| Submit your comments on this article |
| Fifth Column |
| Victor Davis Hanson on fault lines |
| 2001-10-26 |
There is a growing class division in this country over the war. Of course, 90 percent of us, of all classes, at least for now profess support for strong military action. Yet at least a tenth of the country — a very influential tenth in the media, the university, politics, foundations, churches, and the arts — is adamantly and vocally at odds with most Americans. Why is this so? It is often not a divide between Democrats and Republicans. Nor does the abyss always separate the wealthy from the poor. Most strikingly, the fault line pits a utopian cultural elite against the working middle class. On campuses, especially public universities such as the California State University system, one feels the tension constantly. The tenured, well educated, and relatively affluent among the faculty are adamantly against the military response in Afghanistan. Yet the students — mostly children of the working-class of every conceivable ethnic background — almost uniformly support our troops. The usual explanations about the sociology of dissent do not quite make sense any more. So far, those who are fighting in Afghanistan — mostly highly trained pilots and special-forces operatives — are not from among the unwashed poor. The affluent Left, then, is not opposed to action because the less-privileged are dying in droves. Is it because the better educated are more sensitive to world opinion? To the nuances of Islam? To the "Other" in Afghanistan, who are not male WASPs? To the vagaries of the European press? Perhaps. Perhaps not. Rather, I think fashionable anti-Americanism and pacifism have now become completely aristocratic pursuits, the dividends of limited experience with the muscular classes and the indulgence such studied distance breeds. Our pampered critics may be as clever as Odysseus, but they have lost his nerve, strength, and sense of morality. And so they have neither the ability nor desire to ram a hot stake into the eye of the savage Cyclops to save their comrades. |
| Posted by:Fred Pruitt |