The American Culture of Fear
Some folks have been celebrating since the announcement of Osama Ben Laden's supposed execution. But have we as a culture become less disquieted as a result of this announcement or merely temporarily pacified in our mistaken notions holding perceptions manufactured by those who would manipulate our thoughts?
Considering that the American population comprises people from every conceivable culture on the face of the planet, still the prevailing culture may be characterized as one of free capitalistic enterprise, nationalistic pride, and a belief in the sovereignty of every citizen. The various ethnic cultures coming here frequently do so because they perceive of America as the land of opportunity. America’s globalization in free enterprise supports investments in the endless markets of capitalistic ventures that attract many hoping to gain fortune and the other amenities derived from US citizenship or the association thereof. Many coming here have a good idea about what they typically want and expect ─ often having a working knowledge of the necessary roles they must assume to achieve those goals. Others, unfortunately, may come to America wearing a façade concealing hidden agendas with sinister goals. The culture of those so motivated consider themselves as having a religious mandate fortified by belligerence and enforced by a self-sacrificing and murderous fanaticism they believe will secure a place for themselves in an otherworldly paradise (Marinoff, 2007). Clearly, compatibility between the cultures of theocratic governments of the world and the encroaching globalization from capitalism does not exist.
This incompatibility, thus far, has resulted in the most infamous day of the 21st century – the terrorist invasion initiating the holocaust at the World Trade Center we call 911. From that time forward, American society has become increasingly acquainted with the now familiar axiom, “culture of fear”.
Wikipedia defines the term as the “. . . perceived prevalence of fear and anxiety in public discourse and relationships and how this may affect the way people interact with each other as individuals and as democratic agents” (Culture, 2008).
Subsequent to 911, public understanding of the “culture of fear” in social usage has been shaped by the media’s presentation of ensuing events relevant to the government’s impotence in protecting its citizenry from outside invasion. None of us went unaffected by the sudden realization that we as a nation could be so vulnerable to the startling scheme of an otherworldly culture making a political statement in blatant remonstrative fashion. Ever more telling, an immediate victimization of thousands had occurred right before our very eyes highlighting this culture of fear while producing a climate of disorientation in which possibly thousands more came to suffer the phenomenon known as Post Traumatic Stress Disorder or PTSD (Bacon, 2008).
On 911, from near and far, the response from emergency personnel all across the country was predictably immediate and swift. The public at large knew under these tragic circumstances what the response from emergency medical worker, firefighters, and law enforcement agencies that day would be (Kaplan, 2007, p. 126). The brave men and women that risked their lives in service to others in an attempt to reduce the carnage of that catastrophe are all to be applauded, honored, and acknowledged for the sacrifices freely given on that fateful day.
Yet, the climate making for a culture of fear has forever been etched into our minds and entangled upon a landscape that previously held the notion of inviolate security. Many of us became afraid and suspicious of anyone that looked remotely “Arab” and some of the paranoia remains apparent to this day by the discrimination and frequent acts of violence against totally unrelated and uninvolved members of Islamic denominations and nations. For US citizens, the ramifications and historical dynamics generating the emotional impact imposed upon those that would have chosen otherwise, have shaken America’s notion of a supposed invulnerability. Prior to 911, perhaps most Americans took for granted that as a nation we were secure within our own shores from the ravages of foreign invasion. Perhaps many of us believed we could continue to sit daily and comfortably watch our television programs that sometimes portrayed foreign excursions, while pacifying ourselves with the notion, “It could never happen here.”
Well, lo and behold, what seemed like a normal sunshiny Tuesday morning on September 11, 2001 in New York City, the place termed as “the world’s capital city,” it did happen. For people like Stephen King, surviving the aftermath of that horrendous day involves the difficulty in comprehending a radical faction within a culture justifying their Jihad (Marinoff, 2007). For the Saudi Arabian radicals responsible for the 911 act of war, it became a “noble” act to fight a “holy” war in defense of Islam even if it required the mass murder of thousands of innocent civilians and their own suicide (Johnson, 2003; Marinoff, 2007).
The differences that lie in a cosmology far removed from the customary images, typical conduct, observations, and responses that American society takes for granted (Kaplan, 2007, p. 126) and a strict theocratic government, culture, and society cannot be overestimated (Johnson, 2003; Marinoff, 2007, p. 445-446). For the strictest Saudi Islamic, answering the question posed by Typification as “Who am I and who is the other,” (Kaplan, 2007) the answer might be something like, “I am the avenger of Allah, defender of the faith ─ death to the infidels” (Marinoff, 2007). For a sovereign citizen of America such as Stephen King, the answer would ordinarily be the role he has assumed, “I am a fire fighter and citizen of the United States of America” and all the meaning inherent within that role as an emergency rescue worker.
Of the many consequences, the seeds for a culture of fear took deeper root in a society already grown accustomed to the prospect of unexpected tragedies. From a climate already fertile with fear came the post traumatic stress disorder keeping Stephen King, a retired fire fighter, in the painful grips of dysfunction. Here for King, the typification that Alfred Schultz (Kaplan 2007, p. 126) spoke about being loosely defined as knowing what to expect of others in a particular situation because typical behaviors characterize certain people, (126) broke down to an atypical situation unlike any that King had ever encountered. There was no standard frame of reference for a correct response, no means of prediction for any logical sequence of events, no prepared knowledge for making assessments of patterns relevant to a likely outcome of the situation (Kaplan, 2007). In his role as a fire fighter, King may have wondered, what do I do, how do I do it, and with perplexity, he may have thought, “I don’t know what to do.” Such a realization for the highly organized role of fire fighter, which has authoritative procedures typical of all emergency rescue workers, left King as stated in his own words, “. . . like a walking zombie, literally” (Bacon, 2008).
In the after math of surviving the horror of the event, he communicated that the things keeping him occupied – holding together his frame of reference now for him no longer mattered (ibid, 2008). Perhaps for the first time following 911, King’s role as a firefighter was clouded with uncertainties. Not having a clear picture relevant to what he’s suppose to be doing, where to go from here, and how to get there disabled his psychological locus of control (Neill, 2006) as the American paradigm he once knew had shifted severely.
Within the culture of fear, the probability of Stephen King’s response was predictably high. First, the dysfunction of not accepting the horror of the 911 event meant it could not be processed (Bacon, 2008). Secondly, since he could not access the memory of what had occurred, the suppression of the memory caused the lost of his sense of direction; what had been significant to him before now no longer mattered. Thirdly, the sense of having lost direction resulted in the post traumatic stress disorder rendering him dysfunctional. As contradictory as it sounds, in order for King to process the horror of the memory, he had to relive it, but with the acceptance that the tragedy would occur in the face of an inherently ongoing culture of fear (Bacon, 2008).
JoAnn Difede at Weill Cornell Medical College stated of those suffering PTSD like King, “If they can’t access the memories, then they really can’t process it and get better.” From this it can be reasonably surmised that King and others like him are suppressing those painful memories and this keeps them locked into a patterned of dysfunction.
For retired firefighter, Stephen King, the apparent cause of PTSD lies in America’s culture of fear catalyzed by a lost in the sovereign security that he had formerly enjoyed as an American citizen. For him and possibly millions of other Americans, the vulnerability of a nation that held pride in its autonomous dominion had now been laid bare and open for the entire world to see. Both shock and humiliation are not too strong of words in describing the evident experience that much of the American population after 911 suffered. Succeeding the negativity of 911, King needed to resolve what the appropriate role for himself would now become in American society that could give him a new definition of his purpose (Kaplan, 2008, p. 127). He had to face not only what this would mean to himself for “getting his life back,” but on a universal scale an all-encompassing meaning when considering the fact that not only was America vulnerable to outside invasion, but now, this was known to the entire world.
Jioni wrote it!
Works Cited
Bacon, A. &. (n.d.). 911: Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. Retrieved November 29, 2008, from Kaplan: http://www.pearsoncustom.com/fl/mpl_kaplan/
John P. Hewitt, D. T. (2007). Social Psychology. (K. University, Ed.) Boston, MA, USA: Pearson Custom Publishing.
Johnson, C. H. (2003, January 14). Terrorism as Mass Tort: Responsibility for 911. Retrieved December 1, 2008, from Saudi-American Forum: http://www.saudi-american- forum.org/Newsletters/SAF_Essay_03.htm
Kaplan University. (2007). Social Psychology. Boston : Pearson Custom Publishing. Marinoff, L. (2007). The Middle Way: Finding Happiness in a World of Extremes. New York and London: Sterling Publishing Company 2007.
Neill, J. (2006, December 6). What is Locus of Control. Retrieved December 1, 2008, from Psychology Class tutorial Related constructs: http://wilderdom.com/psychology/loc/LocusOfControlWhatIs.html
