Plenty of people believe the best words encapsulating what America represents are words such as liberty, freedom, justice, or many other words of the same general uplifting ilk. Yet, as appropriate as these words might seem, they don’t really encapsulate what America is all about because America was founded on not just great principles, but also established through the violence so directed against their English oppressors. So too, America has a history of enslaving peoples, which is hardly becoming of a land of liberty, of which, those so enslaved, were not freed, through peaceful means, but actually this necessitated a brutal and bloody civil war to accomplish such.
Indeed, when we look at the incarceration rates in America as compared to other Western nations, and the violent crime, so of, it has to be admitted that America doesn’t even seem all that civilized, which seemingly makes no sense, for a country that is supposed to represent the bastion of freedom, liberty, and opportunity.
Instead, it has to be admitted that America despite all of its well-reasoned laws and great principles, has never been able to successfully shake off the fact that time and time again, America just can’t help itself, and thereby dismisses treaties and diplomacy to reach for its guns, as if to say, that justice comes through the barrel of a gun, which obviously is something not becoming of a nation known for its rule of law, and supposed tolerance of other peoples and nations, in their having the right to sovereignty and self-determination.
It would be desirable that this land would actually live up to its creed to be a “sweet land of liberty” but all the evidence demonstrates that this is patently untrue. Rather, America asserts again and again, that might makes right, and proves that point by the utilization of its military throughout the world, as well as controlling its own population when it is becoming uncivil, through an iron fist, that oppresses especially those people who are the furthest away and with the least amount of hope to ever fairly obtain the American dream.
This is a nation that has clearly lived by the sword, since its inception, and while knowing what the right thing to do is, insists upon ignoring such, so as to simply take care of business through its guns, to thereby take control of whatever it doesn’t desire to engage with in a civil conversation, or to establish any real form of justice with. Rather, America makes it its point, to shoot first, and ask questions later, which is quite unfortunate -- for a true leader of democracy and freedom, would conduct itself in a way and manner that would be consistent with a mature and balanced view of the world along with contributing to accomplishing the appropriate interactions which would reflect that very thing.
In truth, “guns” is the word that sums up America, appropriately, for it is those guns that fought for American independence, and it is those same guns, that kept the Union together. No doubt, a strong argument could be made that this was appropriate – yet, what has been forgotten throughout all this drama is that America still has its guns and still uses them, and seemingly won’t relinquish its hold on those guns because it is those guns that America truly lives and stands by.