[R-G] Thanksgiving Hypocrisy

[Anthony Fenton]

http://www.zmag.org/sustainers/content/2007-11/20lendman.cfm
ZNet Commentary
Thanksgiving Hypocrisy November 20, 2007
By  Stephen Lendman

In the US, Thanksgiving is celebrated on the fourth Thursday of  
November to give thanks for the year's blessings and bounty. At least  
that's how it began. It's not, however, the current practice. Most  
people defile the day's spirit in how they spend it over a full four  
day holiday weekend - with overindulgent eating, parades, "can't  
miss" football from Thursday through Sunday, and, key for merchants,  
the "official" start of the Christmas holiday shopping season. It  
begins Thanksgiving Friday, is now an orgy of holiday consumerism,  
continues through Christmas eve, ebbs for a day, then builds again  
for a final celebratory new year's welcome with more overindulgent  
eating, drinking, partying, and binge-shopping for nonessentials.

This holiday, like all others, is also replete with myths, and young  
minds are filled with them. They're taught the Pilgrims invited  
Native Indians to share their bounty in a show of brotherhood and  
friendship with an array of foods early settlers never heard of that  
were indigenous to the Americas and introduced to them by Native  
peoples. The Pilgrims had nothing to do with this tradition. It began  
with Eastern Indians observing fall harvest celebrations centuries  
before the first settlers arrived. After they did, there was no such  
observance as "Thanksgiving."

While George Washington had days for national thanksgiving, modern  
holiday celebrations date from the Civil War in 1863 when Abraham  
Lincoln wanted a way to boost morale and patriotic fervor of the  
Union Army. His idea was to proclaim a national Thanksgiving holiday  
for the first time ever. It had nothing to do with the Pilgrims nor  
were they ever mentioned until 1890, and the term Pilgrim was never  
even used until the 1870s. So much for tradition and what passes for  
history that, in fact, is pure myth.

The Thanksgiving holiday is also a way to promote what Edward Herman  
calls our "indispensable state," our innate goodness and the illusion  
of American exceptionalism, moral and cultural superiority, and the  
belief that the Almighty made us special the way ideological Zionists  
feel Jews are "the chosen people." It's a short step from these views  
to judging others inferior, especially those ranked low in the  
racial, religious, ethnic or cultural pecking order - blacks,  
Latinos, and today's number one target of choice for a nation at war  
and an enemy needed to justify it - Muslims hatefully portrayed as  
"radicals, extremists, gunmen, insurgents," and "Islamofascists."

Thanksgiving also serves another purpose. It has special religious  
significance in a nation with three-fourths of the population  
Christian, and the traditional separation of church and state now  
weakened. The US was founded as a secular state, and First Amendment  
constitutional law affirms it stay that way with freedom of religion  
guaranteed. In 1802, Jefferson called for a "wall of separation"  
between them, and earlier Supreme Courts agreed. They ruled this  
separation is required to prohibit any state religion and require  
government avoid undue religious involvement, its trappings or  
expressions. That's now changed under radicalized right wing rule.

Today, the extremist Christian Right jeopardizes religious freedom  
with frightening implications to consider. Their movement became  
dominant in the Reagan 1980s and reemerged even more virulently under  
George Bush. It's close to the seat of power with ideologues like Pat  
Robertson, Jerry Falwell while he was living, James Dobson, and  
radical Zionist Muslim hate-preacher John Hagee having enormous  
influence on the administration and Congress.

Religious freedom was jeopardized by the introduction of the  
"Constitution Restoration Act of 2004" that was reintroduced in near- 
identical form in 2005. So far it's gone nowhere, but if introduced  
again and adopted in the 110th or a later Congress, it would turn the  
US into a de facto theocracy even though its supporters deny that  
intent. Don't believe them.

Dominionists like Pat Robertson and others support the bill as do  
influential sponsoring members of both Houses. Their goal is simple,  
but they won't admit it - tear down the sacred wall between church  
and state so the US can be governed by their extremist Christian  
dogma. It would make believers of other faiths, or none at all,  
lawbreakers with their version of Christian canon the new law of the  
land - a very scary prospect for about 75 million non-Christians in  
the country and many of Christian faith who won't go along.

If it's ever adopted, this bill will prevent the Supreme Court from  
challenging the right of anyone in or affiliated with federal, state  
or local government to affirm "God as the sovereign source of law,  
liberty, or government" - an extremist Christian God, that is. Any  
judge at any level interpreting the law otherwise would henceforth be  
subject to impeachment and prosecution in the new USA ruled by the  
empowered Pat Robertson types in it. It would also likely make  
Thanksgiving an obligatory Christian observance, even for non- 
Christians, and make its religious overtones mandatory.

As it's now celebrated, Thanksgiving is already shameful. While  
barely giving thanks, if at all, we forget millions of poor, deprived  
and oppressed peoples everywhere and our government's role in their  
condition. We also ignore the systematic dismantling of our  
constitutional rights and denial of essential social services to  
growing millions without them. And we're too distracted by bread,  
circuses and overindulgence to oppose injustice and support the  
rights and needs of people everywhere.

This day and others should be times of reflection, thanks and much  
more. Blessings aren't given. They're earned and just as easily lost  
when rogue leaders threaten our freedoms, and democracy is an  
illusion. But it's not something new. Our tradition is long and  
disturbing with conflict, violence, and our framers design that the  
"supreme Law of the Land" give government unlimited power, the  
Executive unchecked amounts of it, and "we the people" meant only the  
privileged. It's pure fantasy thinking we have limited government,  
constitutionally constrained and one of, by and for the people. Look  
at the record.

Along with war, militarism, expansionism and free market  
fundamentalism, we're a nation addicted to privilege. It's always  
been this way despite our prevailing fiction of an egalitarian  
country respecting everyone's rights. That's nonsense in a nation  
glorifying wealth and power and those with it claiming a divine right  
for more.

It's always been that way and especially since WW II when the US  
emerged unchallenged as the world's only superpower. Since then we've  
had imperial wars, CIA-instigated coups, political assassinations,  
and disdain for the law to defend unfettered capitalism from  
beneficial social change. On November 22, we should do more than give  
thanks. We should ask for forgiveness and demand accountability.

Journalism Professor Robert Jensen is right calling for a "No Thanks  
to Thanksgiving" in his earlier writing. He suggests we'd be hugely  
uplifted by replacing our overindulgent "white supremicist"  
Thanksgiving ritual with a "National Day of Atonement" and have it  
include self-reflective fasting for our forefathers' "original sin"  
no matter where our own came from. Establishing that tradition would  
be an important step forward - toward a day to give thanks every day  
in a land with leaders resolved never to repeat the crimes of the  
past and equally committed to public service instead of just for the  
elite part of it.

Stephen Lendman lives in Chicago and can be reached at  
lendmanstephen at sbcglobal.net.

Also visit his blog site at sjlendman.blogspot.com and listen to The  
Steve Lendman News and Information Hour on TheMicroEffect.com Mondays  
at noon US central time.