Anti-Americanism and the innocent Frenchies

 

One of the trickiest impediments for mutual comprehension when having a discussion with many Americans is the notion of anti-Americanism. Save for the former USSR where it wasn’t about being anti-Russian but anti-Communist, America is the only country in the world to which the infamous “anti” prefix can be associated. Hmmmm… There must be some misunderstanding here…

This is where the “anti” prefix is misleading. It basically means “against” and one must concede that when taken at face value by Americans, it invariably seems to be an attack directed to the very heart of their identity and their being, with a goal that seems to be no other that the negation of said identity, “anti” being then an implicit synonym for nothingness.

Where other countries accept criticism as a run of the mill occurrence between foreign nations, peoples or different cultures, the slightest critic of America can very easily be misunderstood because it touches a raw nerve and is assimilated to a global and total rejection. A denial of love, so to speak.

Maybe is it the misfortune of America to be a late comer on the world stage, where all civilisations have centuries, sometimes millenniums of history and arts behind them. All countries in the world have long ago shown their mettles and know that the meaning of life is morality, in the sense of “Being” (l’être) as opposed to “Having” (l’avoir). Therefore, America’s history seems to be a continuous overreaction that translates into a permanent endeavour to surpass the rest of the world in terms of might, be it economically or militarily. But this is all about “Having.” And yet, a need subsists: That of being recognized at par with the others in the realm of “Being“. 

Hence, from 2003 to, say, 2007, a virtually unique chord has been harped by the American media to “explain” the French opposition to the war in Iraq, that of anti-Americanism (notwithstanding the loads of garbage). To a majority of Americans, if there’s a country that can be labelled anti-American, it’s France, no doubt about it. The more the French insist they’re not, the more Americans decry them as sheer hypocrites.

So when the Bush administration made the American people believe their security was at stake because of Iraq’s purported WMD and the French, seemingly, not only refused to come to their help but even tried to prevent their right to defend themselves, that was absolute and definitive evidence that the French were anti-American, in the sense that they opposed the very existence of America. Weren’t the French denounced as the closest friends of Saddam whose supposed goal, precisely, was to attack and destroy America?

During his interview with Christiane Amanpour on CNN to expose to the American people the position of France regarding the refusal of Paris to back America in its drive to wage war to Iraq, former President Chirac felt compelled to assert he wasn’t acting out of anti-Americanism… Talk about being ridiculous! How could that even be?

For historical as well as cultural reasons, France occupies a specific place in the psyche of America, its “bad conscience” used to say Susan Sontag. Therefore, when the French criticize America, the country which probably is the closest to their heart, most Americans receive that critic not as such but as an ongoing evidence of the malevolence of the French toward them. Not for what they, Americans, do but for what they are. All attempts of the French in order to convince their American friends that this is not the case fall on deaf ears. From the superiority complex they certainly suffer from, the French can only despise and have contempt for Americans that they consider under-educated, uncouth and historically as well as artistically “inferior”. And yet, is there another country where artists are as well received and celebrated than Americans in France? 

Isn’t that what love stories are made of : misunderstanding? The miss often complaining of the lack of real love from her partner while said partner keeps on insisting he’s innocent and loves her more than anything else.

Note: The picture is “Lovesong” by Georgio de Chirico, Museum of Modern Art, New York