America Today

“Proud to be an American”

Who else can say they live in a country that not only condones, but supports and encourages one to express who they are and what they think? Who else can say they live in a country that grants the people enough power to influence political decisions? Who else can say they live in a country that can destroy the morals of a society in a tenth of the time it took to create them?

The amount of abortions and rapists are steadily increasing while the amount of average, hard-working, middle-class Americans is steadily decreasing. You know it’s a sad state of affairs when it’s deemed “popular” to outright hate the current president, yet he gets re-elected. Who else can say their proud to be an American in times like these? I can.

I’m proud that people can think what they want to think. I’m proud that people can say what they want to say. I’m proud people can do what they want to do. I’m not proud of what kind of people can emerge from a world filled with these rights. The saying “no good deed goes unpunished” comes to mind. I don’t believe that in the founding fathers’ wildest drams would they imagine that, one day, 100 congressmen from around the nation would have to sit down and define marriage.

To continue, I don’t believe this country and government can be blamed for what it’s people do, especially when said country doesn’t have a stereotypical stranglehold on its people. In fact, I love the United States and the ideas and morals it was founded upon, I just don’t think people can be trusted with any good thing. If it weren’t for the rights I have as an American, I would not even be typing away my thoughts regarding the nation.

As Kansas once said, “Don’t hang on, nothing last forever but the earth and sky”. Nothing as great as the United States, at least in it’s original build, can last too long . No amount of pride can save what people want to keep, yet inevitably destroy at the same time.

Ultimately, what does it matter what an Oklahoman student in a freshmen PreAP English class has to say about the country? There will always be diehard fans and outright pessimists that will either protest or support whatever the nation may do, which further shows how great the United Sates really is. Who am I to judge a country that was created decades before my birth by people probably more clever than I could imagine.

In closing, I believe the US to be the greatest country to ever grace the Earth, but, at the same time, I also believe that a country that places so much power in its citizens is unsustainable in a form favorable to its original creators. “The power of the people” becomes so bittersweet.