Not funny at all is it? With everything going on these days, let’s just say that this has been on my mind more than humor. This happened to me about 13 years ago and it happened just as depicted.
One of the most painful things I learned while travelling and living abroad is the pervasiveness of hatred and division. It seems to be a part of human nature that we group ourselves arbitrarily and then hate the other side. Whether it’s based on race, religion, nationality, regionality, sports, or whatever, we just seem to prefer to deal with each other with an us vs them mentality. I can’t tell you why it’s like that, but it’s definitely like that. I was shocked that even in Belgium, which has a population of 11 million people, the northerners and the southerners dislike and talk trash about each other. And then there was this jerkface.
My dad spent some time in Germany in the 60s. It was in those post-WWII, post-Kennedy, the world likes America years. People were excited when they found out where he was from and they wanted to talk to him about it. Unfortunately, I was in Belgium during the George W. Bush years. Let’s just say that the world’s crush on the states had worn off by then. People often gave me a hard time for being American and they freely volunteered that they didn’t like my country. Again, people like that us vs. them mentality, and boy, they sure do like to feel superior. I didn’t like George W. Bush or his politics, but I generally tolerated some flak being thrown my way because I understood that people are just like that. However, some people take this stuff past pettiness into mean-spirited nastiness, and that is super not ok.
This took place at a bar that I really used to like. It was a small, warm space with good beer and board games. My friends and I used to go there regularly. And then one night when we were playing Jenga, this happened. It takes a heck of a lot to leave me speechless, but this did it. Man, I get that you’re not a fan of the states, but how can you be so low as to joke about a tragedy? People died. Lives were ruined. There was nothing funny about it. The man who said this was the owner of the bar too. I never went back. Similarly and sadly, when my little sister spent a semester in Ireland a year later, someone walked up to her, asked if she was American, then told her it was too bad more people didn’t die during Katrina.
So what’s the solution? What do we learn? How do we fix this mentality? How do we react against arbitrary hatred and malice? I wish I knew. I’ve traveled a lot and people really aren’t so different. We come up with these distinctions because they make us feel better for some reason. Hatred like this hurts. It easily gets taken advantage of by people with agendas. My hope is that with the rise of the internet and globalism, we’ll realize that we aren’t all so different and cut each other some slack. I hope we get there someday. Sadly though, I’m not usually very confident that we will.