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Chris Hedges and the Graduating Class at Rockford College: Whose Voice is More Unpopular?Last Saturday, on May 19, 2003, Chris Hedges, a Pulitzer Prize-winning author and New York Times reporter, gave a commencement speech at Rockford College. After it was over, he expressed confusion over the audience’s reaction to his speech, a reaction he would be quoted as calling “heartbreaking.”During his speech, graduates shouted, chanted, and screamed at Hedges to leave. One student even threw his cap and gown at him before walking out of the ceremony. Some students turned their backs while others rushed the stage and unplugged the microphone. Unfortunately for Hedges, while he can cry that his freedom of speech was trampled that day, he fell victim to nothing more than the students expressing their own views. No governmental agency stepped in to stop the assembly, and no trial date is set for anybody reacting to the event. Nobody’s freedom of speech was trampled, but the voice of the majority, in the end, drowned out the unpopular voice of dissent. This is the way it’s supposed to work, isn’t it? Unpopular views can certainly be expressed, but that doesn’t mean that they have to be accepted by the majority. If, for example, Hedges had come to the stage wearing a swastika on his arm and praising the accomplishments of Adolph Hitler, it would be my hope that the graduating seniors of Rockford College would react with just as much fervor as they did on Saturday. After a few minutes of Nazi rhetoric, I would be among those rushing the stage to silence him, but I would not support, in any way, a law or an ordinance making unpopular speech illegal. After all, such an ordinance might prevent me from speaking out against somebody like Hedges. Luckily, Hedges is not a Nazi. He is not that bad. However, having read the transcript of his speech, I can say that I would not have listened to Hedges talk without reacting vocally to it. The truth is that Hedges is a pompous, self-righteous, closed-minded classist who hates America and believes that this country will destroy itself. He does not think that anything good has been accomplished in Iraq, and he dismisses any report he sees of citizens parading the streets of Baghdad in celebration. He believes that war is an ego-boosting mechanism that has nothing to do with selfless or righteous causes. He believes that terrorists have good reasons for their actions and that we should appease them. By inference, he believes that America should never exert its military force in any situation whatsoever, no matter how good the cause is. He believes that such actions are, by their very nature, imperialistic and self-destructive. He rests on his laurels and brings them up several times in his speech. He talks of his time in the Middle East and his experience as a reporter, firmly making it clear that he believes he knows more on the subject of current events than you do. However, according to several media outlets, including CAMERA (the Committee for Accuracy in Middle East Reporting in America), Chris Hedges exudes “material errors and grave...bias” with every written word. A good example of CAMERA’s complaint against him (such as a point-by-point dissection of a single essay written by Hedges, where corroborated facts are put up against Hedges’ uncorroborated allegations) can be found in many places on the CAMERA website. His qualifications are not without skepticism. But I think the most offensive thing he said in his speech last Saturday, and the one that would make me rush the stage, is, “what saddens me most is that those who will by and large pay the highest price are poor kids from Mississippi or Alabama or Texas who could not get a decent job or health insurance and joined the army because it was all we offered them.” All we offered them? Once again, he parades an intellectual bias against the South, a cultural stereotype so ingrained in us and so unquestioned by the same people who complain about the civil liberties of black German lesbians that it infuriates me to the core. He is also implying (and this is not the only time he does it in his speech) that “getting a decent job or health insurance” is more important than anything that could be accomplished by our military. And, to top it all off in this single statement, he fails to acknowledge that “they” are making sacrifices for us. He wonders, as I’m sure other people do, what the graduates of Rockford College found so offensive about these opinions. But let me continue. He also asserts, at the climax of one of his arguments about comradeship, that “after war we fall into despair.” He says this as if it were true. According to my history books, the 1920’s was one of the longest-lasting parties in our nation’s history, and, according to the census numbers, people were celebrating quite prodigiously after World War II. I’d hardly call the celebrations on the streets that followed every major war in this country “despair.” He also calls the Vietnam War a failure (actually, he calls it a humbling and humiliating defeat), which is a great myth believed by millions who don’t know their history. I wouldn’t call Vietnam a complete success, but it did achieve it’s strategic goal of keeping China out of the equation. He also states, very cynically, that “war in the end is always about betrayal, betrayal of the young by the old, of soldiers by politicians, and of idealists by cynics.” Why would anybody find that offensive? My grandfather was not poor when he went to Europe and helped to save the world back in World War II. He did not join the military because he lacked adequate health care or because he couldn’t find a job. In fact, the same can be said of my cousin, or several of my close friends. I know two separate men who are flying helicopters in Iraq, white middle-class men who could easily find a job here in the states if they wanted to. I know another who is working on a secret operation for the Marines, a college graduate with a degree in Criminology. These young, idealistic soldiers are not being betrayed by old, cynical politicians. These young, idealistic soldiers have more honor than the rest of us combined. We owe them for everything that they have offered us. America is not a doomed empire like Rome. America is not an egotistical power-hungry monster hell-bent on taking over the world because it makes us feel better. We will not “become pariahs.” Our situation at home is not “a time of soaring deficits and financial scandals and the very deterioration of our domestic fabric” that needs war as a “diversion.” The people of Iraq cannot be generalized by the actions of a few dissidents or even the celebration of a few thousand civilians. I do not understand how anybody can look at the mass graves or pictures of Halabja, listen to accounts of torture and rape, read reports from UNSCOM and UNMOVIC, or watch the videotaped accounts of life in Iraq from refugees and honestly believe that the removal of Saddam Hussein and the Ba’ath Party was a bad idea. I do not understand how anybody could be cynical enough to believe that a quick, decisive war followed by a temporary American occupation is any worse than the alternative. Yes, Chris Hedges, you have the right to believe what you believe and you even have the right to speak out for those same beliefs. But I have the right to say that I despise your opinions, I have the right to proclaim that you hate our country, I have the right to demand that you stop telling the rest of us how awful and evil we are, and I have the right to boo you off of the stage for your offensive beliefs. (This list does not represent the entirety of my research on this subject) -e. magill, 5/23/2003 |
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