The secret to grass-roots movements is legitimating people’s anger and pain and steering them into serious plans of action which will have a realistic chance of success.
In my post about my recent ousting from the American Expatriates Facebook Group (henceforth “AE”), I tried to be factual, rational and cerebral. I intentionally avoided incendiary or foul language; rather I tried to simply recount what happened at AE, without undue emotion. In a later post, one of the contributors at AE posted that my post was “not so nice“:
This group is a valuable resource for many and I greatly appreciate all those who work hard for all of us. However, it does not excuse the nastiness which occurred yesterday. If I played a part in the nastiness, I offer my apologies. The only excuse I have is that I was at the end of my rope with certain individuals. One of the individuals has posted a not so nice piece on the Isaac Brock Society site about this group and Keith Redmond. For me, it shows the true colors of this person and this person will do anything to ram their way of doing things down everyone’s throat. So please make sure that we can have a level of decorum which can make this group the best that it can be.
Here are some other characterizations from various commenters:
- “I missed the discussion but I totally support you, Keith Redmond. Mr. Petros is free to start his own group for whiners and America bashers.”
- “The departed whiners went way beyond US bashing. To say more about my opinion would enter into subjective judgments regarding personalty traits and would not be productive.”
- The blog poster [Petros] has the right to say what he likes, but I think he’s crossed a line using the names of the admin in his post Keith. You don’t start randomly posting hate blogs using people’s names unless you can back up what your saying, even then it’s just best to stop and think before you post. The Internet is written in ink not in pencil what is said can’t be removed. Best to really think before you post, after all this group isn’t secret or closed the whole world can see it!!!!
A hate blog? Really? I do express my disagreement with the policy of deleting comments and entire discussions. But I did not express hatred for these people. Well I do admit that the term “Homelander Abroad” is pejorative, particularly in the manner that I used it. I’ve been asking myself if this characterization is merely inflammatory. What made me think it was an appropriate to call AE administrators “Homelanders Abroad”.
So today I’d like to set out my reflexions on what characterizes Homelanders Abroad. Here is what I came up with:
Ultimate Loyalty
My friend and author David Koyzis shared an excerpt from his book:
“To be sure, we sometimes speak of the human community or the international community, but in general the more expansively a community is defined, the more abstract and less concrete it becomes. The more abstract a community becomes, the less able it is to command the loyalty of its members and to become a focus of communal identity.” We Answer to Another: Authority, Office, and the Image of God, p. 147.
Koyzis clarified further in a comment on his Facebook page:
People have multiple overlapping loyalties, and that is as it should be. The idea that national allegiance is an exclusive or highest allegiance is a dangerous notion that must be resisted. Allegiance to a “national” political community makes sense only in the context of loyalties to more proximate communities. Yves R. Simon notes that the common good is dependent on all the particular goods which ordinary people pursue on a day-to-day basis.
As for a so-called human community, it can have little if any substance. Even people who claim such loyalty are in effect showing their allegiance, not to humanity as a whole, but to a small set of cosmopolitans who just happen to claim loyalty to humanity. It is impossible to escape the us/them distinction, even if we think we have done so.
The Homelander Abroad thus is one who exemplifies less loyalty to the proximate and greater loyalty to the abstract US national community. There may be some very natural reasons for this attachment. Lack of citizenship , language and cultural barriers, or lack of family attachments in the country of residence may make one a permanent sojourner.
I have a simple test to determine ultimate loyalty: Which would you be more inclined to do if the USA invaded your country of residence? Would you help the USA to accomplish its task? Or would you defend your country of residence? If your answer is that you would be more inclined to help the USA than to defend your country against the USA, then you are likely a Homelander Abroad. This question is quite easy for me to answer. When the USA attacked my family through threats of financial ruin, I relinquished my US citizenship. And if the USA were to invade Canada a second time with troops, I would fight the attackers of my hearth and home. My ultimate loyalty is not to the abstract but to the concrete–those who are closest to me: my wife, my neighbors, and my cats.
USA-centricism
In the view of AE adminstrators, the best way to solve the FATCA crisis is to work the system–lobby the US government, discuss with bureaucrats, exploit contacts in the government and the media. On the smaller, more tolerant Facebook group, Citizenship Taxation, this view was expressed to me yesterday by a domestic Homelander: “Well I might make a suggestion. If you dont’ like a law, work within the existing system to change it.” First, I have to say that this person understands the term “law” to mean US law–in all this the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms or the body of International Law governing the relations between nations are meaningless. Secondly, he believes that the only legitimate way to address the problem is through the existing system, i.e. through Washington DC. And this is exactly the approach of the administrators of AE–one who is the President of Democrats Abroad in Sweden complained:
After spending his entire weekend making preparations Keith, along with John Fredenburger from AARO met with:Elena Virgadamo – Department of Treasury, Wendy Ryde – Chief, American Citizen Services, James Heg – Minister Counselor for Economic Affairs and Daniel Goodspeed – Minister Counselor for Consular Affairs at the American embassy in France on OUR behalf outlining all the banking difficulties. That effort was on top of the daily work Keith puts into this –week in and week out– with absolutely no compensation for it. …
Yet there isn’t a day that goes by that someone just has to post something completely irrelevant and unhelpful to the situation just to make a point. If you have the time it takes to rummage for any and every negative article you can find on the internet then perhaps you should think about putting that time to better use and do something that would actually make a difference!
Thus, the administrators are indeed industrious, and one can only hope that their efforts will bear fruit. My efforts on the other hand are nothing but America bashing. The work that Petros has done since writing his first blog post on February 25, 2010, the day I decided that I had to renounce my US citizenship, is just whining. But I maintain that my writing, for which I am not paid either, is indeed doing something–it is helping others to see that their complaints are legitimate and it has spurred them to action. My role in this battle, I said, is as a writer. But a Homelander Abroad said:
It’s easy to sit back and say your writing is lighting the fire in others, but that seems unlikely and somewhat arrogant. All you’re doing is making extreme comparisons between the U.S. and evil things in the world, you’re not contributing ideas.
But for me the system is foreign and illegitimate. I am no longer a part of that system, and it has no legal role in my life. For Homelanders Abroad, all they see is bashing and that nothing I do is helpful, because I seek no USA-centric solutions.
Parochial Paternalism
Ultimate loyalty to the USA and USA-centricism ultimately leads to reactions like we’ve seen at AE. Homelanders Abroad view my critique of their culture as disloyal bashing. They have dubbed our cries for justice as whining, and they have decided that it can no longer be permitted. Above all, they needed to silence my voice–because I insist that the objections and complaints are legitimate and necessary for any meaningful discussion of our situation. The secret to grass-roots movements is legitimating people’s anger and pain and steering them into serious plans of action which will have a realistic chance of success. To silence the complaints is the top down strategy of an oppressor. It is hardly a mistake then that the administrators of AE are party operatives in Republicans Overseas France (Keith Redmond) and Democrats Abroad Sweden (Deedee Gierow). Whether they understand it or not, the chief purpose of these political organizations is to promote their party’s agenda to expats, not to promote the concerns of expats to the political party. I.e., these political operatives are often at cross purposes of the interests of groups like the Isaac Brock Society or Maple Sandbox. By representing the interests of US political parties, these operatives at AE demonstrate that their focus and their ultimate loyalty lie along the Potomac, and not along the Seine, nor in Stockholm. Thus, they must silence those who seem disloyal to America.
Their silencing of critics, deleting their comments and posts, is parochial; it is judgment based on USA-centricism. Calling it bashing and thus illegitimate is also paternalistic. I wrote in another blog post that one of the aspects of a paternalistic leadership style is to belittle those below you:
Belittling. In a paternalistic relationship, the superior belittles the intellect, opinions and concerns of the inferior. The superiority complex in the paternalistic relationship often causes the stronger person to consider the opinions of the weaker to be nonsensical or foolish. The inferiors accept that they have a low level of competence and are in need of the greater intelligence of their superiors. The inferior will accept being treated as a child in need of guidance, unable to make decisions for himself. In the paternalistic relationship between slaves and masters, the master will often call a fully grown man, “Boy”. Also, the superior will often pretend to listen to the inferior only in an effort to trick the inferior into implementing the superior’s agenda. If the inferior party complains, the superior will begin to make accusations of disloyalty, ungratefulness, stupidity, lunacy or extremism. If that doesn’t work, the superior may use violent force to quell legitimate complaints.
I have insisted for the last five years that the United States is acting in a criminal and immoral fashion, destroying so-called US citizens abroad. The administrators and members at AE who remain, now agree (with a few bold exceptions) that I am navel lint, that my concerns are merely nonsensical and foolish “bashing” of their beloved America.
Lines are being drawn in the sand–not by me. Those who belittle our concerns resemble Vichy and not Charles de Gaulle. I, for one, do not believe that resistance is futile.
Petros;
re; “…The secret to grass-roots movements is legitimating people’s anger and pain and steering them into serious plans of action which will have a realistic chance of success. To silence the complaints is the top down strategy of an oppressor….”
Many social movements did not succeed only by working as supplicants within the system. Usually there was a spectrum of approaches – including civil disobedience, increasingly public protests, etc. Those who claim that the way forward is only by approaching the powers that be as prostrate supplicants BENEFIT greatly from those who do not. Thus, despite decrying IBS and our overt loud criticism of the US government (and the governments who have betrayed part of their citizenry by acceding to US threats and signing onto FATCA), groups like the Democrats Abroad, and other expat groups benefit from the heat generated by those others who have decided that begging and pleading is making no difference – the groups that decry us can pat themselves on the back in a self congratulatory fasion while feeling smug about being able to point and wag the finger at us. Yet they can refer to us as evidence of the size of the oppression and the level of unrest and resistance that CBT and FATCA and FBARs have engendered. We are raising the visibility of the very grievances they are supplicating about. Our home is not the US, and thus we are fighting against the imposition of this in our home. It is not DA or any of the other groups who are funding and carrying out legal action. They are also not assisting people who need to renounce/relinquish and those who cannot wait any longer for relief or recourse from the CBT/FATCA threat. I do not see any of them raise the issue of the CBT treatment of the savings and benefit supports belonging to the most vulnerable – children and those deemed legally incompetent.
Those groups need us to exist – while at the same time wagging their finger at us.
The administrators of AE made the choice to serve their party hacks, and their beloved country. Instead of being a group of American expatriates, for American expatriates, they’re now down the dark path of serving the puppet masters that are turning the screws on American expatriates.
It shows most blatantly when actual American expatriates, with actual expat problems, are told that they’re whining, and that their concerns are illegitimate. Then are belittled, bullied, and ultimately suppressed, until they either leave the group, or are summarily ejected. I fail to see how these actions have any purpose in serving the expatriate community, except to further alienate and divide them. Some of these expatriates already feel alienated by governmental policies that are causing direct harm to them. But to be alienated by an expat group, too? That is simply beyond the pale.
I was also one of the ‘whiners’, even though I was being constructive by offering multiple suggestions on how we ought to proceed as a group. Instead, they really seemed more interested in using my story for their partisan gain, and deep down, I really kind of suspected as much, so I refused. I’m sorry, but I want relief from this policy oppression. I don’t want to be used as some political pawn, and I sure as hell don’t want my wife’s story to be used likewise. But yeah. Deleting entire threads, and intimidating other members? It stopped being a group that I could work with, and meaningfully participate in, and it would’ve only been a matter of time before I was tossed out of there, too.
Morale of the story, is never trust an American that claims to have your back. Always keep your eyes open, and your mind skeptical. The truth will always reveal itself in time.
Well, for what it’s worth, after participating in this battle against CBT, FATCA and FBAR for some years, only IBS has really made headway. ACA tries but get side tracked into band aid solutions such as same country exemption. DA is a joke – they really don’t want to help for fear of upsetting the Emperor. RO talks the talk but has yet to walk the walk -> discussions about a suit that ‘will happen soon’ but has not happened yet and I am starting to believe may not happen and it if does, it is for political effect. IBS and others have worked very hard and we have come a long way. However, I feel that perhaps we are now diluting ourselves (and perhaps deluding ourselves as well) with now a separate Facebook page on CBT and American Expatriates and Americans Resident Overseas, and issues arising on Facebook between ‘folks’ (to coin a favorite Emperor expression) arguing with one another rather than focussing on the objective. Legal action is needed, in conjunction with political action – in a consistent and unified form, gives us our best shot at getting change to happen.
It is the US laws that are very seriously and substantially bashing US persons resident overseas, backed by what some may characterize as state sponsored financial terrorism. How bad is it? Is is so bad that people are renouncing, in increasing numbers, US citizenship who really don’t want to. That is a very big and emotional step. And as Petros points out, they do it for love of family first in a forced decision between overseas family and US citizenship. As John X Hanson pointed out they do it because US CBT, FATCA, and FBAR places one’s family financial viability in peril. “What kind of country forces me to make such a choice? Have we forgotten who we are and what we stand for?”
Amping up complaints are fully warranted in view that: 1) the press have reported articles on the injustices for years, 2) the press are unwilling to interview those responsible for the laws, 3) Congress has been alerted for years with testimony and letters to the House Ways and Means Committee and to the Senate Finance Committee, 4) there is no direct representation of US persons living overseas, 5) Congress and POTUS appear not to get legal advice on the Constitutionality of their laws but want to wait for the Supreme Court to tell them how to do their jobs and advise them on Constitutional matters years after the fact. 6) And all during this time the laws are not relaxed but the compliance noose gets tightened further. & all for $0 in US government services in exchange.
So Petros from what I read of your comments and the comments about your comments is that those commentators are belittling the concerns you raise, AS IF they have the situation in hand with imminent remedy of all issues. I don’t believe them. I don’t visit that Facebook Page (I should show support) yet from what you say it does indeed sound like it’s moderation executive is being overrun by Homelanders Abroad and Democrats Abroad-not wanting the FACTA party (Democrats) to look bad going into the upcoming presidential election.
There needs reminding that the sentiments expressed incorporate principals upon which America was founded – which America appears to have forgotten in its CBT, FBAR, and FATCA laws – and that you Petros are perhaps being more “American” than those who comment in opposition to you.
Some very thoughtful feedback so far. Thanks.
@Petros
JC was right on the money when he said that you were more American than those so-called Americans that drummed you out of AE. They sure as hell weren’t acting like real Americans in my view.
But indeed, if their behaviour is what passes off as American these days, then who needs them?
Who needs them? Well that is obvious in one respect: If the aim is to silence the “whiners” than it is the oppressive US government that benefits.
Yup, and the two corrupt parties benefit as well, for every problem they get to sweep under the rug in pursuit of money, and the vote.
Did everybody hear that “Big Shot” Bernie threw his hat in the ring for the Presidential race in 2016? I drew this up to welcome that @$$hole to the Presidential race.
https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/UcnW6lN_vGHOtjbDA0L2Q4dF8Muiwkj6GQChP8pRuvg=w485-h354-no
@Steve,
Nobody is arguing at Citizenship Taxation.
@ Petros
AE’s attitude towards you reminds me of a line drom a song dating back to the US civil war. “If anyone be offended by what I have to sing, then surely his own conscience provides the better sting.”
Hmmmm…wonder if I should join CBT and drive Michael Stiso absolutely “bananas”.
If he says mjh and Petros are spewing vitriol and America-bashing…he ain’t seen nothin’ yet.
“Wait’ll he gets a load of me…”
I do have some really good cookie recipes…some with alcohol…which might be needed at certain stages in this battle that we have with citizenship taxation.
Tricia – sorry, I did not mean to infer there was disagreement at Citizenship Taxation. What I meant was to question whether we are spreading ourselves too thin between all of these FB groups. I think we are all fighting for the same thing – relief from CBT, FATCA and FBAR.
The mockery continues.
I`m wondering if they are not even more terrified than we are? Financial ruin is a HUGE thing to be a threat over our heads. It really is existential. I cannot imagine that they would not celebrate should the things we want to achieve come true. It would be so much to their benefit too. But I have the feeling they have just succumbed to the giant. They feel helpless and impotent. They just don`t believe that the objectives are achievable. I say this with some form of compassion, because they really are our fellow sufferers. If our objectives were achieved they would feel relief. So they decided to try to work within the system not because they are so agreeable, but perhaps more because they don`t think anything MORE is achievable in Washington. And who knows really? They might be right. Thats not to say that reaching for the stars is wrong. Maybe it is more a question of how one views the size of the opposition to our hopes and dreams.
I believe our objectives are morally right. I believe that we have morality on our side and that CBT and double taxation is a human rights violation. But perhaps they think that such a cause is truly hopeless in view of the huge opposition to it from Washington? Not just the Democrats- but the Republicans too. I don`t see any majority in congress calling foul, and this has been going on for so long. The human race loves getting other people`s money. They love having their hands in other`s people`s pockets.
Perhaps we are the optimists and they are the pessimists? But it makes me sad to see a divide because we should in truth all be fighting this thing together.
So- sorry you were attacked Petros. I have been in other forums too. It usually happened when I said things that the others did not want to hear, and the panic level was high.
@ Petros
I meant that they are offended by your remarks because their conscience stings them more.
I am once again blocked from AE. Before I published this post they had lifted the ban, but I am unable to see if there are any reactions to this post there. I would appreciate if those would access would inform me. The heckler at CBT Facebook continues to mock and abuse which will force me to block him.
The surest way to protect one’s biased worldview is to block out all contrary arguments, Peter.
I blocked you from my Facebook account Michael Stiso because you believe that you are making a contribution by denigrading and belittling me.
Let me introduce Michael Stiso to brockers, who said as cited above, “It’s easy to sit back and say your writing is lighting the fire in others, but that seems unlikely and somewhat arrogant. All you’re doing is making extreme comparisons between the U.S. and evil things in the world, you’re not contributing ideas.”
He is the heckler that I have now blocked on Facebook. He just heckles me and provides nothing so stimulating as an argument.
Because disagreement with you amounts to belittling you, thus again making you a victim? Well, don’t worry, I won’t be staying.
Peter: Upon reflection, I realized that I was indeed harsher than civil discourse called for in our latest exchange, and I suppose that can be seen as belittling. So, my apologies for that.
I stand by what I said, but it could have been put more politely.
As for your perception that I’m constantly heckling you, though, note that you post and blog quite a lot, so you call attention to yourself. What you see as heckling, then, I see as me simply arguing with a guy who frequently posts stuff with which I disagree. I’m not singling you out, you just put yourself out there more than others. I’ve had the same debate with many others with views similar to yours.
That’s all from me.
Petros, thanks for this post and in particular for pointing out that quote from David Koyzis.
Also, regarding this:
One thing I want to point out is that Americans aren’t exceptional; this happens to every other diaspora too. Some people want to maintain their connection to their country of origin and demonstrating that they’re “good citizens” of it. Others are concerned mainly with being “good citizens” of the community where they live. Sometimes these two goals might be compatible with each other and with open expression of dissent or even disgust towards the country of origin. But in desperate situations when people feel like they’re under attack, that doesn’t happen.
History doesn’t repeat itself but it does rhyme.
Since this is comment #25 and ends up at the bottom of the page anyway, I hope no one minds the giant source dump below. (Admins, feel free to edit if you disagree) =)
https://books.google.fr/books?id=Pjpb7UgTheoC&pg=PA70&lpg=PA70
I hardly think it’s a coincidence that starting in the 1970s, at the exact time of the Suh brothers’ trial and Kim Dae-jung’s kidnapping, some Koreans in Japan decided that it was more important to focus on issues in the country where they actually lived, rather than trying to engage with their “Homeland” which had gone insane with anti-diaspora suspicion & was reaching out and attacking them
http://www.han.org/a/fukuoka92.html