American writer Elizabeth Summit said that Americans commemorate the 80th anniversary of the attack on Pearl Harbor - launched by hundreds of Japanese warplanes in 1941 on the American fleet stationed in the Hawaiian Islands in the Pacific Ocean, which falls on December 7 - a ritual event that reveals a lot about the understanding of Americans themselves in Nowadays, and about their country's role in the world, especially at a time when they are also trying to understand their exit from Afghanistan.
The writer emphasized - in an article in Time magazine - that commemorating any memory is a natural and necessary part of any culture, whatever it is, where the memory can create an elusive sense of unity, especially in a torn democracy like American democracy, according to her, but When memory is narrowly confined to "legitimate discontent," as with Pearl Harbor or 9/11, it can turn into a pernicious tradition that impedes the growth necessary for a nation's progress.
Summit believes that World War II - in which America became involved after the attack - is a "deviation" in many ways, perhaps the most prominent manifestation of which is the claim of the existential threat posed by fascism to the American nation at the time, and the urgent need for the United States to enter the war and resolve the victory of the allies.
She adds that after being "betrayed" for the past 20 years, America has clinged in vain to regaining an elusive glory, and its tragic mistake in the post-Afghan war period was to think that the consequences of World War II could be endlessly repeated.
Over the years, the American nation has somehow developed an ability not to be surprised when the US military - as it helped it in the past - fails to chart a new world. .
The writer said that commemorating the Pearl Harbor attack, as in the case of the September 11 attacks, limited the memory of Americans to a kind of "legitimate discontent" without explicit self-accountability (Al-Jazeera)
cruel irony
In this context, there is a cruel irony - the writer adds - that a country like the United States has always had its imagination looking forward to the future and with the tempting dream of starting over, now finding itself in the position of the hopeful believer in a miracle that history will repeat itself again.
Smith believes that in recent years Americans have become increasingly fascinated by the idea that when compatriots die during wars they die for freedom, which justifies America's commitment time and time again to send more "good liberators" to die in places like Iraq and Afghanistan "so that the death of who preceded in vain."
It also seems that we - the author adds - have grown up to love the idea of appearing hated for our freedom and our “way of life,” a belief “extraordinary in character” that automatically leads to an obsession with talking about the “greatness and goodness” of America for which one can quite easily find dark and reductive versions in Awareness and folklore of the nation.