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| Subject: I don't either... | |
Author: Paddy (Scotland) | [ Next Thread |
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] Date Posted: 20:33:51 01/18/05 Tue In reply to: Andrew(Canada) 's message, "anglosphere..." on 06:06:46 01/18/05 Tue [ Next Thread | Previous Thread | Next Message | Previous Message ] |
| [> [> [> [> Subject: well... | |
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Author: Andrew(Canada) [ Edit | View ] |
Date Posted: 20:39:59 01/18/05 Tue would any of you care to elaborate? [ Post a Reply to This Message ] |
| [> [> [> [> [> Subject: Yes please do... | |
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Author: Dave (UK) [ Edit | View ] |
Date Posted: 21:51:04 01/18/05 Tue What are we talking about here? If we are merely stating that a Federal Commonwealth should remain close allies with the US, as a prime political and defensive alliance, then I completely agree. However, if anyone is seriously suggesting that the nations of the Crown Commonwealth should feature as additional stars on the Spangled Banner, then that is not why I am here. [ Post a Reply to This Message ] |
| [> [> [> [> [> [> Subject: My sentiments entirely, Dave | |
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Author: Ian (Australia) [ Edit | View ] |
Date Posted: 23:33:25 01/18/05 Tue [ Post a Reply to This Message ] |
| [> [> [> [> [> [> [> Subject: Ditto for me too - FC ally of US - Yes; FC including US - No | |
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Author: JIm (Canada) [ Edit | View ] |
Date Posted: 15:39:41 01/19/05 Wed [ Post a Reply to This Message ] |
| [> [> [> [> [> Subject: Elaboration | |
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Author: Ed Harris (London) [ Edit | View ] |
Date Posted: 00:22:19 01/19/05 Wed Firstly, I tend to think that countries in which bold, innovative ideas such as that of the FCS are treated as suspect and occasionally laughable acts of lunacy, there will be limited progress. Ours are such countries, especially the United Kingdom. The United States of America, on the other hand, is a country in which good ideas, provided that they are in the national interest, are taken forward complete disregard for how shocking they might seem. Secondly, I dispute that the Americans have become too different. In Britain, most people are more familiar with Americans than Canadians. I myself have more American friends than Commonwealth friends, and I am about as favourable to your ideas as it is possible to be. Most people in Blighty – and I must state that I deplore this attitude – see CANZ citizens as barmen, but we experience the Americans as students, tourists, scientists, actors and so forth. If we are honest, the cultural propaganda of the USA, in the form of television, movies, music, and the fact that they are always in the news, means that these days we are held together as much by our Americanisation as by our British heritage. We speak English, most English ‘culture’ comes out of the USA, ipso facto our separate cultures, which were once moving apart, are now moving together again, but it is not CANZUK harmonisation but Americanisation. Like it or not, the USA is the power-house of the Anglosphere, even more than it is the engine of globalisation, since we in CANZUK are much more receptive to American culture than non-Anglophone countries. Thirdly, we would not all be sucked into the USA. A country like New Zealand on its own would not have a chance of maintaining its separate identity, but this is an isolated example. Britain has a quarter of the population of America, so it is clearly too big to become just another state: try and point out a present American state which contains 1/5 of the population. Moreover, if a CANZUK federation were already established before inviting American participation, the disparity in population, prosperity, power &c. would be drastically reduced. The negotiations would be between two huge nations, not one huge nation and a few smaller ones. Fourthly, your point about upsetting the balance of power in the world is, I’m afraid to say, somewhat bizarre. For a start, I am surprised to read that you imagine that the world is so balanced at the moment. Already, the world is dominated by one English-speaking country. In addition, the next most powerful is another English-speaking country – the UK. Britain is not the second power in the world because our economy, population, land area, military etc. make us so, but because there is another element to power, i.e., the willingness to use it in ones interests. This is what made the bigger and richer America less powerful than Britain until 1941: nothing would induce the Yanks to use their economic resources to project their power in the world until Pearl Harbour. The world, then, is unbalanced because of the collapse of the Soviet Union, leading to a unipolar world in which the next greatest country after the only superpower is a country with the same language, history and geopolitical objectives as that superpower. I call that unbalanced enough, and CAZNUKUS would just be political recognition of present-day facts: we will never fight with or compete with the USA, because they are our allies and co-lingualists and co-culturalists. Your last point, about global resentment, is a more convincing one. The world doesn’t like the USA. We must, however, ask ourselves why. It is not because American foreign policy is so ghastly, since frankly it is preferable to, say, Chinese, Iranian or Congolese foreign policy. The reason is that everyone hates the guy on top. They hated us when we were the top dog. Picasso’s notepads are full of bitter, resentful caricatures of British soldiers, all buck-teeth and solar topees, just as modern European newspapers have cartoons of obese Yanks in baseball caps guzzling cheeseburgers and toting guns. The significant point here is that, by Federation, would would overnight regain our superpower status, and with or without America the world would hate it. The Europeans have always striven to undermine the unity of the English-speaking world, because, against us all together, they haven’t a prayer. Even in the 1740s, during the War of Austrian Succession, they dried to drive a wedge between Britain and North America. Indeed, it is arguable that refusal to join in with the USA might be more unpopular and resented than complete Anglosphere Union, because then the world would have two lumbering colossi to deal with rather than just the one. Having said all this, I am more amenable to Commonwealth federation than Anglosphere federation, because I am a royalist Londoner, not a republican Philadelphian. While I believe that Anglo-American relations are not qualitatively different from Anglo-Commonwealth relations, I accept that they are quantitatively different, in that we share a culture with the USA but not to the same extent as with Canada, Australia and NZ. I fear, therefore, that americophobia within the English-speaking world is all too often the result of political objections to this or that American administration, rather than a genuine sense of what Durkheim would probably call the 'ganz andere'. [ Post a Reply to This Message ] |
| [> [> [> [> [> [> Subject: the Anglopyramid | |
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Author: Ian (Australia) [ Edit | View ] |
Date Posted: 02:25:35 01/19/05 Wed Looking at this from Australia, I find it hard to see much reason to get enthusiastic about an Anglosphere Federation, as it would essentially mean becoming part of the USA, which I do not want to do. The idea of “inviting American participation” seems a little optimistic to me. The difference between Australia becoming part of the USA and Australia, New Zealand, Canada and the UK all becoming parts of the USA seems very very slight to me. CANZUK would have to be federated for a generation or so before the argument of “negotiations between two huge nations” could work. If CANZUK had just happened, we would still feel much more like four countries than one, and we would lose the chance to ever get beyond that You say that Americans are not too different from us. Compared to what? Gorillas are not very different to us if we are comparing them with leeches, but that doesn’t mean that I want to give all primates the vote. Looking at what seem to be typical American attitudes towards the law (a sport where people try to get rich by suing each other without any real regard for justice), religion (where a horrifyingly large percentage of the country’s population seems to think that the world was created by some sort of supernatural being who hates abortion but loves wars) and gun crimes (a necessary evil to be combated with more guns), I don’t see much to make me feel at home. I dispute the idea that the statistic “most English-language ‘culture’ comes out of the USA” means that we should accept it all as our culture. In fact, little of the culture that I see as mine comes from the USA. Until you can convince at least 50% of them to understand irony, I’m not interested. Canadians might also have a thing or two to say about merging with a country that invaded them. America fought not to be British. The rest of us have always got on fine. If the choice were between Anglosphere federation and being a province of China, then I would be happy to go with the Anglosphere. Fortunately, that is not the choice we face and is not likely to be. Until then, I’ll stick with the countries I feel at home with. [ Post a Reply to This Message ] |
| [> [> [> [> [> [> [> Subject: Aux Cayes | |
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Author: Ed Harris (London) [ Edit | View ] |
Date Posted: 02:35:16 01/19/05 Wed I accept most of your points, with the reservation that perhaps, as a larger country, Brits tend to feel less overwhelmed by the USA than our smaller sister-nations. One question does arise from your remarks though. You say that Anglosphere federation would be preferable to becoming a province of China or Iran; but would you prefer Anglosphere federation to the status quo or not? My order of preference would be: 1) Commonwealth federation 2) Anglosphere federation 3) Status quo. Many here, however, would seem to prefer to see (2) and (3) the other way round. [ Post a Reply to This Message ] |
| [> [> [> [> [> [> [> [> Subject: preferences | |
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Author: Ian (Australia) [ Edit | View ] |
Date Posted: 02:47:49 01/19/05 Wed I would prefer: 1) Commonwealth federation 2) Status quo 3) Anglosphere federation Because the status quo keeps the option of CANZUK federation open, whereas Anglosphere federation would render that impossible. [ Post a Reply to This Message ] |
| [> [> [> [> [> Subject: But of course... | |
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Author: Paddy (Scotland) [ Edit | View ] |
Date Posted: 12:10:28 01/19/05 Wed The "anglosphere" already exists and is easily noticable (unless it is a defined "movement" with a different definition to that that its name would suggest - please let me know if this is the case). I can travel to South Africa and I will have something in common with the inhabitants that I simply don't have with the average Russian or Frenchman. The same is true of India and many other places worldwide. It is a VERY vague concept and is true to wildly different extents & on many levels. In Jamaica & Singapore there is very strong "British" influence all over the places (manners, phrases, sports etc...) - even in the slums - while in PNG there is some British influence on the coast where the elite is based but move inland and there are tribes who still kill each other with bows and arrows and then eat each other - these people do not even know that there is a government at all on the Island let alone that the Queen is the head of state! Either way though, certainly there is something there & for this reason I would like to see free trade between the nations of the Commonwealth - it would be a natural thing. Perhaps I do not really have much in common with the average American. (Please forgive me but I call citizens of the USA Americans and citizens of the Dominion of Canada Canadians.) Most of the Americans I know are "old" Americans (meaning their families have been there for as long as they can remember). In fact most of the ones that I know are (have been) students in the UK and therefore must have been either pretty bright (scholarships) or pretty rich. I say this to emphasise that it is probable that my personal experiences with Americans are not typical. However it is undeniably true that often I have found more to talk about with these people than with my fellow compatriots. It is a fact that the British lap-up prolefeed from the USA - pop music, films etc... however where do you think that the Americans turn to for "high" culture? It is very much a two-way exchange. The show "Frasier" gets it just right - the two Crain Brothers affect the lifestyle of upper-class Englishmen - they crave fine Clarets, membership of gentlemen's clubs, good tailoring & Niles lives in an "English" style manor for much of the show. Daphne (the Mancunian house-keeper of Frasier for most of the many episodes) ends up marrying brother Niles and the English in-laws are embarrasingly quite the antithesis of the High culture that the two brothers aspire to. This culture exchange is very much real and not artificially engineered. I feel that we should push on and form our own CANZUK union regardless of the opinions of others. However in the near-impossible event that the USA should wish to join our union on our terms I would not say no (or yes) instinctively, but would think about it and examine the conditions at the time. I feel strongly that making our diplomacy merely to counteract the very strong influences of the USA makes us the poorer man. I am more interested in redefining the USA-CANZUK relationship than a Union between the two nations but am always open to new ideas and opinions. [ Post a Reply to This Message ] |