World Politics
What does it mean to be an American?
It’s not just about where you’re born but what you believe in, it’s the core principles of the United States of America.
At surface level it means, according to Webster’s dictionary: “a native or inhabitant of the U.S. : a U.S. citizen” — but if you look deeper, that question has two answers. What it currently means to be an American and what it should mean to be an American. It is a question that challenges the very ideals of our nation.
Let’s start with what it means now. It means supporting a government deeply divided into factions arguing over pointless cultre wars, it means pledging loyalty to both a neo-imperialist nation and the global police. It requires support for horrors all over the world, from My Lai in Vietnam to Abu Ghraib in Iraq and even domestic atrocities ranging from the lengthy plague of slavery to the trail of tears or internment of Japanese Americans. It requires being the soul of the American dream and a beacon of hope around the world even if at times that hope tends more false than true. It means being a supporter of wars of liberation like WW2 in the allied battle against the Nazis but also supporters of replacing foreign dictators with pro-american leaders in pseudo-democratic and heavily influenced…
