Todu dipende gi hafa ta hahasso:
Chamorros on Guam and 9/11
On September 9th 2001,
the Pacific Daily News published a perspective piece by Benigno Palomo
titled “Landmark Legislation, major events happened in Guam in September.”
It contained of events in Guam’s history, all taking place in September, the
majority of which focused on Guam’s political relationship with the United
States. A few days later, the article would seem almost prophetic.
September 11th, 2001: Depending on what channel you were watching it was either an end to irony, the start of a new world, or a second day which will live in infamy. The attack on the World Trade Center in New York and the Pentagon in Washington D.C. was indeed a horrific tragedy. A defining moment in which illusions are dispelled and ideals are thrown aside and only a harsh reality meets the eye.
In his examination of the global and American response (some people think they’re the some for some reason) to 9/11, Slavoj Zizek in his book Welcome to the Desert of the Real, comments on America and how it dealt with the tragedy. “On September 11th, the USA was given the opportunity to realize what kind of a world it was part of. It might have taken this opportunity – but it did not; instead it opted to reassert its traditional ideological commitments: out with feelings of responsibility and guilt towards the impoverished Third World, we are [all] the victims now!”
Makkat este, lao debi di hu konfotme na minagahet
I awoke that morning to the TV, frantically showing over and over what film they had of the attack and the aftermath. Speculations abounded, as to who had done this and why. Everyone was frightened and scared, confused. What was happening? How could this happen to us? I found myself like most people, unable to pull away from the coverage, hanging on every new bit of info, no matter how insignificant.
For a few hours I was lost in that mindless world, which drives people to instinctively reach for something patriotic to wave, or something anti-American to beat the snot out of, without thinking of what they are doing. Biba AMERIKA! For a while I was mad as hell. For a while I wanted to yell to the island and the world that without justice there can be no peace! And those who dare shatter our peace must be brought to justice. A UOG student more than a week later would be quoted in the PDN saying “Kill them all. Turn Afghanistan into a parking lot.” I admit for a few moments the morning of the attack, I felt the same. Kill them all, and let their God sort them out.
But, soon realization formed somewhere behind the unthinking anger swelling within my mind. I began to listen to my own thoughts, my own statements and I began to realize that I was not speaking/thinking in a vacuum. That I was not alone. So many others were feeling the same, feeling so mortally different and confused as we were being pushed into this new world, built upon the charred remains of more than 3,000 people.
It was at that moment that I stopped listening to the media, that I refused to give in to the propaganda. The world was not truly any different, and if a new world was too be formed out of this, it was not the terrorists who would be doing the construction, but us. It would be us remodeling our world. And if everyone felt this intense anxiety and unreasonable anger, then the new world we were making would be one rooted in paranoia, worry and therefore the unreason of hatred.
For Chamorros, and for those linked to America, but not fully a part of the fold, the
confusion would be even greater. How were we to act with this? The circle of belonging for Chamorros is far from complete, and the relationship will most likely never be satisfactorily resolved for those who remain on Guam. Such is the nature of a colonial relationship, it is always fraught with confusion, as issues of belonging and identity, overlap, blend and mend, leaving no clear pictures.
With patriotism rushing about all, blinding and binding all with its producing propaganda and its oppressive prohibition of any dissent, I wondered what was being hidden by all this? The September 15th edition of the Pacific Daily News compounded my concern. In huge font across the front page were the words, LET FREEDOM ROAR. Nation embraces a surge of patriotism. Shaking my head in sad reservation I recalled a song lyric from the musical Chicago. In the musical while the players discuss how hype easily replaces truth in courts and in life, the lawyer Billy Flynn sings, How can they hear the truth above the roar?
Fehman magahet
In the September 14th PDN, Kongresu Robert Underwood prevailed upon the floor of Congress to “remember who we are a people.” But is exactly this point which must be questioned, this point which is obscured. After September 11th, the calls for unity, the calls for all to pull together as a people is the kind of bland rhetoric which must be resisted and critiqued. Because it dismisses and puts aside vital questions, such as “are we the same people?”
Para todu I Chamorro siha, Gefhasso pot este. Gi 9/11, kao mismo ma hatme hao, I manterrorists? Pat kao ma hahatme I passport-mu?
Are we the same? Culturally? Maybe, depends on who you ask. Historically? Perhaps, but only in a very dubious way. Politically? This is one that Chamorros always seem to get hung up on. People are always quick to pull their passports on this one, quick to quote history and deny reality. But all arguments fall because of one simple reason. Despite all the rhetoric anyone can muster in defense of the American blah blah blah way of life, rooted in yada yada yada democracy, Guam is still a colony. Military construction or cash infusion cannot destroy that. Citizenship cannot and has not destroyed that.
A little history lesson for all, Chamorros especially, is that the Chamorros under Spain, towards the end of their reign were considered Spanish citizens, with all the subsequent rights. And in an eerie parallel, they didn’t have to pay income taxes either. Also, any funding that went into Guam was primarily through the military, as Guam was nothing more to the Spanish than an outpost (which is the same as now with America) (By the way, this relationship, this continual exploitative aspect is drawn out in clear and concise form for all to see in the September 20th PDN article, “Guam’s Military role endures). One last thing which everyone should know is that in the last half of the 19th century, under Spain, Chamorros were allowed to elect their local leaders, just like we are able to do now.
So long as another country controls our destiny, politically or culturally, we are colonized in mind, body and soul. John Adams, one of the “founding dead white males” of America, was quoted this regarding British control of the colonies, “there is something very odious and unnatural about a government a thousand leagues off.” I bet he never envisioned his words would be used against the government he helped to spawn.
A significant problem with Chamorro perceptions is that much of what we think is colonialism derives from our history under Spain. But times change, and so must our ideas. Those modes of colonial control are outdates, and only work today if you have tacit US support, like in East Timor. Today’s new colonial missions are benevolent and chalked full of lip service regarding concern for human rights, self-determination and democracy. But the bottom line for colonialism has never changed.
Magofli’e yanggen fanmanosge hamyo, lao malamana yanggen ti
fanmanosge
We are still a possession as long as we remain on Guam. We are not equals. We are not really Americans. And aside from the rhetoric that occasionally comes by the slow boat to China from the states, or that which we disperse ourselves, we are constantly reminded through our own wishful forgetfulness and the US’s convenient ignorance that we are not truly part of that big gaudy American dream.
In the months following September 11th, dozens of examples pop up here and there which intimate to Guam’s being outside the circle of belonging, outside the very scope of the United States. When the PDN would run photo pieces about the aftermath of the attack, with titles such as A NATION’S TRAGEDY. A NATION’S RESOVLE. There would always be an added page, an almost “oops” afterthought, which would include Guam, constantly created as separate, as different. AN ISLAND’S RESOVLE. When America would pray a local headline would read “Guam joins America in prayer,” As if somehow when America prays, it needs to be reminded that we are supposed to be a part of that prayer group.
Less than a month after September 11th, Guam had been left out of an economic stimulus package, as well as a new series of states entitled “Greetings from America.” The impetus behind the stamps was to boost patriotism as well as the national economy. Incidentally not just Guam was left out, but also the other Insular areas and territories such as Puerto Rico, CNMI, American Samoa, the Virgin Islands and others. Earlier Guam and the other territories had also been left out of the national coin program, which issued a special quarter for each of the 50 states.
In response to the federal snub, Guam’s Delegate said that “this is a direct slap in the face at a time when we are trying to show national unity.” A Dededo resident added, “Guam is a part of the US. We can’t let them just forget us.”
Kao maolek ha’ este? Na I guatdia para democracy yan freedom
taiguini? Hamaleffa?
Aside from the obvious colonial entrapments attached to the military and its presence and its conceptualization of Guam’s essence (perfect strategic location, too bad people live there), the primary colonial force we must deal with, kololo’na pa’go despues di I hinatmen 9/11, is American patriotism.
Chamorros on Guam are caught in that terrible colonial contradiction, insisting that we are both the same and different, at the same time. For years Guam and Chamorros have been moving closer to and further away from the US. The jingoism and unthinking patriotism which has been wrenched from within or freely volunteered from every able-bodied citizen is dangerous enough in a country with the potential firepower and ability to wipe human existence from the face of this planet. But on Guam, it becomes the drug that every Chamorro longs for and secretly hates at the same time.