Some days I wonder if this nation can be saved.
I know what I’m supposed to believe: that America is still in its infancy, that it is a beautiful idea; that we simply haven’t become what we can become, and that in time we will emerge from being a noble, elusive aspiration and into a glorious and fully realized waking dream.
I know that I’m supposed to say that we have still not seen our best days yet and that when (not if) we eventually do, it will be worth all the struggle we’ve endured to claim the nation our forebears dreamed of.
I’ve often believed that, but I’m not sure I will be able to believe that anymore.
Now, 244 years into our lifespan, we are as afflicted with systemic racism as we’ve ever been, white nationalism has completely infected the entirety of one of our two primary political parties, and we are teetering perilously close to a minority rule that will in effect, permanently silence the voices and votes of the vast majority.
With personal access to every bit of information and knowledge now literally in the palms of our hands every waking moment, too many of our people are still believing disprovable falsehoods, still falling victim to nonsensical conspiracies, still vulnerable to big lies about important things.
And perhaps worst of all, is that in 2020, 74 million Americans voted for one of the single most reprehensible human beings on the planet, despite his staggering four-year attempt to show them how grossly unqualified and morally incapable he was of leading. His ineptitude, immorality, and predation were somehow not dealbreakers but selling points.
A toxic cocktail of overt racism, neanderthal theology, intellectual ignorance, and self-preservation has rendered a large swath of this nation hostile to Science, terrified of diversity, and violent toward vulnerable people—and that’s the problem.
How are decent, reasonable people supposed to work with this?
How do we find common ground with those who insist on dehumanization?
How can we engage in constructive conversation or honest dialogue on critical issues, with people whose reality is so malleable?
How can we forge a new and more equitable America while so many current Americans live perpetually backwards, longing for a bygone and pined for day when fewer people had a voice or a vote; when people of color and women and LGBTQ human beings had their value declared and their options dictated and their futures defined by straight, white men?
If our families and friendships and workplaces and churches and political systems are all still this saturated with supremacy, can an interdependent community of disparate humanity with equitable access to life, liberty, and happiness ever be a reality? Romanticism and misplaced optimsims aside, is America as we envision it still possible?
I suppose it is still possible, yet with every year I think it becomes less and less probable. The longer we live as a nation with these untreated collective cancers of heart and mind, the greater opportunity they have to metastasize exponentially and the less chance we have of eradicating them for good. History reminds us of that the more we abide brutality and tolerate discrimination, the more normal they become. Our normal is not sustainable, if we’re ever going to grow into something truly beautiful.
I want this nation to become what the songs and the anthems declare we can be, but I’m not sure we all share that desire. I think many of us want the ugliest atrocities of our past to be part of our perpetual present, and that may be a disease too invasive to be healed of for the rest of us.
There’s an old saying: when the horse is dead, dismount.
The ride may be over, America.
Maybe this horse is dead.
Yes, I’ll be leveraging my time and my resources to let freedom ring and let justice roll down like a river, but many days it feels like a fool’s errand.
Today, I’m waking up in this America that is and will be fighting like hell to craft the America that could be, but I’m not so sure how much longer that will be true.
Guess I’ll ride a bit longer and see what happens.
