It’s Independence Day in small town USA. The country pride is high.
Outside my window, fireworks crack the sky open. I think of mortars falling, of distant and not-so-distant gunfire. Of countries where there is no such thing as independence. And I think that America is great. I also think that it has grown so great that it no longer remembers why this holiday is so important.
Americans like tout the word freedom as if it is the secret pass-phrase into a superhero hideout. We celebrate ourselves as victorious heroes who overcame great odds, but the truth is that, for a very long time, this country has not known what it is not to be free. It has forgotten what it is to be small, powerless, beleaguered and belittled. It has forgotten the days when those flashes and that rumbling were made by cannon and muskets of enemy forces coming across the fields. More importantly, it has forgotten why those battles were fought in the first place. Those revolutionary battles were not fought to give us a birthright to luxury, but to give people the chance to strive for a better life.
One would think that a better life would make a better kind of people, more gracious, kinder. But separation from hardship has inured this nation to freedom. The desperate huddled masses are forgotten apart from a few media feeding frenzies if they get the proper pathetic photo or have the right political slant for the day.
Consequently, the days of expansive welcome that inspired the poem “The New Colossus” to be placed on the Statue of Liberty, have been forgotten in proportion. Commiseration and compassion have on many levels been abandoned for nationalism and an ugly, fierce pride in something that begins to look more and more dystopian with every passing year.
Perhaps, America will remain great in terms of size and political power. But is it good? And what, dear friends, will it take to make it better? Don’t look to politicians. Or soldiers. This isn’t truly a matter of immigration policy or gun control or even desegregation. Legislation is never going to fix what is wrong with this country. What is wrong lies inside our hearts, our minds, places sacred and intangible—in our very souls. We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal. And until we are able to look at people, any people, and see that their souls are no different than ours, that their children are no different than our children, then we will continue this downward spiral, desperately grasping at whatever we think we need to keep us afloat, never realizing that all of these things we cling to so greedily are what is weighing us down.
I long for my country to be good, noble and worthy. I want to be able to be proud to live here, not because the country is amazing, but because it is full of people who are truly trying to be great.
Outside my window, fireworks crack the sky open. I think of mortars falling, of distant and not-so-distant gunfire. Of countries where there is no such thing as independence. And I think that America is great. I also think that it has grown so great that it no longer remembers why this holiday is so important.
Americans like tout the word freedom as if it is the secret pass-phrase into a superhero hideout. We celebrate ourselves as victorious heroes who overcame great odds, but the truth is that, for a very long time, this country has not known what it is not to be free. It has forgotten what it is to be small, powerless, beleaguered and belittled. It has forgotten the days when those flashes and that rumbling were made by cannon and muskets of enemy forces coming across the fields. More importantly, it has forgotten why those battles were fought in the first place. Those revolutionary battles were not fought to give us a birthright to luxury, but to give people the chance to strive for a better life.
One would think that a better life would make a better kind of people, more gracious, kinder. But separation from hardship has inured this nation to freedom. The desperate huddled masses are forgotten apart from a few media feeding frenzies if they get the proper pathetic photo or have the right political slant for the day.
Consequently, the days of expansive welcome that inspired the poem “The New Colossus” to be placed on the Statue of Liberty, have been forgotten in proportion. Commiseration and compassion have on many levels been abandoned for nationalism and an ugly, fierce pride in something that begins to look more and more dystopian with every passing year.
Perhaps, America will remain great in terms of size and political power. But is it good? And what, dear friends, will it take to make it better? Don’t look to politicians. Or soldiers. This isn’t truly a matter of immigration policy or gun control or even desegregation. Legislation is never going to fix what is wrong with this country. What is wrong lies inside our hearts, our minds, places sacred and intangible—in our very souls. We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal. And until we are able to look at people, any people, and see that their souls are no different than ours, that their children are no different than our children, then we will continue this downward spiral, desperately grasping at whatever we think we need to keep us afloat, never realizing that all of these things we cling to so greedily are what is weighing us down.
I long for my country to be good, noble and worthy. I want to be able to be proud to live here, not because the country is amazing, but because it is full of people who are truly trying to be great.
“Keep, ancient lands, your storied pomp!” cries she
With silent lips. “Give me your tired, your poor,
Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,
The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.
Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me,
I lift my lamp beside the golden door!”
THE NEW COLOSSUS
Emma Lazarus
