Blue values other cultures only inasmuch as they are potential converts, and Orange doesn't care what you believe as long as you buy, buy, buy.

On an international scale, Green is very sensitive to anything remotely resembling imperialism. We've all heard the litany from those opposing the war on Iraq; the U.S. is just being an imperialist bully. However, Green's desire for equality and diversity can go too far, becoming pathological and destructive. The desire to promote diversity and create equality can be perverted into an ideology that attempts to reduce everything and everyone to the lowest common denominator. (Ken Wilber, a prominent philosopher in consciousness studies, calls this the "mean green meme", or "MGM".) This means (among other things) that successful, powerful nations like the U.S. must be deconstructed, and poor, "victimized" nations like Iraq must be propped up; the "playing field" must be leveled in the interests of diversity. The MGM becomes trapped in a vicious retro-Romanticism, glorifying the nobility of (for example) the "Arab Traditionalist" culture -- never mind that that Red/Blue culture exhibits all the typical Red/Blue problems, stuff that Green would never tolerate in its own culture!

In short: since the U.S. and (to a lesser extent) Europe are the most powerful cultures on the planet today, the MGM typically assumes a very simple mantra: Everything Western is bad, everything non-Western is good.

The WTC attack initially threw the MGM into a tough bind. If everything non-Western is good, and everything Western is bad, then how come a non-Western society had just done something really, well, BAD? The only answer that the MGM could offer is that the attack must be the West's fault. The attackers, whom most people would call murdering scum, were in fact justified in their hatred of the U.S. You even had a radical fringe claiming that al Quaeda was not responsible, the whole thing was set up by the FBI/CIA/NSA/whoever [or Mossad � SCDB], to enrage the U.S. into attacking innocent Muslims. What the MGM could not and cannot admit is that the Purple/Red "Arab Traditionalist" culture that created Osama Bin Laden and his ilk is backward, unsuccessful, and diseased.

MGMs hate Bush. Any MGM's out there?

Recovering MGM here, Phil.

I once had a dartboard with Nixon's face on it. Bull's Eye was a big, red, clownish nose. It was very satisfying to dart him and I was delighted when he had to resign. I see now that he wasn't a bad President, just a paranoid Presidential candidate.

quote:

What the MGM could not and cannot admit is that the Purple/Red "Arab Traditionalist" culture that created Osama Bin Laden and his ilk is backward, unsuccessful, and diseased.

I agree with this. The whole Middle East seems to be a sick place. Maybe the Iraq thing will shake it all up and allow something new to happen.

I am decidedly green, but I'm not an MGM. I don't believe in cultural relativity (the mentality that says we have no business telling the Taliban how it should treat women), but I know people who are. I do have friends who fit the MGM profile, and they do indeed hate Bush.

Honestly, I believe Bush et al are terribly misguided, but I could never hate them for it. Hating people is not an option for the serious follower of Christ. I try to pray for them instead. And I try to remember that regardless who wins in November, God will still be the One who spins the stars.

Dave

quote:

Originally posted by Dave:
[qb] I am decidedly green, but I'm not an MGM. I don't believe in cultural relativity (the mentality that says we have no business telling the Taliban how it should treat women), but I know people who are. I do have friends who fit the MGM profile, and they do indeed hate Bush.

Honestly, I believe Bush et al are terribly misguided, but I could never hate them for it. Hating people is not an option for the serious follower of Christ. I try to pray for them instead. And I try to remember that regardless who wins in November, God will still be the One who spins the stars.

Dave [/qb]

What right do American's have telling the Taliban what is right/wrong, when American soldiers rape Iraqi women? Please see the Taguba Inquiry which confirmed independent reports of Iraqi women rape (and don't forget Abu Gharaib):

"The Taguba Inquiry confirmed independent reports that U.S. soldiers had raped women prisoners. Some of them were forced to bare their breasts for the camera. The women detainees sent messages to the resistance, pleading with them to bomb and destroy the prison and obliterate their shame and suffering....Another Iraqi prisoner, a male, was more forthright: "We need electricity in our homes, not up our arse." The Walrus (Tariq Ali).

People adopt a "Green meme" b/c of stuff like Abu Gharaib. And it's not an isolated incident. As early as November 2003 word was getting out of sexual abuses.

I guess that makes me die hard green meme, for good reasons.

Kissenger is not a "green meme," yet in an interview this year he said that the US is becoming a super power, resembling the Roman empire. And he's voting Bush. So maybe, there is factual evidence of this and it's not simply a matter of putting people in a "green meme" camp. The majority of the world doesn't dislike US foreign policy without reason.

What our soldiers have done is irrelavant vis-a-vis the actions of the Taliban. Was Abu Graib wrong? Of course. But that doesn't make the Taliban right.

I believe tyranny ought to be opposed wherever it is found (though not with violence). If Jesus had been born in present day Afghanistan instead of Roman era Israel, he would no doubt rip the Taliban just as he ripped the pharisees then. If he were born in the U. S., he would have choice words for us as well.

Read Tariq Ali's article in "The Walrus." I have nothing more to say. America, as Kissenger notes, is expanding its empire in various ways. If Kissenger compares the US to the Roman Empire, I believe it.

Asher, Have you ever heard of Thich Nhat Hanh? He is a Vietnamese Buddhist monk who lived through the horrors of the war. He is a greater peace activist than you or I will ever be.

He wrote this incredible little book called Being Peace. In it, he addresses the MGM phenomenon in depth (though he doesn't use that term). I suggest you, and all peace lovers, read that book. Most public libraries have it.

I find your conjecture about what Christ would do misaligned with the Beatitude (Verse 9)

"Blessed are the peacemakers: for they shall be called the children of God."

How can you even make such a conjecture? This is dangerous thinking, in my opinion.

Asher

[QUOTE]"I find your conjecture about what Christ would do misaligned with the Beatitude (Verse 9)
'Blessed are the peacemakers: for they shall be called the children of God.'
How can you even make such a conjecture? This is dangerous thinking."

I can make such a conjecture because of the kinds of criticisms Christ made towards the pharisees. If one can't transpose Jesus's teachings and apply them to modern times, then his teachings are useless (as are the Buddha's, Krishna's, and even Gandhi's, since he, too, is dead).

quote:

Originally posted by Dave:
[qb] [QUOTE

I can make such a conjecture because of the kinds of criticisms Christ made towards the pharisees. If one can't transpose Jesus's teachings and apply them to modern times, then his teachings are useless (as are the Buddha's, Krishna's, and even Gandhi's, since he, too, is dead). [/qb]

"While the tax collector�s sins may have included robbing God, the Pharisee sinned more by exalting himself. His mental attitude canceled out his deeds of service to God. Like many today, he foolishly thought that his large contributions would cover his sins."

It is my opinion that America fits the hypocricy of the Pharisee's, as much, or more than the Taliban. Remember that America armed the Taliban during the Russian threat to Afganistan. Does this even need repeating? The "enemy" keeps changing. Who knows who will be next. Many Americans seem to feel that it is American's who will be next. The Patriot Act is what these critics cite as their example. I wouldn't go this far, but I would suggest that America is assuredly NOT aligned with the Religion of Christ, and to suggest this is simply naive, in my opinion.

"The most recent evidence of historical amnesia and a messiah complex lies in the lack of a measured exit strategy following "Operation Iraqi Freedom," a war whose rapid result could have been guessed by grade-school children (Tony Blair knew that it would be a long haul, and the complicity in this charade of the British prime minister, whose country's occupation of Iraq lurched on until 1955, prove that diseases of blind faith and hubris have spread across the Atlantic.) But there is more to it. The absence of planning bespeaks a collective mind existing in a permanent present, and an adolescent insistence that "history begins with us.

-It was Carl Schmitt, a gifted legal theorist of the Third Reich, who insisted that the totality of politics was encompassed by the essential categories of "friend" and "enemy." This view suited most empires and Schmitt's writings were influential in the United States after the Second World War. Conservative thinkers such as Leo Strauss acknowledged his influence. The message--studied, learned, and adopted by the "Straussians" now surrounding President Bush--was straightforward: if your country does not serve the interests of our empire it is an enemy state. It must be occupied, its leaders removed and more pliant satraps placed on the throne. In time, they hoped, the presence of a Roman legion would become unnecessary. However, soon after the legion withdraws, the satrapy begins to crumble. Occupation, withdrawl, rebellion, another occupation, and, sometimes, self-emancipation, is a pattern in world history" Tariq Ali.

I think the comparison of America with the Roman Empire is apt. What side would Christ be on now?

An excerpt from a review on Kissenger's book about American foreign policy:
___________________________________________

Basing foreign policy on domestic politics instead of universal principles applied in a realistic historical context, Kissinger warns, led to acts of naive arbitrary interventionism such as the American bombing of Yugoslavia in defense of Kosovo while ignoring a nearly identical situation in Chechnya, and naive ideas like Clinton's belief that freedom of speech in China could be produced by unilateral demands of the American legislature. It also signifies a revival of sweeping Wilsonianism that risks making America the world's policeman, which will only guarantee America's isolation in the world community and ensure that every dictator and extremist will make it their life's mission to try to undermine it.
_________________________________________________

Henry Kissinger says, "The notion of justified pre-emption runs counter to modern international law, which sanctions the use of force in self-defense only against actual -- not potential -- threats."

________________________________________________

Kissenger's ideas about the war in Iraq can easily be extrapolated. He also hammers in the point about American's having a wide-spread amnesia problem in regards to history.

Phil said: Now I will tell you where I think the hatred of Bush is coming from, and I have hinted above: it is from liberals who are strongly attached to their ideology. Put even more succinctly, it is in liberals who are infected with what the Spiral Dynamics people call the Mean Green Meme.

Gee, ya think, Phil?

quote:

However, Green's desire for equality and diversity can go too far, becoming pathological and destructive. The desire to promote diversity and create equality can be perverted into an ideology that attempts to reduce everything and everyone to the lowest common denominator. (Ken Wilber, a prominent philosopher in consciousness studies, calls this the "mean green meme", or "MGM".) This means (among other things) that successful, powerful nations like the U.S. must be deconstructed, and poor, "victimized" nations like Iraq must be propped up; the "playing field" must be leveled in the interests of diversity. The MGM becomes trapped in a vicious retro-Romanticism, glorifying the nobility of (for example) the "Arab Traditionalist" culture -- never mind that that Red/Blue culture exhibits all the typical Red/Blue problems, stuff that Green would never tolerate in its own culture!

In short: since the U.S. and (to a lesser extent) Europe are the most powerful cultures on the planet today, the MGM typically assumes a very simple mantra: Everything Western is bad, everything non-Western is good.

The WTC attack initially threw the MGM into a tough bind. If everything non-Western is good, and everything Western is bad, then how come a non-Western society had just done something really, well, BAD? The only answer that the MGM could offer is that the attack must be the West's fault. The attackers, whom most people would call murdering scum, were in fact justified in their hatred of the U.S. You even had a radical fringe claiming that al Quaeda was not responsible, the whole thing was set up by the FBI/CIA/NSA/whoever [or Mossad � SCDB], to enrage the U.S. into attacking innocent Muslims. What the MGM could not and cannot admit is that the Purple/Red "Arab Traditionalist" culture that created Osama Bin Laden and his ilk is backward, unsuccessful, and diseased.

What would make for an interesting discussion is whether the obvious lies and distortions being spread by some MGM types stems, when all is said and done, from a deep-down sincere, but ill-formed, compassion or a purposeful, premeditated and unapologetic hatred.

(Cross-posted with you, Brad.)

Hmm. . . couldn't have asked for a better MGM demo than what we're seeing here.

You see, the problem is not Green, for that's healthy, as is every other color level (i.e. level of values development). With MGMs, what's characteristic is the lack of development of Orange and Blue levels, which provide an internal infrastructure from which Green arises. Consequentially, MGMs do not appreciate the values affirmed in Orange and Blue, and when they hear Orange and Blue kinds of statements, they only hear an affront to the kinds of pluralistic, postmodern perspectives that Greenies value.

This is a big problem, imo, for there are so many in the current generation of young people who received a thorough, Greenie education, but without proper development of Blue and Orange levels from home, Church/synagogue/mosque and public school. The consequence is a severe impairment of the powers of reason, with rank, judgmental emotional associations used as a substitute instead. MGMs place little value on traditional, transcendental moral norms, such as have developed in all the world religions, believing all morality to be mere cultural conventions, often used to control people. They cannot properly evaluate between competing principles, much less sort out a hierarchy of truths or values in the situations facing them. To make matters worse, some have even been taught that the mind and intellect are obstacles to knowing truth . . . patriarchical . . . tools to exploit the environment . . . Cartesian . . . delusional, etc.. It's a sad thing to see!

So when it comes to Bush--who is a True Blue, Agent Orange, emerging-into-Green kind of guy, MGMs detest him, as they must. Their hatred says more about them than W, however, who is not really a very complicated person, after all (quite the contrary). W. represents the shadow, undeveloped side of their nature, and they hate being confronted with that. Much better the fuzzy-wuzzy "let's dialogue and all get along" kind of guy than one who want sto wop Purple/Red Arab terrorist scum. Much easier to believe that W cannot be up to any good, but must be about world domination, for Red-Blue-Orange cannot be trusted, and if it's asserting itself, it must be about something sleazy. MGMs just really can't conceive that Bush really is sincerely trying to free the world from the tyranny of some very bad people--evil people! There's no such thing as really bad people, you see, and who are we to judge anyway? What about our support of oppressive dictators? Watergate? Viet Nam? We have no right to judge! Take the plank out of your own eye first. What about the poor in your country? Enron? The Patriot Act? Blah blah.

It's just impossible to discuss anything with MGMs; they don't have the mental apparatus to dialogue on these matters, really. Very sad to see, but not hopeless. They need to "grow down" a bit and catch up on some things that were missed. That will not be easy, as their distorted Green conditioning biases has left them with arrogant, snobbish Egos that are basically unteachable. Humility is not easy for MGMs, but a good first step would be to learn to listen and reflect more.

Fortunately, they each get only get one vote!

Phil writes: "Much better the fuzzy-wuzzy "let's dialogue and all get along" kind of guy than one who want sto wop Purple/Red Arab terrorist scum. Much easier to believe that W cannot be up to any good, but must be about world domination, for Red-Blue-Orange cannot be trusted, and if it's asserting itself, it must be about something sleazy. MGMs just really can't conceive that Bush really is sincerely trying to free the world from the tyranny of some very bad people--evil people! There's no such thing as really bad people, you see, and who are we to judge anyway?"

Okay. You've made some good points. But what about Thich Nhat Hanh, for instance, whom I mentioned earlier. Being a Buddhist monk, trained in the Vietnamese Thein (zen) tradition, Nhat Hanh doesn't believe in evil. Gandhi didn't believe in evil people either, though he did refer to some deeds as "evil."

Thich Nhat Hanh does not agree with Bush's policies (I don't think Gandhi would either), but he clearly doesn't hate Bush, or anyone else, for that matter.

So, is Nhat Hanh an MGM? Or must one rather hate in order to be an MGM?

________________________________________________
Phil: So when it comes to Bush--who is a True Blue, Agent Orange, emerging-into-Green kind of guy, MGMs detest him, as they must. Their hatred says more about them than W, however, who is not really a very complicated person, after all (quite the contrary). W. represents the shadow, undeveloped side of their nature, and they hate being confronted with that.

_______________________________________________

I've pondered and reflected on this and it sounds like a bunch of pychobabble. Of course Bush is not a complicated person. He's naive. And his naivity causes havoc in the world.

________________________________________________
Much better the fuzzy-wuzzy "let's dialogue and all get along" kind of guy than one who want sto wop Purple/Red Arab terrorist scum. Much easier to believe that W cannot be up to any good, but must be about world domination, for Red-Blue-Orange cannot be trusted, and if it's asserting itself, it must be about something sleazy. MGMs just really can't conceive that Bush really is sincerely trying to free the world from the tyranny of some very bad people--evil people!

There's no such thing as really bad people, you see, and who are we to judge anyway? What about our support of oppressive dictators? Watergate? Viet Nam? We have no right to judge! Take the plank out of your own eye first. What about the poor in your country? Enron? The Patriot Act? Blah blah.
_________________________________________________

Why wouldn't any intelligent person ask these questions? Green meme, or any meme, these questions are important and people who evade them have a one track mind. On one hand you are a staunch advocate of the mind/intellect and on the other you seem to downplay critical thinking skills.

_________________________________________________
It's just impossible to discuss anything with MGMs; they don't have the mental apparatus to dialogue on these matters, really.
__________________________________________________

Sigh. Putting people in these categories, although I admit to fitting the bill of green meme. And all these great critics simply have the same disease "the green meme." Sounds like an absolute "blue" contruct. What broad generalizing.
_______________________________________________

Very sad to see, but not hopeless. They need to "grow down" a bit and catch up on some things that were missed. That will not be easy, as their distorted Green conditioning biases has left them with arrogant, snobbish Egos that are basically unteachable. Humility is not easy for MGMs, but a good first step would be to learn to listen and reflect more.

________________________________________________

I've read the articles you posted; and I admit that there was a time when I agreed with Bush's actions in Iraq. That was before I began to educate myself and read Tariq Ali and other "green memes." I also sort of noted the global wide spread hatred of American Foriegn Policy and asked myself. Why? The "Green Meme Theory" although intriguing, doesn't seem to answer my questions, although I'm eager to learn. I really am. Convince me. Or am I to be forever damned as a mean spirited Green Meme. Oh Lord.

Dave, there are even higher levels than Green. See this page, for example, which describes the full spectrum. Green is the transition to what Graves and Beck call the "second tier" of values, which are more mystical and integrative. I think Thich Nhat Hanh would be a good example of second tier development, as would Gandhi and lots of others. I also think these two had good formation in the blue, orange and green levels. I don't think these levels necessarily predict how one will view Bush's policies. The Dalai Lama, for example, thinks the war with Afghanistan was justified, and is reserving judgment on Iraq.

Here's some comments from Ken Wilber (who has a deep interest in Spiral Dynamics) re. the Iraq situation:

. . . There is no mistaking Mr. Bush's values: they are essentially blue-to-orange. It is the deeply fundamentalistic, absolutistic values of Bush that alarm many other governments (particularly those of France, Germany, and Russia), and understandably so. The blue wave typically divides the world into good vs. evil, and has an unshakable (if ethnocentric) sense of right and wrong. Bush's "axis of evil" is classic blue. The worst that can be said of Bush's essentially blue approach is that, indeed, it is deeply ethnocentric and imperialistic. The best that can be said is that it takes blue to curtail red, and Bush's actions are serving the larger Spiral by rooting out pockets of red terrorism.

�The other major faction in the debate is essentially representing green-meme values. The green wave�what Clare Graves called "the sensitive self"�wishes to end all war, and thus must see itself as anti-war under virtually any circumstances. However, because it often takes war to end war (e.g., it takes WWII to end Auschwitz), green is often paralyzed in the face of real world aggression, insisting on lying down in front of Nazi tanks, as if that would actually stop them. But as long as green can see itself protesting aggression, it is relatively content. The worst that can be said of these protesters is that they are essentially "Saddam enablers" (in exactly the same way that Neville Chamberlain was a Hitler enabler). The best that can be said is that these individuals serve the larger Spiral by sensitizing more people to the horrors of aggression.

So you take that tendency of Green in general re. Iraq and, with the lack of development of Blue and Orange in so many, what you get is a lob-sized view of things. They can't see any value in what Bush is doing whatsoever and view his actions as the antithesis of everything Green stands for. Note that even Wilber, who doesn't especially like Bush, ends up conceding that it takes blue to curtail red, and Bush's actions are serving the larger Spiral by rooting out pockets of red terrorism. That's a pretty big service to the world, considering that these "pockets" hold an awful lot of vermin.

The thread point is that if one's level of development is centered in Green, one will oppose the war and not like Bush, though not hate him either. If one is Green with very little appreciation of Blue or Orange, one will probably hate Bush. This is not to sum up everything on the matter; people in Blue, Orange, Yellow, etc. can oppose the war, and do (just as many in those levels support it). I don't think there's much hatred of Bush outside of Green, however, except for the lower Red, terrorist groups, who hate him for other reasons.

I, too, fit the Green Meme profile, until it gets to this point:

"In short: since the U.S. and (to a lesser extent) Europe are the most powerful cultures on the planet today, the MGM typically assumes a very simple mantra: Everything Western is bad, everything non-Western is good."

Do you agree with that last statement, Asher? I don't know how any thoughtful person could make such a sweeping generalization.

Gents, see my post above. I think we all cross-posted.

Dave, I think the "everything is bad" point was hyperbole, but there really does seem to be a "hate America first" group out there, even in the U.S. I think that point was more about MGM than Green.

Phil wrote: "The thread point is that if one's level of development is centered in Green, one will oppose the war and not like Bush, though not hate him either. If one is Green with very little appreciation of Blue or Orange, one will probably hate Bush. This is not to sum up everything on the matter; people in Blue, Orange, Yellow, etc. can oppose the war, and do (just as many in those levels support it). I don't think there's much hatred of Bush outside of Green, however, except for the lower Red, terrorist groups, who hate him for other reasons."


Ah. I see where you're coming from. Where did you get the Wilber quote?

I provided a link in the new, up-to-the-second, edited version.

Please note my comment that it is MGM that tends to view the West as mostly bad.

Reposting the link to Wilber's article, just in case. It's very good. Give it a read.

quote:

Originally posted by Phil:
[qb]

. . . There is no mistaking Mr. Bush's values: they are essentially blue-to-orange. It is the deeply fundamentalistic, absolutistic values of Bush that alarm many other governments (particularly those of France, Germany, and Russia), and understandably so. The blue wave typically divides the world into good vs. evil, and has an unshakable (if ethnocentric) sense of right and wrong. Bush's "axis of evil" is classic blue. The worst that can be said of Bush's essentially blue approach is that, indeed, it is deeply ethnocentric and imperialistic. The best that can be said is that it takes blue to curtail red, and Bush's actions are serving the larger Spiral by rooting out pockets of red terrorism.
[/qb]

This makes a great deal more sense than what is posted above. It also gives a balanced perspective of Bush's best and worst qualities.

quote:

Originally posted by Dave:
[qb] I, too, fit the Green Meme profile, until it gets to this point:

"In short: since the U.S. and (to a lesser extent) Europe are the most powerful cultures on the planet today, the MGM typically assumes a very simple mantra: Everything Western is bad, everything non-Western is good."

Do you agree with that last statement, Asher? I don't know how any thoughtful person could make such a sweeping generalization. [/qb]

Hi Dave,

No I certainly don't believe in that statement. I love America and Canada (where I live). I think America has a deep and soulful vision that many writer's like Walt Whitman, Hart Crane, Emily Dickinson, Herman Melville and so many others have captured. Whenever I cross the border into America, there is usually an electical surge in my being, a dynamism. I love America's dynamism. A short trip to India makes me run back to the West, where I find energy to move, change, grow.

Walt Whitman begins his great epic American poem:

I celebrate myself,
And what I assume you shall assume,
For every atom belonging to me as good belongs to you.

I loafe and invite my soul,
I lean and loafe at my ease observing a spear of summer grass.

My tongue, every atom of my blood, formed from this soil, this air,
Born here of parents born here from parents the same, and their parents

the same,
I, now thirty seven years old in perfect health begin,
Hoping to cease not till death.
Creeds and schools in abeyance,
Retiring back a while sufficed at what they are, but never forgotten,
I harbor for good or bad, I permit to speak at every hazard,
Nature without check with original energy.
________________________________

This is the kind of American sentiment that I most believe in, a freedom of speech, the unbridled force of the landscape flowing through the sinews of veins-- Good night. Nice to meet you.

A couple more good Wilber quotes from here.

As for the healthy and unhealthy green memes, I always start any discussion of the MGM by pointing out the HGM's many accomplishments to date: the civil rights movement, feminism, environmental protection and ecological sensitivity, health care reform, political awareness of marginalization in all forms, etc.

But I have focused on the damage that the MGM has caused, mostly because that is where the action is in the cultural elite. The MGM is the driving force of boomeritis, and it has dominated academia, liberal politics, and the humanities for three decades. Its damage is staggering, and only made worse by the smug self-satisfaction of these particular Inquisitors.

Yup!

As for Blue Bush, But there is another sort of "good news, bad news" about Bush's approach. On the one had, blue always has a much better understanding of red and of how to handle red. Blue is right next to red, has just come out of red, and understands the drastic measures that are required to handle red war loads and brutal terrorists. Green is generally helpless and hapless in the face of red: all of green's tools and values are clueless in the face of joyous brutality and intentional aggression. Talking, sharing, caring, and dialoging do not impress red. It takes a blue meme to smash red in the face and not blink.

LOL!

Do you see, now?

Maybe we're at a place in this time in history when that's the urgent need? Civilization as it's emerging cannot really proceed with Red-meme terrorists bombing train stations, flying planes into skyscrapers, or getting their hands on WMD and really wreaking havoc. Questions like "are you better off now than you were four years ago" make little sense with such a crisis in full-swing. Repeating Wilber, with whom I am in agreement here (as he's interpreting Spiral Dynamics) Green is generally helpless and hapless in the face of red. Totally! While many European countries are immobilized in their Green-ness (some in MGM stuff), thoughtful leaders like Blair understand the crisis the world faces and value the contribution Bush and the U.S. has to offer at this time.