It raises questions I’ve wondered about for nearly as long as I’ve been a writer, starting with this one: Why is the relationship between art and politics such an uneasy one in the U.S.? Most people in other places tend to view these as inseparable. Mexico, for example, has historically celebrated its political artists as national heroes, but here that combination can make people nervous, to put it mildly. We seem to have an aversion to national self-criticism in general. We began as a nation of rabble-rousers, bent on change. But now, patriotism is often severely defined as accepting our country to be a perfect finished product. As in, “Love it or leave it!”
I suspected this internal shift might date to the mid-20th Century, a time when U.S. citizens were persecuted, lost jobs, and could even be imprisoned for expressing dissident opinions. People were singled out not just for communism, but for supporting unions, women’s rights or racial desegregation. Those times seem to have put a stamp on our national psyche that has never completely washed off. I always thought someday I should go sleuthing, to see if I could turn up something interesting: the end of World War II, the House Un-American Activities Committee, the blacklisting of artists, I knew these were probably relevant but wasn’t sure how.
In the autumn of 2001, after the September 11 attacks, I witnessed a ferocious backlash against people who raised questions about how we should respond. The mainstream media launched a lot of vitriol at any artist or public person identified as a dissident voice. It stunned me. The culture of fear is potent and terrible, something worth dissecting in order to understand. That was the push I needed. It was time to sink or swim, so I dived into that question and swam.