American Exceptionalism!

by Kit

Ever notice how liberals will talk about countries like Sweden and Switzerland and point out that they are so much more tolerant than Americans because you never hear about racism and discrimination from those countries?

First, I think racism comes out of a natural human preference for the familiar and the known. People prefer other people who look, think, and act similar. Its not a pleasant aspect of human nature but its a natural one. It hits skin color (& tone), religious beliefs, and economic status. Racism is simply an outgrowth of that natural preference. It comes from an unpleasant, but almost universal, aspect of human nature.

Now, notice how countries like Sweden and Switzerland are almost uniformly white. And not just white, but a distinct subgroup of whites such as Scandinavian or Germanic. And they are culturally uniform. So what does this mean? Well, to quote a former Indiana Klansman of the 1920s in explaining why there was very little anti-Asian rhetoric then: "You can only hate what you have".

If they are not there and you are not fighting them then even there will be very little tension. And sometimes, the first few trickles of immigrants cause very little tension because they are never seen as a threat. It is only when large groups of immigrants come that ethnic tension bubbles up. You can see this happening in Europe now with the violence between whites and Muslim immigrants.

But America is probably the most diverse country in the world. Really, name an ethnic group that has more than 1 million members I will bet you that at least one member lives in the US. Yet we are remarkably free of the ethnic tension that plagues countries with far smaller populations. Just go to Africa or South America.

True, America has had its share of racial violence, especially in the 19th and early-20th centuries but since 1960s we’ve more or less moved past it. There have been a few flare-ups such as the targeting of Korean business during the Rodney King riots. But given a country as vast and diverse as America, we should be a complete ant total basket case —but we aren’t.

America is remarkably cohesive. I think that is for several reasons: First, unless you are an American Indian, you cannot trace your ancestry or culture back more than 400 years.

Second, we have, for the last 200 years, continuously had an influx of immigrants from the Germans in the 1820s and the Irish in the 1850s to the Hispanics of the past few decades, not to mention the large numbers of blacks brought here as slaves.

Third, that immigration flow means there is no “American ethnicity”. The constant flow immigrants has made it impossible for Americans to craft a sense of racial identity. Though some have tried, such as the Nativists and Klan of the early-20th century, they have failed.

Fourth, the failure to form an identity around a racial or ethnic idea means that we have had to craft one built around a set of basic values and an inherent Middle Class aesthetic. Americans see themselves as ideally Middle Class and anyone can be Middle Class, whether you are black, white, Chinese, Japanese, or Indian.

Its not enough to say you believe in “American Exceptionalism” you must know why America is Exceptional and our ability to craft a single nation out of many races, religious groups, and ethnicities is just one of them.

E Pluribus Unum.

Out of many, one.