Week 2

Sometimes I wonder if I’m always going to be angry about one social problem/injustice or another. It is so frustrating to me that some people don’t get fired up about inequalities and injustices in this country and throughout the world. And if people do get fired up, they forget about it by the next day because it doesn’t affect them in their everyday lives. I can recognize that I lead a life of privilege. I am a white woman from a family who is very staunchly middle class – I have had to deal with comparatively few injustices personally in my life. But precisely because I come from a place of privilege, I feel as though I need to be the voice for people who have injustices levied upon them every single day. I keep having this experience where I read about a specific social injustice and I feel the need to discuss it with someone, but mostly it ends up with me talking about the injustice to someone and then a discussion never really occurs because it either doesn’t affect them personally or they don’t have their own opinion about it. Thankfully, I’m in a place where I can finally discuss things like this on a daily basis with other people who understand what I’m saying and have things to say about it too.

             The chapters in the Dionne book this week talked a lot about communitarianism versus individualism. Dionne says that America’s inability to understand its own character leads to confusion and tension. He also talks about Bill Clinton saying that there are two commitments – to protect personal freedom and to seek common ground - and that America is bound to both of those obligations. Many historians even say that the best way to understand American philosophy during the time of the revolution and the founding is to see it as both individualistic and communitarian. Somewhere along the line though, I feel that “community” somehow received a negative connotation.

             It’s actually kind of funny that we talked about “American Exceptionalism” in class this week, because my mom and I criticize this idea quite often. My mom is an ex-patriot and lives in Germany with her husband. She and I both criticize America and Americans a lot for claiming to be this perfect land where everyone has the same opportunities to be successful, where in reality we just tend to ignore our rampant issues. In reality, we’re all part of the problem by letting this continue to occur and basically saying that everyone can have a success story, as long as that person has self-reliance, responsibility, and doesn’t expect any handouts. My mom and I compare Germany and the US a lot and it’s very interesting to see the differences between how they remember history. Germany acknowledges its less than stellar history, and attempts to learn from it, not hide it. It also commemorates horrible acts that have been committed by Germany/Germans by some of the most beautiful memorials that I’ve had the opportunity to see. Whereas America doesn’t really teach its full history to students and doesn’t acknowledge the horrible acts that it has done to others (such as the Native Americans and African Americans). I, for one, knew embarrassingly little about Native Americans and the horrible atrocities that America committed against them – I wasn’t taught much about that time in history in school, and what I was taught glossed over the genocide we committed against them). The so-called “American Dream” is entrenched in this idea of American Exceptionalism too. America and Americans seem to be so intent on creating an “other group” and being so exclusionary, that we can never be a cohesive nation of people. Of course, that’s not to say that other countries don’t have similar issues, but they don’t seem to flaunt their “acceptance” of others as much as America does. We say that community is a central part of American thought and life, but most of us don’t seem to practice it much in our daily lives.

             Another place that we see community as an essential aspect in American life is with this idea of “The city on a hill”. As Winthrop said, “the eyes of the world are on us” so we should be seen as caring for the powerless. This Christian charity was seen as the heart of the community during Winthrop’s time. I think it’s interesting that we claim to be a nation founded on Christian principles, but (again) most people don’t seem to practice the ideals of Christianity very closely. Of course, some people go to church, but in terms of actually practicing these Christian principles in their daily lives, many people fall flat. This is one important reason why I am very critical of organized religion. Most of my family is very religious, so I respect the fact that faith and religion can be important parts of people’s lives. However, when people pick and choose which parts of religion are important and which ones can be ignored, I get very annoyed at the hypocritical statements they tend to make. (Update: I’m watching the Republican debate and Governor Kasich just said that he wants to restore America to the city on a hill!).