Political Parties: Are they destroying America?

Growing up in a white neighborhood where the people were of predominantly Italian, Irish, and German descent, I didn’t really witness racism. There weren’t any other ethnicities no less races in our little social bubble so the concept of racism was something you heard about on television or read about in history books. I was taught that the Democrats represented the workingman and rich people vote Republican. My father is a workingman, raised me to be a workingwoman, and that was the extent of my lessons on politics as a kid. I was a part of the middle class with parents who worked nonstop to make sure that we had everything we needed. As a young teenager, I assumed we were close to poor because we shopped at K-Mart and I didn’t get the black and white Reebok Classics or the Starter jacket I wanted. (Instead I got a bootleg Lakers jacket that I think my mom bought on Canal Street) As I grew up, attended college, and entered the workforce, I realized that there were many things about the world I didn’t understand.

Various nationalities and ethnicities existed in these five boroughs and I had no knowledge of any of them. I grew curious about other peoples cultures and religions and have been blessed to work along side individuals who, instead of judging me for my ignorance, kindly accepted me in spite of it and opened my eyes to a world I didn’t know existed. I then interacted with people who lived in real poverty and I soon realized how misinformed I was.

Twenty years later, I’m on every social media site just like everyone else, posting my vacation pictures and taking pictures of my dinner for Instagram. However, I never want to be someone who lives with her head in the sand again. Now more than ever, with the obvious societal divide in our country, it is the duty of those of us who were ignorant once before to help prevent those who are ignorant from being so any longer. It is a difficult task, as it puts you at odds with people you love and respect, but we have to do so if we ever want to see real change in America.

As I write this, it has been two weeks since the events in Charlottesville VA. It saddens me that people are allowing their political party affiliation to dilute the real problem this country is facing. I read people’s posts and they equate my concerns and frustrations with “Nazi hysteria”. People forget that Hitler began as one man in a cell. The Nazis and the KKK showed up to Charlottesville dressed in fatigues, armed with weapons, spreading hate, and prepared to fight. They cheered when violence erupted and openly said any individual who died opposing them deserved it. It is disheartening that people keep equating them to their opposition.

Freedom of speech and press are the most important rights we have as American citizens but when you hide behind your 1st amendment right while spewing violence and hate, you pervert what the amendment was established for. Please stop sympathizing with these people. If you are an immigrant, the child of an immigrant, multi-racial, Jewish, of Jewish decent, black, a member of the LBGTQ community, ANYTHING that is not considered White Anglo-Saxon…these people believe you’re part of the problem and would never defend you. They don’t want you either so please stop making excuses for their behavior.

I know it’s not easy but we have to unify as a nation and let the world know we will not allow Nazi ideals to take root in our soil. We are Americans and Americans believe in freedom and equality. Look around you. Meet and speak with your neighbors. You would be shocked how many of them have some connection to the Holocaust or participated in the civil rights movement because they experienced segregation in their youth and they refused to stand for it any longer. The way people look at Colin Kaepernick and judge him as anti-American while he is exercising his first amendment right is very confusing to me. He took a knee during the national anthem to protest police brutality and institutionalized racism in the United States. He did this during game time (I’m assuming) because he had the ability to reach an extremely large audience while causing the least amount of disturbance. He doesn’t rally, he doesn’t fight, he doesn’t spew hate, he simply kneels and people are boycotting the NFL and calling for him to be blacklisted from the industry because of his actions. They believe he should be stripped of his livelihood for expressing his opinion. Yet, as I scroll though the comment sections on many Facebook threads, the responses to the white supremacist rallies are quite different. People believe this is an expression of their first amendment right and justify their actions. They make statements like, “He shouldn’t lose his job for expressing his opinion” and it makes me wonder. Is racism rooted that deeply in American society that a black man expressing himself is seen as threatening whereas armed white people marching through the streets is seen as a right? They argue that the “snowflakes” are dramatizing things again, that the liberals have gone too far, that they need to stop trying to change history. They make false equivalencies to justify their blind loyalty to a political party that may not really represent their true values. Instead of acknowledging this conundrum, they legitimize their argument by comparing the removal of Confederate monuments to the idea of removing images of George Washington and Thomas Jefferson.

The problem with this comparison is that those men are the fathers of this country while Confederate generals Robert E. Lee, Stonewall Jackson, and Confederate President Jefferson Davis participated in tearing it apart. Having monuments of men in public places, representing the very slave institution the Union army fought against, prevents us from ever moving forward as a nation of tolerance and true equality. If we continue to ignore that statues of Confederate leaders represent a time in this country of extreme racism and oppression, true equality for all will continue to be unattainable.

The removal of statues representing confederate generals is not an attack on American history. It is a progressive decision symbolizing that the United States is moving forward into a more accepting society where we will no longer honor men who perpetrated institutionalized racism. “Changing history” would be never teaching about the Civil War or pretending that the dividing force in the United States was over economic opportunities for women as opposed to the economic system of slavery. These men were great generals both before and during the Civil War. They should be read about, discussed, and their lives should be memorialized in museums, classrooms, and textbooks. These men should not be revered as heroes and placed on display where people who are not white, not southern, or are immigrants have to look upon the face of their oppressor every time they walk to the store or drive to work. The main issue I have at this stage is many of my comments lead to me being viewed as an enemy to a political party (you can decide which one, I do not believe in labels) instead of them being viewed as the opinions of an educated individual.

In George Washington’s Farewell Address in 1796, he warned that political parties would be detrimental to the development and unity of the newly established United States. He stated:

“In contemplating the causes which may disturb our Union, it occurs as [a] matter of serious concern [to be]…characterizing parties [based on] geographical discriminations; Northern and Southern, Atlantic and Western…One of the [methods] of [a] party to acquire influence within particular districts is to misrepresent the opinions and aims of other districtsthey tend to render alien to each other those who ought to be bound together by fraternal affection.”*

Fast forward approximately 220 years and the Democratic and Republican political parties have dug two deep trenches in American society. Any individual who tries to present a position that lies in the middle of this political spectrum might as well be in No Man’s Land; both parties will attack you for being too sympathetic to the other. I for one don’t care…fire your comments, your criticisms, and your opinions. I am an American, I am a patriot, and I believe that political parties are destroying our ability to progress forward as one nation.

The worst lesson our parents ever taught us was politics should never be discussed in public because it leads to arguments. I say nonsense…we’re adults. People should be able to have an open discussion about politics without resorting to name calling and if you can’t, you are worse than a group of children who argue over which radio station to listen to in the car. Political lines divide us but an open dialogue will unite us. People don’t have to have the same values or beliefs, but equality shouldn’t be a value people disagree on. Speaking out against racism, bigotry, and hate in the United States should not be something people are criticized for.

I’m proud that there are men and women who will travel to stand against hateful organizations like the KKK and the Neo-Nazis. To all who want to compare these organizations to Black Lives Matter…please don’t bother. BLM want black lives to matter TOO and for the blatant racism that permeates our society to end. As for Antifa…they are representing the left version of what the KKK and Neo-Nazis are so if you sympathize with white supremacy, in theory, you should understand Antifa. They are militant, they believe in spreading their message using action (including violence) and they keep their identity a secret. It sounds like Antifa, the KKK, and the white supremacist militias are all anarchists to me therefore the hypocrisy is difficult for me to reconcile. If I’m wrong, maybe an educated individual who doesn’t spew hate can clarify with evidence how one institution represents anarchy while the other represents American values. The White supremacists aggress towards the police and threaten violence the same as Antifa does. I am not condoning that at all. Those men and women are there to protect everyone therefore violence against them is wrong and unfair.

American society is standing at a precipice in 2017. Half of the country is blindly loyal to the Right while the other half blindly supports the Left. Neither side takes responsibility when their political party makes a mistake yet these same outspoken citizens litter my newsfeed with complaints about adolescents who have no sense of accountability. “How will these kids make it in the real world if they can’t take responsibility for their actions?” Am I the only one who feels they are learning this behavior from the very adults who are doing the complaining? We must put our differences behind us and face this evil head on. We cannot tolerate and allow bigotry and racism to spread any longer. It is un-American and it’s wrong. For the future of this nation, please teach your children better.

*Footnote:

http://avalon.law.yale.edu/18th_century/washing.asp

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