An Aching Heart for America
My heart has been hurting for America. Over the course of being home during the COVID-19 pandemic and throughout many restless nights, I had a lot of time to reflect on the state of the country and how we got to this point. Like many around the country, I find myself being quicker to anger all the time, overwhelmed by the amount of problems in the country with roots deeper than that of an oak tree.
Many of us grew up with the premise of many American principles. We grew up with the ideas that America is the shining city on a hill- a bastion of equal justice, freedom, and opportunity for all- in which if you worked hard enough, you would succeed in achieving the American Dream and live a happy life. Being raised in a religious household, I was taught to love your enemies, to do unto others as you would have them do unto you, and to do all you can to make life better for other people.
As one looks at not only the state of our country now but the history of the country as well, we are forced to be confronted with the harsh reality. The United States ranks number 19 in the World Happiness Report, a metric used to measure citizens’ wellbeing, freedoms, social support, corruption, etc. Between 2005 to 2015, depression rates rose among Americans (particularly with teens) while substance abuse has increased and many Americans do not have access to adequate mental health services, even if they have health insurance. The United States ranks highest among G7 nations in income inequality, ranking 40 out of 150 countries. The wages of median income households have stagnated despite worker productivity and CEO salaries increasing (these statistics are even worse when you compare between races). About a third of young Americans between the ages of 18 to 29 say that there are countries better than the United States. The US ranks second to last in raising a family. When it comes to corruption and public trust in government, the US ranks 23 out of 180 countries in the least corrupt and only 17% of Americans believe that they can trust the government to do what is right. Overall trust in government since Eisenhower has dropped to a historic low, particularly after the Nixon Administration.
When one looks at the actions of those within government, one realizes how many politicians have preached to distrust government under the premise that it’s ineffective while rendering government inefficient in addressing the issues that matter, becoming a vicious cycle. We see how many Americans feel that their government has left them behind and is no longer working for them as they gut mental health services, education, healthcare, and internal accountability while structuring the rules of the economy and granting funds for the wealthy and corporations. We have witnessed politicians and media alike espouse misleading information to the public over decades, using different scapegoats rather than recognizing their own failures. It’s not hard to see that for every preventable death, for every person that is homeless and in poverty, and for every person that dies in poverty, that those are the results of policy failure.
A lot of this has to do with American individualism, which is as American as apple pie, and is seen as admirable. This individualism can be a good thing, but this principle faced a significant test in the face of the COVID-19 pandemic. After a series of missteps by the federal government and various state governments trying to accommodate for Americans’ unwillingness to adhere to most public health rules in the fear of tyranny, it’s apparent that individualism failed for the public good. Many Americans accepted the risk over their own health in not adhering to these rules, despite the risk it would have for carrying the virus to those around them. This tendency reflects the approach that they will have for their politics and with elected officials.
It’s a tendency that is reflected in their views towards political efforts towards curbing gun violence, health care, environmental regulation, social justice, and economic equality and equity. In the spirit of individual liberty and the attitude of “pull yourself up by your bootstraps”, it has led to the abandonment of compassion towards the general welfare of all of our people, and has over time led to having demagogic leaders who would rather send in the troops than to listen and address the plights of people who have suffered the most throughout our nation’s history- all while abandoning the leadership and competence necessary to address one of the most significant threats to a nation that already shows cracks.
These issues are so deep, there are days where I would like nothing more than to move to a country that governs with compassion for the general welfare of the people. Fellow Americans who fear the tyranny of government while turning a blind eye to the historical and current systemic oppression by the government on people of color and the working class would also like nothing more than to have people like me move somewhere else. There are days when I feel that many people in this country are too far entrenched in themselves and on the lies that they have been absorbing over the years. Many Americans have given up altogether on even wanting to vote or pay attention to politics because they feel that things will always be the way they are. Who could blame them?
Despite the individualism, I think many of us have more in common than expected. I’ve spoken to a lot of my more conservative friends and family about some of the issues and there are common themes. We tend to agree that government corruption is an issue, that all people should be equal in the eyes of the law, and that everyone should be able to have good education and healthcare. When it comes to the specifics of achieving such, there are obviously disagreements on how to do so and some of those conversations become debates over human nature, but I am sometimes able to convince those friends to see my point of view on how we have to address those issues for a more compassionate politics and a just society, while not being afraid to call out the injustices we see.
Like the late Congressman John Lewis, we must lead with compassion while being able to address others’ problematic tendencies and policies. Some fellow Democrats have been unable to strike this balance, with a lot of the older generation longing for the days of civility politics without effectively fixing corruption and the systemic issues. The balance is often seen as “unelectable”.
Someone once said, “In ancient Athens, politics was a glorious word. It was the word used as an antidote to autocracy. And now these rascals in politics… have turned politics into such a dirty word that the whole idea of elected public service is now distasteful to the thousands of wonderful people in this country.”
A lot of politicians, in many views, run for office for the power and tend to be more beholden to their wealthy and corporate donors, often at the detriment of the collective welfare of most American people. As a result, it stagnates the progress of our nation and leaves many Americans feeling hopeless that things will change for the better. That is the tragedy.
For those of us who want better for our fellow Americans, it’s our duty to keep speaking out about these issues. We have to run for offices to be the voice for the voiceless and the help for the helpless. We have to aim to restore public faith in government by using public service to improve the lives of our people and truly be an example for the rest of the world. We need to start asking our elected officials what they are doing or what they will do to make people’s lives better. If you’re not serving in government for this purpose, then what is the point?
There are still days and nights when I feel hopeless over the state of our country, and for many of us, there will be many more. To paraphrase one senator, if you haven’t cried for the country and if she hasn’t broken your heart, you don’t love her enough. To paraphrase another senator, fear and cynicism don’t win elections, but hope and courage do- so we must choose hope over fear.
If not us, how many more people will continue to suffer and die as a result of policy failure? If not now, how long will people have to wait? If not us, who will?