I come from an Asian country, we are used to bribes, crooked politicians, government workers etc etc.
To me the USA was the place where Neil Armstrong lived, it was the country that gave me so much that I was thankful for, it was a country where the words "Freedom of speech" ruled above everything. To me it was the country I wanted to be in if I had a wish.
Little by little, that idea I had of the united states is being changed, may be its my fault since I idealised the USA too much. May be its the news I read about, large scale surveillance, government officials who has no regard for civil liberties, people more powerful than the FBI, people above the law, power crazed security guards at airports etc etc.
I really really dislike this, wish I would once again get to believe that there is a place where people are treated right.
I once worked with a woman who immigrated from Russia who had learned computer science on punch cards. She was always full of energy and happy to be working on interesting project in the USA, because that kind of thing did not happen in the USSR. In that environment, you learned to "not be noticed". Bad things regularly happened to people that were noticed.
Her attitude changed in soon after the Bush administration started their wars in the middle east and the PATRIOT act was passed. When that came up in conversation one day, she suddenly got really serious and quietly said, "It's happening again." The same environment she had fled from the USSR was happening here, and it terrified her.
There was a change. The USA has always had problems, but there defiantly was a change that happened somewhat recently. I've been trying to fight it ever since, but all that has done is convince me that it's going to get a lot uglier before it any true reform is possible.
A lot changed after 9/11. The US Government took the public's irrational fear of Terrorism and used that to usher in sweeping reforms against personal liberty, under the guise "War on Terror."
To me the USA was the place where Neil Armstrong lived, it was the country that gave me so much that I was thankful for, it was a country where the words "Freedom of speech" ruled above everything. To me it was the country I wanted to be in if I had a wish.
Little by little, that idea I had of the united states is being changed, may be its my fault since I idealised the USA too much. May be its the news I read about, large scale surveillance, government officials who has no regard for civil liberties, people more powerful than the FBI, people above the law, power crazed security guards at airports etc etc.
I really really dislike this, wish I would once again get to believe that there is a place where people are treated right.