Don’t be excited by anti-war Americans [Archives:2003/632/Letters to the Editor]
Millie Puddy
[email protected]
Please don't get excited when you receive and publish letters from Americans who support your views of the war. Be sure that most Americans support our leader and our troops. Also be sure that there will always be a healthy debate in the United States about anything and everything that our government does because we are free people. I was outraged by an editorial in the Yemen Times that accused Americans of being brainwashed and believing anything that our government tells us. Obviously, you have never watched a White House or Pentagon briefing where the majority of reporters are trying to uncover the truth and many of those reporters are likely not fans of the Bush administration. That is what we call freedom; freedom to criticize our government, freedom to criticize religion or religious leaders, and freedom of information so that Americans have access to the truth. Our newspapers and television reports are full of reports by those who would like to find fault in the Bush administration. We can read, write, think, and do just about anything here in the U.S. That freedom isn't always used wisely by all Americans. I think you would be ashamed to know that most of the anti war protesters in the United States are left-wingers – Hollywood celebrities, whose behavior and morals would be abhorrent to most Muslims, or political leftists who would also espouse causes and values that would insult Islamic morality as well as Christian principles. If you, at The Yemen Times, are embracing the anti war left from the U.S. then you are most likely embracing what Muslims consider the worst of American society.
As to the accusation that Americans are brainwashed by our government…do you read U.S. newspapers or watch U.S. news reports on television? We read Arabic newspapers and see Arabic reports on television and most Americans are shocked that the Arabic world sees such propaganda and blatant lies as truth.
A Saudi editor, Abd Al-Rahman Al-Rashed of the daily Al-Sharq Al-Awsat presented his views in recent editorials translated by the Middle Eastern Media Research Institute. He says, “Notice the difference in press conferences on both sides. In the West, journalists are not satisfied with listening. They probe, express opposing opinions, and expose lies. In our media, anything [the Iraqi information minister] Al-Sahhaf says is broadcast as if he was a Friday preacher in a mosque. …”
Americans would not tolerate the level of political propaganda and lies in our media that the Arab media spews. We have too many other options for information and most Americans care about truth because freedom will only be found in the truth.
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[archive-e:632-v:13-y:2003-d:2003-04-21-p:letters]
