On 2020

Ultimately we are the American party. The American people.

This left and right moniker is sickening and really shows everyone’s true colors, our true divide as a whole. America has a mixed history, benefiting one side solely and without acknowledging that, we can’t move on to the potential America has. It’s hard to see something you love being tainted, it’s hard to see something you look up to have such a dark history, but without taking the past into account, how can we progress? How can we learn?

This country has only been around 244 years. I have long living relatives, some seeing 95+, nearing 100. And while my family wasn’t in the country at the time, my great great grandfathers were alive. That’s not so long ago.

Blame whoever you will, but if your first thought of something is “how does this benefit me” and not “how does this benefit the American people” you’re not an American, you’re the exact opposite and you’re damaging to what little remains of the American dream, and a detrimental part of society, no worse than the loyalists who fought against their neighbors for King George.

There has never been a time in my life, nor anyone’s life alive today where the American people have seen peace. Where we have known peace.

I grew up with war, and terror ringing in the background. I remember seeing the planes strike the twin towers during kindergarten, seeing my teachers shock, unsure of what was, only that everything had changed. I remember being rushed home, like so many other kids, during lunch. My mother frantic. I remember going to Walmart that night, my mother going stock up on supplies, and a bomb threat was called in to the Walmart on Bevelle in Daytona Beach. My mom put me in a fire truck, to be watched by the firemen as she ran out to help direct lines out of the store. I remember seeing my family cry as the news rolled images over and over, as the country tried to understand, and cope. I remember wrapping a jacket around my head, as I often did in the summer heat in Florida, only to be threatened by teachers for having done so. I remember my mother kissing the tv as a Bush gave a speech in regards to how America is a unified nation. I didn’t realize how 3000 people would die that day, and many more would die as a direct cause of it. I don’t remember the millions of families that were threatened, assaulted, or prejudiced against for being Muslims, or seemingly being Muslims. I don’t remember the hatred American families showed for people they didn’t understand. I didn’t see the fear in a fathers eyes as he withdrew his daughter or son from school, and moved away because someone left a letter on his porch saying they’d murder his family for simply being there.

I didn’t remember American rights being jeopardized in a faux attempt at regulating security.

I couldn’t imagine someone else’s perspective on anything else. Looking back, this was the only time I ever dealt with or felt fear.

and I was lucky enough never to see it first hand. I was lucky enough to not see a lot of things.

This isn’t the America we read about in textbooks. This isn’t the America we see in movies, and television shows
This isn’t the America we envision for our children.
This is America’s true colors, a society of bickering, spiteful, angry citizens who’s president reflects the soul of the nation.

244 years later and we’re still beating the war drums over conflicting views on how America should be, we’re so focused on ourselves we don’t see our neighbor struggling, and for most of us if we do, we turn a blind eye.

I really hope things change. I’ve never known anything other than war, rage, and hate. I’ve never known anything other than looking over your shoulder at airports, fearful of what could be, or what would be.

But then again, I’ve never had an issue walking in a dark park alone, strolling down the street, talking to a girl, getting pulled over, or standing outside a gas station to smoke. Ive never had the thought of “ is this it?” I’ve never had an issue speaking out about my sexuality, my gender, being vocal, and doing what I wanted. Some of that is contributed to my size. The rest, to my skin. I’ve never had anyone tell me what to do with my body.

At the same time, I’ve seen prejudice, being disenfranchised by family members under the pretense of being “middle eastern” for dating “outside my race”

But that doesn’t mean that it doesn’t happen to others. If we pretend that it isn’t a real issue, or try at we move to diminish the fact that these things happen, we aren’t American. We’re just selfish people running around pointing fingers, designated by a left and a right, while higher ups fill their pockets and laugh at the quelled quibbling nation they’ve so meticulously divided.