posted
I just received an e-mail from a high school student I know who was asked to write an essay on this topic for his US history class. This was my response.
quote:Well first off, I'm going to ignore the temptation to point out that "Americans" is a term applicable to the citizens of over 50 countries that occupy north and south America and the Caribbean and try to focus on what the teacher probably meant.
Being an American means that you were either born in the US, born to parents who were US citizens or that you have immigrated to the US and become a naturalized citizen. It means you are a citizen of the most powerful and wealthy nation in the world (although not the nation with the highest standard of living). It means you have the right to vote in local and general elections and run for public office once you have reached the age of majority. It means you can claim the rights enumerated in the US constitution. It means you have an obligation to pay taxes and follow the laws established by the constitutional government. It means being legally allowed to live and work anywhere in the 50 states (as long as you are not a convicted felon).
Anything else one could claim it means to be an American would exclude some part of those who are Americans.
For me, being an American meant being more affluent than 90% of the world's population, yet there are Americans who live in dire poverty. For me, being an American meant having access to an excellent tax payer funded education, yet there are those in the US who do not enjoy this privilege. For me being an American meant being able to get my appendix out in a safe reliable hospital, being able to see an eye doctor, and get my teeth fixed by some of the world's best trained professionals in some of the most modern facilities, but a growing number of Americans are being denied these things as well. For me being an American meant safety. I never had to worry about death squads roaming through my neighborhood, but even that is not true in some US neighborhoods plagued with violence from both gangs and the police. For me, growing up as an American meant I could read Karl Marx, check "The Anarchists Cookbook" out of the library and protest Ronald Reagan's visit to the US without fear of reprisal. But only a few years before I was born those activities might have put me on McCarthy's black list and today they likely make me a subject of Homeland security investigations.
Being an American should mean you are committed to human rights, fairness, justice and the rule of law. Unfortunately, Americans have never fully lived up to those ideals and now it seems that many of our leaders have abandoned even giving them lip service,
For me, today, being an American means being sorely disappointed that my country has not lived up the great ideals I was taught were the American way. It means being angry that our criminal justice system only works for those who have enough money to pay for the best legal council. It means being ashamed by a government that conducts illegal wars, operates political prisons, tortures and kidnaps people. It means being embarrassed by lack of integrity in our elections. It means grief for the children who don't have enough food to eat. It means a mixture of sorrow and indignation over the friends who have to hold a community fund drive to pay their medical bills while they are dying of cancer. It means distress as I watch our nations infrastructure (roads, national parks, etc) fall apart while politicians talk only of cutting taxes. For me, being an American means a deep deep frustration because although I have the right to vote, freedom speech and freedom of assembly, although I voted in every election since I turned 18, although I have spoken in classes, on the streets, in the news papers and even on the radio -- it seems I am powerless to make my voice heard and pursued my fellow Americans to live up to the ideals we are supposed to share.
And finally, for me being an American means both gratitude for the many privileges I have enjoyed and a sense of obligation, responsibility and perhaps even a tinge of guilt toward the many citizens of this country and world who do not have the same privileges.
So what does being an American mean to you?
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posted
Oops, that person was you, well, you make good points. I think being an American means striving to make our country better with our actions, even if they are small.
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posted
[snark]It means that you recognize that others have the right to their illusions of complete self-reliance, even while you recognize the fallacies of those notions.[/snark]
I think you make some good points, Rabbit, but I think it boils down to whether you're talking about the American ideal or the American reality; obviously, there's some gap between the two. Perhaps more disturbing these days is the obvious gaps between two people experiencing the same reality, but longing for very different ideals.
It seems like there's always been a contrast between the reality and the ideal for many Americans: "We'll fight to make our country free!" (and then have our own people put us in debtors' prison.) "We'll go out west and carve out our living from the land!" (and watch that living turn to dust.) "We'll raise our family in a nice house in a safe neighborhood, and our children will have even better lives than their parents!" (And we'll put ourselves deep in debt in the process...)
Perhaps that aspiration is one of the more recognizable (if not necessarily unique) aspects of American character. The continued efforts to bridge the gap; the unwillingness to settle into a niche.
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quote:Perhaps that aspiration is one of the more recognizable (if not necessarily unique) aspects of American character. The continued efforts to bridge the gap; the unwillingness to settle into a niche.
I have the same problem with this statement that I have with all statements that define X as part of the American Character. There is no characteristic that is shared by all American citizens except citizenship. When one claims that "X" or "Y" are defining characteristics of the American character or part of what it means to be an American we are ineffect claiming that those citizens that do not share that characteristic are less American than those that do. We are defining a group of insiders who are real Americans and consequently also defining many citizens of this country as less real and less American.
Although the tendency to exclude sections of our population has always been part of America, it shouldn't be. America should be a place where all citizens are welcomed in the public arena regardless of race, creed, gender, or ideals. One of the ideals I seek for in America is inclusiveness, but I hope that no one ever claims "inclusiveness" as part of the American character because that would exclude those Americans who are exclusive and violate my ideal.
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posted
Forming legends about ourselves is part of building a nation. "What it means to be an American" isn't about describing but dreaming. Origin stories, national ideals, and quintessential archetypes are all part of forming a mythology for a community, whether that community is a tiny family or a humongous nation.
It's like decorating a Christmas Tree where everyone gets to add their own ornament. It isn't possible to create a single ornament that stands in for the whole tree - just make your doodad and stick it on. To me, Rabbit, it seems like yours says "Christmas Trees Are Stupid", but, okay, that's your ornament.
I think this metaphor is mine. Members of all the nations of the earth can come and make their own ornament or even rename the whole thing to Hanukah Bush or Festivus Pole or whatever. What it means to be an American is that act of decorating.
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posted
No Katie, I'm not saying that "Christmas Trees are Stupid", I'm saying "Christmas Trees hurt people".
The problem with origin myths, national ideals and quintessential archetypes is that they define who belongs to the community and who does not. Those who share the dream you have described become insiders and those who don't become outsiders.
I seem to remember only a week or so ago you were objecting to people making broad claims about the dreams of "Mormon Women". Can't you see that this is the same issue?
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posted
It isn't an analogous situation. This is like asking a broad spectrum of people to write what it means to them to be Mormon. That's far different from saying what it means to everyone. I'll bet a million dollars that you are not the only person asked this question. The purpose was to gather enough material to make an anthology. You're not writing a definitive paper - you're adding your voice to the chorus.
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posted
...No offense, but did you ask only to raise objections to whatever responses you get? It doesn't exactly make me glad I put in the effort.
I've read pieces that pointed out the difficulties in definition for concepts that seem very simple on a surface level, such as "human". If a human has two legs and two arms, is an amputee not human? Or a mannequin human?
I'm not suggesting that we start deporting everyone who doesn't "aspire to bridge the gap between the American ideal and the American reality"; indeed, as I pointed out, I think there's less and less concensus on what that "American ideal" is. But I really don't think that failing to consider experiences or perspectives that belong to a large number of Americans is necessarily helpful, or considering them harmful, outside of explicitly stating that someone who doesn't experience things these way isn't American.
If nothing else, if we don't recognize features that are common to the majority (even if not the whole), we'll never recognize how outsiders view us. Which is arguably a major problem right now.
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quote:...No offense, but did you ask only to raise objections to whatever responses you get? It doesn't exactly make me glad I put in the effort.
That's a good point. I'm willing to bet the original purpose of the request was to assemble an anthology that would be greater than the sum of its parts.
What was your purpose?
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quote:Well first off, I'm going to ignore the temptation to point out that "Americans" is a term applicable to the citizens of over 50 countries that occupy north and south America and the Caribbean and try to focus on what the teacher probably meant.
Just a minor quibble, but the USA is the only nation with "America" in its name. "American" is not ambiguous. I don't know who started this thing with saying that we aren't the only "Americans", but I think it's silly. We don't have another convenient one word term for ourselves, and we aren't trampling on anybody else's name for themselves.
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posted
I'm not really sure why it was so important to Abraham Lincoln that the states stay united, but it was. I'm not sure if this other idea I had of him, that America meant the ability to rise or fall on one's merits, is central to it. I think that was just the thesis of the producer of A house divided.
Something it talks a lot about in The Book of Mormon is how divisions among the people were harmful to them - and it doesn't give much basis to the idea of prospering according to one's genius. But there is something there. If people cannot rise above their circumstances, they are in captivity.
Sufficeth to say I feel Lincoln was one of the great Americans and I put a lot of stock in his definition, but I'm also capable of seeing why Booth called him a tyrant.
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quote:Originally posted by katharina: It isn't an analogous situation. This is like asking a broad spectrum of people to write what it means to them to be Mormon. That's far different from saying what it means to everyone. I'll bet a million dollars that you are not the only person asked this question. The purpose was to gather enough material to make an anthology. You're not writing a definitive paper - you're adding your voice to the chorus.
I disagree. The assignement wasn't "What does it mean to you to be an American" it was "What does it mean to be an American", so I think the situation is exactly analogous to the generalization pooka made about Mormon women. If anything its even more extreme because pooka only made a claim about "a general phenomenon" among Mormon Women. If she had said, "Being a Mormon Woman means . . . " I suspect you would have taken even more offense. I certainly would have.
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posted
Eh. The question is entirely subjective. kat I think has come closest to how I would answer that question, and I think her analogies of adding many voices and trees are good ones. That's what "out of many, one," is all about.
I think the question is asking an opinion on less legal or statistical parts of being an American. I don't think you will probably ever find an answer that EVERY person in the country will agree on, but I don't think that means you should attack the question. This country was never formed on ONE idea. You can't say it was freedom, not with slavery running wild. People came here for a lot of different reasons. For land, for religious freedom, because they were brought here, as indentured servents, to make a new start, to escape something, to start a family, to gather wealth, etc. So I have no problem if one person sees the country differently from another and if they define different characteristics than I might as American.
So yeah, e pluribus unum probably is the simplest way of saying it.
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posted
But I wasn't making a generalization about Mormon women. I was talking about a miasma that seemed non-specific and pervasive. And in the end, I saw it was not a characteristic, but a symptom of what Mormonism seeks to treat. In the same sense, I don't think it's the case that "American" encompasses every conceivable thing. But I'll have to think about it and post more later.
posted
Rabbit, you haven't answered what your original purpose of this thread was. To all appearances, it looks like another one of those threads that posters start just so they can criticize everyone who answers.
I think you're wrong about the question. Do you think you are the only person asked for this assignment what it means to be an American? Of course the "to you" is implied.
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posted
I'm certain I wasn't the only person this student asked about this assignment. I'm also certain that the teacher didn't assign the students to make an anthology or to even ask anyone about it. This was the method this student chose to do research for the assignment. The assignment was to "create a representation of what it means to be an American" -- it was not an assignment on what being an American means TO YOU.
I started this thread for exactly the reason I stated, to find out what being an American means "TO YOU". The "You" in that statement is the crucial part. I was hoping people might share their experiences as Americans (or non-Americans) and perhaps their vision of what America should be.
My only objections have been to those who seek to define a particular trait as American. I object to all such generalizations because they marginalize Americans who don't share those traits.
And I don't think its obvious that the "to you" is implied. I see a world of difference between saying (for example) "For me, being an American means tearing up when I here the Star Spangled Banner" and "Being an American means tearing up when you here the Star Spangled Banner". The first is a statement about a very personal reaction to the symbols of ones country. The second is a claim that typical Americans share this reaction and such claims automatically marginalize those Americans who don't share that reaction. A claim like that necessarily implies that those who don't feel strong positive emotions when they here the National Anthem are less American (or perhaps worse Americans) than those who do.
Given your recent diatribe against Pooka for making generalizations about Mormon Women, I thought you would understand that reason. I guess I was wrong.
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posted
Yeah, you've mentioned that a thousand times and I've already rejected it for the reasons stated above. Repeating yourself isn't convincing.
As for the thread, maybe you conveyed it badly. It sure looks like you got people to post and then blasted them no matter what they said. I said that being an American was adding your own voice to the chorus and you had a problem with THAT. Apparently the only acceptable answer is to believe nothing, say nothing, and only criticize.
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quote:Originally posted by katharina: Yeah, you've mentioned that a thousand times and I've already rejected it for the reasons stated above. Repeating yourself isn't convincing.
Curiously, prior to this post I've only made 5 posts total in this thread including the one starting the thread.
quote:As for the thread, maybe you conveyed it badly. It sure looks like you got people to post and then blasted them no matter what they said.
By my count, I've only objected to one point one poster made about being an American. Perhaps you could point to the others I seem to be missing.
quote:I said that being an American was adding your own voice to the chorus and you had a problem with THAT.
When did I say or imply that I had a problem with the idea that being an American was adding your own voice to the chorus?
In fact, I never stated any objection to your Christmas Tree analogy except when you claimed (in the same post where you made the analogy) that I was saying "The Christmas Tree was stupid". I was simply trying to clarify that this was not my original intent.
I've read through my posts and I fail to see any objection I've made except to specific claims that something is a defining trait of Americans. It you see otherwise, please point it out specifically so that I can fix the problem.
quote:Apparently the only acceptable answer is to believe nothing, say nothing, and only criticize.
Take offense if you choose but please point out precisely where I'm doing this.
As best I can tell, you have formed an opinion of my intent and are no longer willing to listen or think about the issue.
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posted
Then it isn't clear from your tone. I certainly took away from it that you had rejected my contribution. Maybe if you focused on what people are contributing instead of nitpicking them you might get more benefit of the doubt that you're not just out to criticize.
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quote:Originally posted by katharina: Then it isn't clear from your tone. I certainly took away from it that you had rejected my contribution. Maybe if you focused on what people are contributing instead of nitpicking them you might get more benefit of the doubt that you're not just out to criticize.
Kat, I guess I'll consider it worth continuing the discussion with you when you start taking your own advice.
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quote:...No offense, but did you ask only to raise objections to whatever responses you get? It doesn't exactly make me glad I put in the effort.
I'm sorry sterling, I didn't mean to come across that way. I actually agreed with most of your original post. I've rarely been one to post "I agree" because it seems to add so little to the conversation. I should try harder on that point. Even in real life I find that people tend to interpret my elaborating or expanding on a point they made to mean I disagreed with their point when in truth I largely or entirely agreed.
quote:If nothing else, if we don't recognize features that are common to the majority (even if not the whole), we'll never recognize how outsiders view us. Which is arguably a major problem right now.
I wonder how the teacher would respond if for the project a student turned in a collection of cartoons like this. When I'm outside the states, Its funny how often people assume I couldn't be American because I'm thin, liberal, well educated and speak more than one language. And yes, I'm at least as offended by those stereotypes of Americans as I am about the ones Americans hold of themselves.
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quote:Originally posted by The Rabbit: When I'm outside the states, Its funny how often people assume I couldn't be American because I'm thin, liberal, well educated and speak more than one language. And yes, I'm at least as offended by those stereotypes of Americans as I am about the ones Americans hold of themselves.
Would I be uncontributive if I said "I agree"?
New Zealand was interesting for me both in how those in other countries view Americans and how graciously willing many people are to see past nationalities and treat people as individuals.
And then there was Fiji, which was... Well... *sigh*... Another story.
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posted
I thought the indigenous NZers have had similar problems to indigenous people throughout the world.
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What makes you think Sterling was refering to the indigenous NZers (Maori)? They only make up 15% of the population. My sense was that he was referring to his interactions with many NZers and not just or even primarily the Maori.
Its also not clear to me that the story he hasn't told us about Fiji had anything to do with problems common to indigenous peoples.
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From a strictly observer's view (and noting I'm not an anthropologist, nor was I there for purposes of some sort of anthropological survey) I think the Maori have actually done a much better job of integrating their culture into New Zealand and maintaining their cultural identity than many indigenous people. Most every Kiwi I met, whatever their ethnic background, knew at least a few words of the Maori language; it's taught on television (including one channel almost entirely in spoken Maori) and in schools, and certain rituals and matters of etiquette (such as taking off of shoes before entering homes and sacred areas) seem to have been widely adopted in New Zealand as a whole.
I'm sure the Maori would identify problems unique to them, including continuing questions regarding interpretations of the treaty of Waitanagi and land use. But most of the problems I saw, while the Maori experienced them as well, were hardly unique to them- the rise of gangs, high rates of alcoholism, ridiculous quantities of grafitti (possibly in part because of a large number of young people who drop out of the education system and then run about idle), etc.
But what I was thinking about with regard to my comment was more that many New Zealanders seemed to dislike America, or at least American policies, including (but not limited to) the invasion and occupation of Iraq. But I never felt like I was being pilloried as the available scapegoat for those perceived wrongs. People would ask what I thought about them, or what I hoped for the future, but they largely seemed to recognize that I wasn't responsible for the direction of my country (and I also had some interesting, albeit distressing, conversations as to why.)
As for Fiji... Well, the short version is I've never felt so much like a white colonialist pig as I did in Fiji. From the get-go- from before we got off the plane, come to it- we were seperate. The immigration card asked specifically (and mandatorally) about our racial identity. Airport attendants, seeing us in the crowd, specifically made way for us and got us through customs faster. We taxied to an artificial island with diesel-powered generators powering the lights and air-conditioning of a dozen Western-owned resorts, along a broken road surrounded by houses without windows, across a bridge guarded by a private security force.
I don't think we were necessarily seen as "Americans" so much as "rich tourists". But we were visibly different, we were all that was keeping their highly artificial economy afloat, and if anything was inconvenient or unpleasant to us in any way, it would be removed. The only native Fijiians allowed on the resort island were those who worked there, and when they'd completed their shifts, they left expediently.
I don't know if the indigenous Fijian people actually think of the white tourists as "better" than them (I hope not), but there is little doubt in my mind that most Fijians would never raise vocal opposition to something an American tourist did or said. Even if they were standing in their homes when they did or said it.
It was very uncomfortable.
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posted
Tourist resorts in developing countries are frequently like that. I completely understand your discomfort.
I wish we had some one around who had lived in Fiji as a school teacher or a missionary who could perhaps give us a broader perspective but even then I'd still have some questions.
In the time I've spent in Europe and now in the Caribbean I've noticed a tendency of many US expats to be very condescending toward the local culture.
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posted
There was less active... Solicitude?... In areas that weren't as actively tourist-oriented, but I still often had the feeling that we were being treated with kid gloves, even in areas where we shouldn't have been. No one ventured that it was considered rude to wear a hat when we visited a village, and given that it was one of the founding villages and a place where the president often kept residence, one would think there would have been every reason to admonish the rude visitor (fortunately, my wife warned me.)
It feels like Fiji's relative geographic isolation and its lack of arable land- its general dependence on outsiders for its existence- make it unusually concerned with the impressions of tourists. As near as I can tell, all electric power in Fiji is generated by diesel generators, which means anyone who depends on electric power is dependent on it getting shipped in. It's hard for me to fully comprehend what it must be like to have such a tenuous existence.
ADD: On research, it appears that as of 2004 about half of Fiji's power comes from diesel (with the other half coming from hydroelectric plants.) The same report, however, notes that almost all growth in demand is being met with diesel power.
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posted
I'd think a mixture of various forms of renewables would be a good solution for Fiji to become energy independent. Wind would be the most obvious, offshore of course, and in the future tidal power would probably be a boon as well, and maybe even cogeneration/waste biomass generation. Given the rising costs of shipping that'll only make transoceanic diesel deliveries more expensive, it'll be a good investment for them.
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Between being the subject of a recent military coup and the rising price of rice, I suspect infrastructure investment is a regrettably low priority right now.
Sugar has long been one of Fiji's major exports, and what I've seen and read suggests a) it's rapidly ceasing to be profitable, and b) Fiji has no capability to refine sugar- at least into white sugar- within the country.
Barring a sizable foreign investment with a charitably low expectation of ever seeing the money coming back, I don't see a renewable power boom for Fiji any time in the near future.
Which is doubly sad, as Fiji has more to lose from global climate change than many.
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posted
Given the boom in sugarcane as a source of ethanol, I find that surprising. Why is the world wide price of sugar falling? Tariffs?
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I don't know that it's falling worldwide; it may simply not be cost-efficient to get it from Fiji to somewhere where it could be refined.
ADD: Hmm... this implies that the profitability of sugar in Fiji depends on preferential trade agreements and subsidies that can't continue indefinitely. I don't doubt that there are easier places to get one's sugar.
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quote:Originally posted by Lyrhawn: Given the boom in sugarcane as a source of ethanol, I find that surprising. Why is the world wide price of sugar falling? Tariffs?
Sugar production went far beyond expectations. Better technology, more favorable weather... whatever. Supply is up. The demand just isn't there to meet it. Price drops.
For once, this one seems mostly like a natural market process.
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And the US is unable to gain much, if anything, in consumer surplus from the falling price of cane sugar because of the barriers we have in place. Ah well.
Another interesting tariff story has been circulating the net, recently. Apparently there's a recently created tariff on importing metal coat hangers from China, which costs dry cleaners an average of $4000 each annually, which means a total cost to dry cleaners (passed on to consumers in large part) of over $120 million. That's over $400,000 per coat hanger worker in the US annually, and over $200,000 per coat hanger worker of a few years ago, when there were substantially more. The average salary of coat hanger works in the US? Around $30,000.
It must be extremely important that we retain our capability to manufacture coat hangers. If we want to help these workers out, a tariff is not the answer (hopefully I'm preaching to the choir). Even substantial grant aid to send every single one to community college for a two year degree and replace their salaries during that period would be less each year than the cost of the tariff to US consumers, and would only go on for a couple of years.
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