Patriotism: What Powers the Heart of a Nation

SENSITIVE CONTENT: PROFANITY, POLITICAL REFERENCES, AND VIOLENT DEPICTIONS

God, sometimes I wonder about saneness of people. Are they really alright? After what they ask or do or say to each other and to me?

Just a few months ago, right before the Kamala – Trump election, I was sitting on a park bench in the good ol’ nation’s capital, Washington DC, when this MAGA and liberal really start going at each others’ throats. I’m just watching ‘cause I’m amused, when the MAGA throws her hat at the liberal’s head, and he screams “I hate this country! Why did I have to be born here? Goddamn it, America is so lost to rightist politics I’d even move to China or the Middle East!” This really pisses me off, both the hat-throwing and dissing of America, and so being the impatient, impertinent, fist-throwing kind of person I am, I involve myself.

“Excuse me?” I ask as I approach the white MAGA chick and blond-haired dude wearing a shirt with a knife through America.

“It’s none of your business,” he spits at me, scoffing and looking disdainful.

“Yeah, move it along, Ching-Chong Chow,” she says, her voice pompous and full of derogation.

“Woah . . . Back it up,” I say, fully prepared to rain hellfire on them. “I’m gonna start with you, the unpatriotic dipshit, and then I’ll move onto you, racist poptart. My dad was born in a hole in the wall dump called Afghanistan, where his older sisters were raped and slaughtered by the Taliban and where this thing called freedom and the right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness doesn’t exist. My grandfather tried to appeal to the justice system for my dad’s sisters and got a bullet in the back of his head and my mom disappeared off to God knows where after she left home without a male escort. My mom’s parents were living in a shitshow called China during WWII, the civil war, the cultural revolution, and the communist takeover. They escaped through Hong Kong on the last ship out, leaving behind all their family including their siblings, parents, and cousins to be massacred. They arrived in Taiwan only to be mugged and kidnapped, before they fled to Japan on a fucking fishing boat, where they then legally immigrated to the flippin’ US of A, they very place you want to diss and curse. My parents were the lucky ones, considering they got to escape those nightmares and move to a country where they could have a family, speak their mind, and get ahead in the world.

You don’t understand how lucky and blessed you are to be living in the greatest country in the world, where the US dollar is strong and steady, where the government has checks and balances to prevent living under an authoritarian thumb, where you’re allowed to say whatever the hell you want, where you’re allowed to disagree with the government and not be thrown in a damn cell, buried under 20 feet of dirt and death and disgust. How are you so ungrateful?

Do you know how many people in the world would murder and give everything they have to live here? People in Africa and South America and Asia and throughout history? Why do you think the US is #1 in immigration? Why do you think Venezuelan and Colombian migrants risk their lives to travel all the way to the US? They don’t stop in Mexico or Guatemala; they go through hell to get here and live here because it is so extraordinary compared to their lives.

You’re complaining about things other people couldn’t even dream of it’s so out of reach for the realities they’re living. You want to go live in hellholes like Afghanistan or China or Israel right now? What is wrong with you? The current life expectancy in Afghanistan is just over 60 years. Do you know what it is in the US? 77 years. The average person in the US lives almost 17 more years than someone in Afghanistan. Do you know why? Go to Afghanistan, not to cities where the big shots live, but go to where the everyday people live. Have you seen the mutilated bodies in the streets? The dogs eating the rotting corpses? The women and children shot up against walls? The people missing limbs from bombs and missiles? Do you know how bad those people have it? Our Founding Fathers decided that they were going to do something revolutionary: create a set of laws and rights for the basic human being. Do you know have many countries don’t have that? We’re so blessed; We are the < 1% of people throughout history who are not living under an oppressive dictatorship or monarchy, and who have an actual chance to live a decent life. You said you were born here? You’ve reaped the benefits of being an American citizen all your life and are denying the fact that you’ve received any luxury or security at all. Are you absolutely insane?”

The guy stands, shellshocked. “I wasn’t expecting that,” he said. “Especially from someone like you.” I go red.

“Someone like me?” I ask.

“Yeah,” he says. “The child of immigrant parents. You’re also a female Asian.” I am dumbfounded. You see what I mean when I question the saneness of humanity?

“What does that have to do with anything? You think that just because my parents were immigrants, and I’m an Asian girl that I can’t be patriotic? Isn’t that discriminatory in itself, saying I can’t be something because of my race or gender?” He doesn’t answer. God. I turn on my heel to the pink-faced MAGA after.

“Now you, racist cupcake. Did you know that the Chinese invented paper? And the mechanical clock? And toothbrushes? And wheelbarrows? And gunpowder, which shaped Western conquest and warfare for centuries? They even first developed noodles, which Marco Polo and other merchants on the Silk Road brought back to Italy to evolve into pasta. They were the center of economic and intellectual progress for 100s of years, I dare say almost a millennium.

And the Middle East, where the first civilizations of the world developed. Mesopotamia and Anatolia. The Fertile Crescent, King Sargon of Akkad, all these people and inventions. Cuneiform: The first writing system ever. You think that’s unimpressive, and have the guts to use a racist slur against me to try and assert your balls? I’m not intimidated, just pissed.

The reason that the world’s devolving into shit right now is because there are too many people like you guys: racist ‘geniuses’ and unpatriotic, ungrateful, uneducated idiots both fighting and fighting and fighting without listening to each other or even trying to reach a compromise or solution. You’re both struggling for a throne to profess your desire for freedom and in your view, what are principled and proper politics and policies, while you ignore any reason or logic coming from any other direction. Fix yourselves up before some morons elect an imbecile like you to serve our country.” I walk away without turning to see the looks on their faces.

Damn, that felt good.