My response to a conservative talking about American exceptionalism...

[Gravitycollapse]

And the greatness of our founding fathers and the non-existent American "golden era." He attempted to argue away slavery as, he literally put it, irrelevant to the greatness of early America. He especially loves talking about George Washington...

Slave ownership is not a flaw. It is a clear corruption of ethos. And anyone willing to participate in slavery was and continues to be a terrible human being. It has never been difficult to recognize the humanity of slaves. There have always been those opposed to slavery and I applaud those historical figures who had the audacity to make such unpopular statements.

George Washington wasn't one of those historical figures. He was a slave owner and, because of that, a bastard. The phenomena of slavery has a very unique historical quality where it was so ubiquitous that its gross immorality went full circle and turned into some sort of unavoidable virtue. Slavery was a horrific wrong from the moment of its inception right up to the modern era.

Of course, and this might be the most important point, there is a certain reasonableness to the abandonment of discretion when it comes to slave ownership in historical America or abroad. But no one seems to take that to its logical conclusion. That is, the era of slavery, and not just slavery itself, becomes necessarily irrelevant to contemporary politics. Our founding fathers were men of their times and such times are over.

You do not get to hark upon such a false golden era as the embodiment of some sort of lost ideal without also acknowledging the wickedness that shatters such a false perception. If you want to own the era of our founding fathers, then own it in its entirety.

Once you begin to accept the totality of American history, once you acknowledge that Tocqueville was a privileged white man writing about other privileged white men, you will abandon the term "American exceptionalism."

[snappyturtle]

1. Excellent....thank you. I have never liked the term

(and you have given me more reasons to dislike it) and
broadcasting it....well, not an endearing term especially
in such global times. To me it is a term of national
arrogance. imho

[AverageJoe90]

2. While I think 'bastard' is rather too harsh a term to describe G.W...there is still much truth here.

American exceptionalism,. while sometimes noble in spirit(though not always; the hardcore RW version not only ignores the dark side, but sometimes even whitewashes it.), often does overlook the dark side of American history, including the great overall tragedy that was slavery(and that was the lesser evil. Some planters truly *were* bastards, no question about it), and the evils of Jim Crow, and even the unfortunate remnants of societal and institutional racism in *today's* America, etc.

[Bernardo de La Paz]

3. "American Exceptionalism" is a codeword to act like a bully to the world. It's Mostly a Crock.

For example, many Americans will say "No country in the world loves its children as much as America" as one argument for American Exceptionalism.

The truth of the matter is that no developed country has as many children living in grinding poverty as America.

No 'advanced' country has as high an infant mortality as America.

No 'developed' country has such terrible nutrition for children.

No 'modern' country has such terrible health care actually received by children as America (even if a few rich kids and charity cases get the world's best health care).

That is the true "American Exceptionalism".

The flip side is that the American bully boys (and gals) say that they can push other countries around and bomb them at will because America is Exceptional.

Even if the false conception of American Exceptionalism were true, it would not be a license to walk all over other countries and peoples and cultures.