Today whilst filling out private scholarships for law school, I came across a question that evoked something of a rarity on my part: silence. I was positively stunned, and for the first time since I could remember, I was at a loss for words. The application called for an essay addressing the following topic: āIn 3000 words or less, what makes America the greatest country in the world? Please discuss as it applies to your emphasis in public interest law.ā And for the life of me, I couldnāt bring myself to write anything.Ā
Vague and expansive charges notwithstanding, I sat for some time thinking about the topic. I had already filled out most of the application, spent hours that Iād no longer get back, and so, there was a certain compulsion to finish the prompt. I sat staring at a blank screen, the blinking icon mocking my lack of inspiration. And then it hit me- why I was so caught up on the question, and why I wouldnāt be able to answer it all. It was simply a matter of inspiration. I didnāt accept the operating premise of the question. And I wouldnāt, in good measure, be able to honestly answer it without jeopardizing principles long since solidified in my mind. And in times when we find there is no right way to answer, we must find it in ourselves to say something from our hearts. America is not the greatest country in the world, and unless something is to be done, it never will be again. And although Iām sure I wonāt be the committeeās top choice for the $10,000 grant, they will know above all else that I spoke from the heart.
āā¦Whenever I hear that oft-perpetuated lie, āAmerica is the greatest country in the worldā, I canāt help but cringe. I am reminded of Winston Churchillās playful quip about democracy being the worst form of governments, except for all others. By whose definition are we the greatest? In what respects? Mila Kundera once lamented that āthe struggle of man against power has always been the struggle of memory against forgettingā, and I canāt help but guard against her harrowing thematic constant. We are the living, breathing definition of the art of deception- with a knack for forgetting.
America has become a model for appearances. We appear a certain way to our enemies, another to our friends, and even different still to ourselves. And in this splitting of efforts, to draw from a domestic analogy, we find ourselves struggling to come to terms with what defines us any longer. Our identity becomes threatened; threatened by our duplicitous deceptions, caught too deep in the lies we stand in, without a hint as to how we got there at all. A crisis of character soon will follow, if the guise isnāt lifted, for how couldnāt it? It is a tremendous burden to lose oneself, especially when one meets their demise by thine own hand.Ā
Where Benjamin Franklin once observed that the cause of America is the cause of mankind, so too is the caustic culture with which we have fallen prey to. Bedeviled passions eager for satisfaction, inundated with greed and deluged with voyeuristic cupidity, have beset our once great nation and left it as the worldās poster child for decadence and political nihilism fueled by a whorish capitalism run rampantly amuck. The horrific cultural forecasts echoed in Jean Jacques Rousseauās āman in chainsā, Karl Marxās ādeath of the individualā, and Friedrich Nietzscheās democratic ālast manā are startlingly close to realization, harrowing truths that if brought to fruition, could forever taint the one hallowed ideas of liberty and freedom.
By what characteristics can we define ourselves as being truly great by comparison? Our education? Our healthcare? Our unbridled respect for liberty and freedom? Our culture? Our commitment to democratization? Our morals, perhaps? We love to appear the world over as the shining exemplar of model society, built on equality for all, a place where the content of your character was all that was necessary for success. But time and time again we are reminded of the falsity of such a dream. āLife, liberty, and the pursuit of happinessā, just as long as you know whoās favor to curry. āDemocracy for allā, just as long as you pay tribute to the Almighty Dollar. āLet freedom ringā, except in the ghettoes and poverty-stricken communities both domestic and foreign.
In the last forty years, our government has ensured its own preeminence through its accumulation of wealth, its globalization of the world, and the proliferation of liberal democracy and capitalism throughout the world through military might, and so I say again, āThe cause of America is the cause of mankindā- but is that cause a moral one or a realistās terrible necessity? Our misguided brutish efforts to propagate emancipative values delivered with the duplicitous intent of overt ethnocentric self-interest cannot be undone. The combined efforts of American democratization in Iraq, Afghanistan, and Pakistan combined in total a sum of over 3.7 trillion dollars, and brought to power some of the most iniquitous, villainous despots the world has seen in recent years, despots that eventually grew strong enough to turn against us. We have pulled the rest of the world up by our hand-me-down laces, and did so without wiping our hands. That is to say, our grip is slipping, and our nervous sweating has been noticed. Foreign policy in America sets the tone for the excusals from the rest of the world, a world weāve painted as our enemies who in the future may come to embody the physicality of that unsolicited charge. One can only hope that their memory is forgetful as ours.
America is no longer the greatest country in the world. We are approaching a waning twilight of American power, and for the purposes of my audience, Iāll keep it to our precious sound bites. We are 24th in the world in literacy, 36th in education, 37th in healthcare, 49th in life expectancy, 23rd in gender equality, 26th in child-well being, 9th in retirement security (between Poland and Chile), 23rd in wage distribution. In 1960, a prematurely born child had a 10 percent chance of living if born under 2.2 lbs, and now it is closer to 60 percent. And yet, our infant mortality rate has slipped on the international stage, falling from No. 12 in 1960 to No. 55 today, our figures being nearly six times over the rate in Sweden and Norway, who are atop the list.
We are a country rooted on the ideas of freedom and peace. However, we arenāt even atop those lists. Weāve fallen 13 spots to No. 46 on the World Press Freedom Index, out of 180 countries considered to have freedom of speech and press. We are 101st out of 162 countries in terms of peace, according to the Global Peace Index. Weāre quick to label other countries as tyrannical or extreme or religious or violent (for me, one of the same), and yet we rank close to our Islamic āenemiesā in disapproval of marital infidelity, of homosexuality, and of ānon-believersā; we call them barbarians, but compare in measure in terms of marital abuse and rape. In 2010 the United States had an estimated Christian population of 243,060,000, or about 11.0% of the worldās total Christians, enough to be ranked first out of nearly 200 countries. 77 percent of our population; 36 percent of Americans state that they attend services nearly every week or more. While some might see this as a demonstration to our piety and moral grounding, I instead see it as a warning sign of something entirely more portent. We are number one in the world of adults who believe in flying Angels and fire and fuckin' brimstone.Ā
Here are a few lists we do sit atop of:Ā
1) We are ranked first in incarceration rate, with nearly 750 imprisoned citizens per 100,000 residents, or as many as Iceland, Japan, Slovenia, Finland, Sweden, Norway, Denmark, Germany, Netherlands, Ireland and France combined.Ā
2) There are an estimated 100,000 people in the world with a net worth over 50 million USD. Nearly half of those people live in America. John Wooden once said, āThe true test of a manās character is what he does when no one is watching.ā The richest 10 percent now own 85 percent of the worldās assets, while over half the worldās population own just 1 percent of global wealth. The average CEO earned about eight times the salary of his average employee a century ago, but earns more than 300 times his average employee's wages today.
3) According to the International Society of Aesthetic Plastic Surgery, in 2011 there were 5,950 plastic surgeons working in the United States, or 18.7% of all plastic surgeons working in the world. In 2011 there were 284,351 breast augmentation surgeries performed in the United States, or 23.6% of all such surgeries performed in the world, more than the next five industrialized countries combined.
4) According to the National Academy of Sciences, in 2008 the United States had a death-by-violence rate of 6.47 per 100,000 people. That is enough to make the United States rank first out of seventeen āhigh-income democraciesā ranked in that category. And this goes without saying, considering that our government spends more than the next 25 countries combined on defense spending, all of whom are American āalliesā.
So there you have it- a testament to our avarice and selfish brutality. At the very least, it makes for a shit list of things to be great at. The hands of capitalism turn on Americaās political watch face, but no one has the time to check the unbridled force that grew while no one was watching. We are a history of conflict, rooted in greed, fear and oppression, blanketed with lies; truth is given to us in order of priority, the first being constant: America is the best nation in the world. End sound bite. I know it's what were brought up to believe, but the reality of the matter paints an altogether different picture. Itās no wonder weāre so good at lying. But in a society so centered on the importance of today, sometimes one cannot help but worry about tomorrow.Ā
There was a time in American history where we aspired to find meaning, to find truth, to reach a moral ground that was worth revering. We lauded intellectual curiosity and participation; we didnāt shy or shirk away from it. We stood up for what inspired us. Great men, intelligent men, honest men, men of compassion and love, standing up for what inspired them, not for what paid the bills- ethical men, not financial puppets. And as politicians devolve from the once hallowed ranks of the likes of Madison and Jefferson and Jackson and Lincoln to the now tawdry display of antics between candidates devoid of any merit, a competition between āwho knowsā and āwho caresā, it becomes readily clear why we are simply a culture of smoke and mirrors.
The true character of our government is but a reflection of our truest selves. āIn a world forgetting, by the world forgotā, starts the Ovidian poem by Alexander Pope, warns us of the harrowing dangers of blithe ignorance and self-interest. Our moral fiber is at best questionable when no one is looking, but in the immediacy of modern society, that luxury stands on shoddy ground. And so the elites have tried time and time again to misinform and obfuscate, create enemies and foster false crises, all whilst wearing the cloak of an altruist: but are we so blind as to see the true intent of our democratization? Our culture screams injustice at the hands of capitalism at the same time our government takes measures to assure its preeminence. Our culture cries for peace and equality as our government caters to the wealthy and goes to unseemly ends to perpetuate the class division. And yet, at the end of the day, our culture idolizes what they try so hard to denigrate. A British economist once jested that the American middle class citizens were just ātemporarily embarrassed millionairesā, and although certainly not enveloping, this acerbic criticism underlies a certain cultural avarice customary to the American way of life.Ā
I dream of a real democracy, where liberty and equality and freedom were embodied in the very forms of sensible experience and not simply hollowly represented in the institutions of law, not only with words, but with our hearts and actions. And it is to this effect that I am called an idealis like my forefathers.But we are the realist nation that separates the practical benefits of democratization from the Utopic philosophic sentiments 'of the people by the people' for which if abided by cannot be brought by the force of arms. We are the worldās tyrant against tyranny, and because we believe our cause to be highest, our tyranny is justified: but on what grounds? In our day and age, itās getting harder and harder to tell when itās peace time and when itās war time, a lamentable truth that demands response.
We are the last superpower left, and we are certainly not behaving in a way that is conducive to that preeminence. Because a nation can be āruined a thousand unexpected waysā, it matters not when; what is expected, then, is a purpose by which to a nation strives for, something higher. āGive me liberty or give me death!ā- so too do the prophetic words of Patrick Henry ring tried and true even today, and so I ask: what is it that we are striving for- preservation or inspiration? Itās not enough to just survive. What is necessary today is an emerging model of global collaboration, a moral pragmatism to preserve more than just a nation, but an idea worth perpetuating. We are technologically permeating, economically pervading, and culturally saturating. Shouldnāt our politics and moralities be moving towards a shared meaning? Shouldnāt our governments situate themselves to safeguard liberty and civility on high, not security and preservation?
All human activity, war not so far removed, exists in the paradigm of the language of justification; it is lauded or condemned, justified or vilified- but it is never ignored. By the mere reality that we argue over these moral matters, study the actions of our predecessors, lay bare the principles these judgments exude, and attempt to acknowledge shared sentiments of praise and blame presupposes an agreement to be had. The opinions of mankind, reiterated over time, shape a practical conception of justification. The justifications we live by- what I believe to be morality- is our defining characteristic as a species. Everything else exists within the confinement of predetermination and luck. And although both play a major role in our own determinations, our freedom of choice, our morality, separates us. Morality isnāt so much about transcending the physical world as it is about navigating through it. We have a choice as to how we choose to do so, and strong moral arguments exist as a response to this testament.Ā
I truly believe we have an innate moral compass, in that we understand how our actions affect others in a way that other beings canāt; to feel good for doing good, to feel bad for doing bad, these arenāt higher divine orders, itās entirely human to know right from wrong. This compass gives us pause when we act against humanity and direction when we act for the sake of, and as of late, weāve been acting entirely too selfishly. But if we continue to accept the realist operating premise that we are situated in a particularly relativistic world, that times of war remain outside the realm of law and morality, and that morality itself can never progress, then we are dangerously setting a portentous precedent that sets the stage for the death of peace. Because more than simply a descriptive term, peace is a moral term, a philosophically idealistic term- and a term that is rejected from the outset of realism, however intentionally or not, by accepting the Hobbesian conception of human nature, the āawful truthā that we are naturally at war and predisposed to conflict. In an increasingly conflicting world, we are entering an era of perpetual war, and so, an era of perpetual lawlessness by extension, if we donāt begin to change our modus operandi.
Montesquieu once deplorably noted that what makes humanity peculiar is the unique ability to circumvent and break laws, even laws they erect themselves, in the name of interest. This is at base a trait common to all of humanity, and yet, isnāt our defining character, as Montesquieu and Hobbes thought; it is simply what happens when we choose to act basely. Once more, we have the ever-present and for that very reason estimably more esteemed option to act contrary to our nature; and that represents what makes humanity peculiar- the unique ability to do otherwise. Though it is a natural necessity to preserve ourselves, it is a social necessity to mutually depend on one another, and because we live in a social and not a natural world, we must give preeminence to social responsibilities, lest we commit ourselves to a stubborn (and lonely) end. I do not doubt that in moments of extreme fear and duress, man may become savagely brutish. In this manner, he is indistinguishable from the nature of animals. And yet the very notion that he may choose to act otherwise is an idea worth spreading.
Change in the world will not arise from highlighting the many ways in which we are different; someday, we must point out the insurmountable ways in which we are exactly the same. We need a return to informed action to demand a responsive government, and the only way thatās achievable is by achieving that which the elite class never expected, the cynical philosophical schools never suggested, and what the materialist culture so richly deserves. We need to be honest first and foremost with ourselves, and reevaluate just what it means to be American. What type of legacy do you want to leave? We are the last superpower left, and some go as far as to say we are the last superpower that will ever be. No other nation in history has ever or will ever enjoy the unparalleled influence that America possesses, and if we arenāt careful, weāll lose that privilege before ever truly exercising it for the good of the people, in all corners of the world. Weāve been made aware of the status quo: so let us embrace something different.
āThe dogmas of the quiet past are inadequate to the stormy present. The occasion is piled high with difficulty, and we must rise with the occasion. As our case is new, so we must think anew and act anew. We must disenthrall ourselves, and then we shall save our country.ā The immortal words of Abraham Lincoln encourage us to be resolute in our convictions. America is no longer the greatest country in the world. But let us beat on tirelessly in full measure to ensure our mistakes are never borne back ceaselessly into the past, but in a direction the world would applaud. Let us take the road less travelled by; maybe thatās all it ever took to make a difference. My name is Loren Legorreta, and I thank you for your time and considerationā¦ā
