My Country

Well, another year has passed and it is almost July 4th once again. I have a friend who likes to point out to me sometimes that I do tend to study other countries more than I study my own, and perhaps this is true. However, I do love my country very much, and I wanted to say some of the things I love about America:

If I were enormously wealthy and could choose any place in the world to raise my theoretical children (because if I were extremely wealthy I'd adopt at least a hundred of them), I would choose this country. I wouldn't choose it because it's my own, or because it's familiar, or because it's wealthy. I would choose it because, as a general rule, I would be able to send my child to school without fear that armed militant groups would take over the school and slaughter hundreds (do you remember Beslan, Russia? Or, just a few days ago, that international school in Cambodia?) I would raise my children here because they could go to church without having to risk their lives, as Christians do in so many countries around the world, or that we could go to church without fear of losing our jobs or imprisonment, as is the case in Communist China. I would want my daughters raised here because so many daughters in impoverished countries end up in the international sex trade. Yes, we have that here, too, but an American girl is much less likely to end up entrapped in it! I would want my children raised here because they would have the freedom to choose their vocation, their educational level and institution, their fields of study and employment, etc. They wouldn't be trapped in a caste-like system, or a system of education and vocation that decides for the child in which direction he or she should go, as is the case in Communist countries. I would raise my children here because the odds are very slim that we will be eating at a pizzeria or cafe someday and have a suicide bomber walk in, or that the bus or subway we are riding on will be hijacked or blown up. Children in Israel deal with that every day. America may be younger than other countries, but we have more than made up for our youth with our contributions to the world. So many inventions are by Americans. So much advancement in medical science is through American doctors and scientists. Our level of freedom is unrivaled in the world. Americans are extremely generous. We give billions each year to overseas missions, hospitals, humanitarian projects, etc. (I am not talking about government money, but private money donated by everyday Americans). We are not perfect. We have crime. We have homeless. We have had school shootings, and hijackings, too. However, we are far safer than anywhere else in the world. If I were a journalist by profession, I would not have to worry about my headless body being found by a river because I wrote too scathingly about my government. (Ukraine just a few years ago). This past election was intense, but we did not see the candidates poisoning one another with Dioxin (again, sadly, Ukraine). We may have our problems, but it is illegal to buy or sell children on the street, as they do in many third-world nations. Our inner cities are in bad shape, and we do have gang warfares, drive-by shootings, drugs, prostitution, etc. but, however, there are many reasons why I am proud of my country. I am not going to delve into politics. I am not politically savvy enough to do that and am afraid that I would only make myself sound ignorant, and I don't want to do that. However, I do not think that we are the evil empire many make us out to be. We are not perfect. We make mistakes, sometimes many of them. I do not think our President is another Adolf Hitler, nor do I think he is intentionally trying to take over the world. Again, I am not going to go into my opinions of the war, or the election, or any of that. I do not believe that the "religious right" is out to destroy the country. I do not think that people who are Christians are just ignorantly waving flags and voting for whomever their pastors or conservative radio tell them to vote for. I think a good majority of votors have brains (notice, I said votors, not just the average joe who says he or she will not vote because they either don't care, don't know enough, or don't want to be involved). I find it insulting when I hear people say that the religious right is destroying America because we are too stupid and backwards to be progressive, too concerned with sexual morality and abortion rights to be concerned with the rest of the world. That is, to be blunt, a load of crap. Just because somebody believes in God and leading a moral lifestyle, and in raising their children to be moral and God-fearing citizens of our country, does not make that person ignorant-- some Bible-thumping hillbilly too stupid to read The New York Times or Philadelphia Inquirer. I'm probably not making much sense here, but I am getting tired of feeling guilty for being an American, for feeling guilty for belonging to a country that is, in my ignorant, Bible-thumping, small-town and henceforth small-brained opinion, the best darn country in the world. I've been outside my little town. I've seen glue-sniffing homeless children living under bridges in Eastern Europe. I've heard Chinese Christians whisper their sad stories to me as we sat huddled in the corner of our hotel room or walked outside where there were no "bugs." I've been in a country where the Mafia rules all, where one cannot even buy a loaf of bread without giving them a kickback of some sort. I've been in lands where people are tortured and simply disappear just because they disagree with their government. I've met people who had their fingers crushed. Who were wrapped in ice-cold sheets and left in torturous pain as those sheets dried, constricting them and almost asphysixiating them. I've met the people who rebuild their church every other year because the Communists keep tearing it down. I've met the 16-year-old who runs from town to town, living off the land and off the charity of others, because if she stops, the authorities will arrest her for talking too much about Jesus. I've met old women who had to sacrifice some of their own children to save some of their others during the War. I've stood in forests where partisans fought and where concentration camps were erected. I've been to the land of Babiyar and the land of Baba Yaga. I've come home and gotten down on my knees and thanked God for my country, for my freedom. I am not some ignorant hoke, and I am not some starry-eyed optimist who thinks her country never does any wrong. I do not have an education, whether formal or informal, in Political Science, so I could not debate with you about so many of the issues of the day. However, I do have a brain. I do think things through before I enter a voting booth. This is a long blog, and I'm sorry for going on like this, but I wanted to reiterate exactly why I love my country, why I voted the way I did, why I do not think we've become the Roman Empire or Nazi Germany arisen out of the ashes, etc., etc., etc. That's all I'm going to write for now. Feel free to comment, whether you agree or not. Dialogue is the best way to discuss various issues, especially in a blog.