Remember when being an American meant something?
Philip Scott August
Remember when being an American meant something? When we were the most prosperous country in the world and we created things like the Peace Corps to share the wealth and help other countries raise their standards of living? When being an American meant you cared about your neighbors, you cared about your family and you'd take a bullet for your kids.
When was it that being an American became an excuse to be a low-life, uncultured, slob? To do as little as possible to help your fellow man because you're looking out for number one and "fuck everyone else" became the motto for the day, and everyday? And when was that being a "Christian" meant fuck everyone all week but shake hands on Sunday?
When was it that everyone decided it was a someone else's job to pick up trash, fix the environment, feed the homeless, and keep children out of harm's way?
I don't think I know a people more self-centered, selfish and sociopathic than the average American. Is there another country with more overweight, under-educated, slovenly, avaricious, greedy, jealous, petty, and simple-minded people as ours?
I grew up in the 70s thinking that we were riding a tide of goodwill that would lead us all to a great understanding of the human condition and an appreciation for all the peoples and cultures of the world. What came out of the 70s was little more than a lower standard for personal hygiene, a lowered standard for inter-personal relationships and a general and belligerent arrogance that just being an American gives you some kind of entitlement to harass, demean and destroy the lives and livelihoods of others. Sure we could blame the government, and believe you me they deserve a goodly part of it, but when it comes down to it, it's everyone's responsibility. Accountability and reason are sorely lacking as everyone takes either the victim role and complains that there's always someone else to blame.
It's time to wake up America. The entire country will soon be little more than a trailer park from polluted sea to polluted sea. And unless EVERYONE starts taking personal responsibility for the common good, we will soon cease to be a civilized species and devolve into a primitive state (we're more than halfway there) which will surely lead to our own demise.
Rise above your animal instincts and become the rightful heirs to the legacy of The Enlightenment and The Renaissance, not a common animal who does little more than eat, shit and fuck. Turn off the idiot box that controls your softened brains and start taking pride in, and ownership of, our world, your world, the only world we will all ever have. No one's going to fix your problems but you Americans. Surely not politicians who are little more than pathological liars conspiring to make you feel that they've got your backs, or government in general and surely as hell not the CIA.
Believe you me, they are among all of us, trying to grind us down, offering you drugs, enticing you with sex and alcohol and whatever else they can to keep you mute. Watch TV commercials for 5 minutes. The government and Madison Avenue are selling us the idea that if you're getting laid and getting drunk you've got it made. And while they've got you distracted and otherwise not paying attention, they're taking away your wages, your TRUE quality of life and, quite literally, your sense of decency, decorum and your compassion for your common man.
Wake up and realize the powers-that-be are conspiring to turn you all into subservient drones. They are everywhere trying to play to what they think is an innate laziness that is fit only for common animals. Don't be sheep people. Care, love, build, grow, show the world that being an American can mean that we're the most kind, generous, loving, altruistic and concerned bunch of people the world has ever seen. It's good to care, it's human to care, and it's just plain RIGHT to care.
And sure, I mourn the deaths of men like JFK, RFK, MLK, John Lennon, Bob Marley, Duke Kahanamoku and John Denver but the mourning period has got to end and new idealistic people need to rise to the occasion. There are now far too many examples of what it's like to be a piece of shit in our society and we've got to take the focus off of them.
Read our great writers, watch films that embolden the human condition, listen to music that lifts your spirits to new heights. Take aim at your dreams and bring them into reality. And for once and for all time people, learn again to deserve the respect of others.
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