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    Stuff Happens by David Hare: A Brit in New York

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    Ariana
    The document criticizes the rhetoric used by Americans after 9/11 to justify the war in Iraq. It argues that claiming "America changed" and "you don't understand unless you're American" to defend military action is infantile and does not justify attacking the wrong countries. The document questions if those same justifications could then be used by any other groups in the world to attack whoever they want.

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    Stuff Happens by David Hare: A Brit in New York

    Uploaded by

    Ariana
    458 views1 page
    The document criticizes the rhetoric used by Americans after 9/11 to justify the war in Iraq. It argues that claiming "America changed" and "you don't understand unless you're American" to defend military action is infantile and does not justify attacking the wrong countries. The document questions if those same justifications could then be used by any other groups in the world to attack whoever they want.

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    Stuff Happens

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    The document criticizes the rhetoric used by Americans after 9/11 to justify the war in Iraq. It argues that claiming "America changed" and "you don't understand unless you're American" to defend military action is infantile and does not justify attacking the wrong countries. The document questions if those same justifications could then be used by any other groups in the world to attack whoever they want.

    Copyright:

    © All Rights Reserved
    Download as DOCX, PDF, TXT or read online from Scribd
    Download as docx, pdf, or txt
    458 views1 page

    Stuff Happens by David Hare: A Brit in New York

    Uploaded by

    Ariana
    The document criticizes the rhetoric used by Americans after 9/11 to justify the war in Iraq. It argues that claiming "America changed" and "you don't understand unless you're American" to defend military action is infantile and does not justify attacking the wrong countries. The document questions if those same justifications could then be used by any other groups in the world to attack whoever they want.

    Copyright:

    © All Rights Reserved
    Download as DOCX, PDF, TXT or read online from Scribd
    Download as docx, pdf, or txt
    of 1

    Stuff Happens 

    By David Hare: A Brit in New York.


     
    'America changed.' That's what we're told. 'On
    September 11th everything changed.' 'If you're not
    American, you can't understand.' The infantile
    psychobabble of popular culture is grafted
    opportunistically onto America's politics. The
    language of childish entitlement becomes the lethal
    rhetoric of global wealth and privilege. Asked how
    you are as President, on the first day of a war which
    will kill around thirty thousand people: 'I feel good.' I
    was in Saks Fifth Avenue the morning they bombed
    Baghdad. 'Isn't it wonderful?' says the saleswoman.
    'At last we're hitting back.' 'Yes,' I reply. 'At the wrong
    people. Somebody steals your handbag, so you kill
    their second cousin, on the grounds they live close.
    Explain to me,' I say, 'Saudi Arabia is financing Al
    Qaeda. Iran, Lebanon and Syria are known to shelter
    terrorists. North Korea is developing a nuclear
    weapons programme. All these you leave alone. No,
    you go to war with the one place in the region
    admitted to have no connection with terrorism.'
    'You're not American,' says the saleswoman. 'You
    don't understand.' Oh, a question, then. If 'You're not
    American. You don't understand' is the new
    dispensation, then why not 'You're not Chechen'? Are
    the Chechens also now licensed? Are Basques?
    Theatres, restaurants, public squares? Do Israeli milk--
    ‐bars filled with women and children become fair
    game on the grounds that 'You don't understand.
    We're Palestinian, we're Chechen, we're Irish, we're
    Basque'? If the principle of international conduct is
    now to be that you may go against anyone you like on
    the grounds that you've been hurt by somebody else,
    does that apply to everyone? Or just to America? On
    September 11th, America changed. Yes. It got much
    stupider.

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