Who Are We?

WHO are we? It’s an eternal human question, and though it is only three words long, it can be posed in three radically different ways. “Who are we?” can be the question of the newly independent country or the newly liberated group: Where do we come from, what is our story? “Who are we?” can also be the question of the troubled or the uncertain, the question of conscience. And finally, “Who are we?” can be the question of the nation at war or the group under attack: Where is the boundary to be drawn between us and those who threaten us-who is in the group and who is out?

Phrased that last way, this eternal human question has suddenly become immediate and urgent for the nations of Europe. At the Labour party’s national conference nine days after the first London bombing, British prime minister Tony Blair offered a powerful and memorable answer: “The spirit of our age is one in which the prejudices of the past are put behind us, where our diversity is our strength. It is this which is under attack. Moderates are not moderate through weakness but through strength. Now is the time to show it in defense of our common values.”

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David Frum

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WHO are we? It’s an eternal human question, and though it is only three words long, it can be posed in three radically different ways. “Who are we?” can be the question of the newly independent country or the newly liberated group: Where do we come from, what is our story? “Who are we?” can also be the question of the troubled or the uncertain, the question of conscience. And finally, “Who are we?” can be the question of the nation at war or the group under attack: Where is the boundary to be drawn between us and those who threaten us-who is in the group and who is out?

Phrased that last way, this eternal human question has suddenly become immediate and urgent for the nations of Europe. At the Labour party’s national conference nine days after the first London bombing, British prime minister Tony Blair offered a powerful and memorable answer: “The spirit of our age is one in which the prejudices of the past are put behind us, where our diversity is our strength. It is this which is under attack. Moderates are not moderate through weakness but through strength. Now is the time to show it in defense of our common values.”