Quote Originally Posted by irydyum
Shit, I'm 30 and still looking to find the good side of this country.
when i was a small child my grandfather took me aside and told me that this was the greatest country in the world. i loved my grandfather dearly so i just smiled and nodded and walked away. when i was an impetuous teenager my mother often said that we were lucky to live in this, the greatest country in the world. i learned my patience at an early age so every time she made such a blatantly false statement i just smiled and nodded and walked away. when i was a young adult, with a family of my own that i struggled to house and feed, my mother still insisted that this was the greatest country in the world. i was angry at my own failings and often demanded to know just what was so fucking great about this country, but eventually i would tire of the argument, smile and nod and walk away.

i'm getting on in years now, soon i'll be just another old man. that little family i struggled to support just up and left one day, but by then i could hardly blame them. i've lost everything several times, gaining a portion of it back each time, and somewhere along the way i realized that my grandfather and my mother weren't all that wrong. the greatness of any society has nothing to do with its government or its laws or even its history, it is a matter of its people and their ideals.

this is a country where even an old fool like me can survive and even thrive, even though i have stood against the status quo all my life. this is a country where the individual isn't burdened with formal class distinctions and where even the most destitute is afforded a standard of living that is envied in most other parts of the world. that standard of living has bred a people more giving and charitable than anywhere else on earth, with a higher percentage of our gdp given away each year in charitable donations than any other nation. those nations that come closest still give less than half of what u.s. citizens do, even as our economy crashes down around us. we began with the simple concept that the rights of the individual are of supreme importance and, despite the inevitable jealousy and greed engendered by the success of some and the failure of others, that concept has enabled this nation to see more productivity and innovation than any in history. in less than two hundred years we became the center of the world and the one country that never shirked its responsibility to aid both its friends and its enemies.

of course we have not been completely blameless, what country can claim no sin in its past. in times of expansion and violence we decimated the aboriginal peoples of this land, in times of war we were ruthless (then more than charitable in its aftermath), in business we sought success (sometimes at the cost of the well-being of others), and at all times we made decisions that were later seen as foolish or ill advised. all these sins are inherent in humanity and, try as you might to blame this country for the ills of the world, every nation has been guilty.