Feeding America’s Soul

Feed the soul, starve the ego

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geography_of_the_United_States

This 4th of July, America will turn 250 years old. The day marks the adoption of the Declaration of Independence in 1776. I ask that we not forget our history.

America, as we know it, may be turning 250 years old, but we must remember that people were here on this land thousands of years before that. And the land we live on is millions of years old.

I hope we take a moment between the fireworks and the parades to reflect on the darker parts of our past, because once we remember the darkness, we can remember how to move forward from the dark place we are in now.

While there are many differences between America and Ancient Alexandria, I would like to focus on the similarities in this piece. Furthermore, I would like to focus on the cracks, the warning signs of collapse. Ancient Alexandria did not collapse in one fell swoop; it happened gradually, as men with oversized egos and self-serving agendas took over.

Ancient Alexandria was founded by Alexander the Great in 331 BCE. It was the economic and intellectual capital of the Mediterranean.

Like America, Alexandria was an experiment. In the 1970s, an educational program called Schoolhouse Rock coined the phrase in a song titled “The Great American Melting Pot.”

To quote the song, “What good ingredients, Liberty and immigrants. They brought the country’s customs, their language, and their ways. They filled the factories, tilled the soil, and helped build the U.S.A.” — Lynn Ahrens

Ancient Alexandria was home to people from Christian, Stoic, Neoplatonist, Jewish, and many other religious and ethnic backgrounds for centuries. There were fights and disagreements, but they generally lived together without fear.

The Roman siege of 272 AD, during the reign of Emperor Aurelian, followed by Emperor Diocletian’s campaign in Egypt a few decades later, had a strong negative effect on the city.

What made Alexandria vulnerable are some of the same factors that are making the United States vulnerable: tribalism, religious extremism, violence, and war, as well as some in power pushing anti-intellectualism.

Currently, one could argue that the people who hold power in the United States, especially those in the White House, seem fine with banning books and defunding libraries, given that the Constitution establishes the separation of church and state.

“A house divided against itself cannot stand.” -Abraham Lincoln, 1858

The idea of collective responsibility seems to have faded, replaced by a false notion of strength.

Currently, one could argue that the people who hold power in the United States, especially those in the White House, seem to be fine with the idea of banning books and defunding libraries, as well as ignoring the fact that, in the United States Constitution, we have the separation of church and state.

“I say it with a sad sense of the disparity between us. I am not included within the pale of glorious anniversary! Your high independence only reveals the immeasurable distance between us.”

— Frederick Douglass, What to the Slave Is the Fourth of July? 1852

Human beings have been around long enough to make all the mistakes. By mistakes, I don’t mean forgetting your car keys. I mean the grave sin of racism, classism, and sexism.

This 250-year celebration needs to honor America’s grief. It is a human right to grieve. One can feel a multitude of things at once. One can feel sorrow, hope, excitement, and despair all in one day.

According to The Associated Press and Reuters.com, the Trump administration officially terminated more than 80% of U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) programs and canceled nearly 90% of its foreign aid contracts, amounting to billions of dollars in cuts to global development and humanitarian assistance.

According to Boston University and PBS News, an estimated 800,000 people have already died as a result of the sudden halt in medical supplies, clean water initiatives, and clinic operations.

Trump’s global aid cuts could lead to 14 million preventable deaths over five years. An estimated 700,000 additional child deaths are expected to occur annually.

Humans hurting humans. What will it take for us to stop?

In my calculations, here’s what it would take.

1 The environment: when one feels safe and secure, whether one is an adult or a child, one does not need to be in fight-or-flight.

2 The ability to coexist in peace and harmony, even when we are on opposite sides of the world. If America wants to be a world leader, our leaders need to be mature enough to ask what “peace through strength” really means. Does it mean we need more bombs or to start useless wars?

3 To see your child as my child, to extend our hearts, minds, and empathy, and to treat every child’s nervous system on this planet as a precious jewel. Which I believe, in certain activist spaces, is already starting to happen.

There is a mothering that is happening and an awakening among humankind to see each other as one. The question remains, will it be too late?

What if “we” and “our” were the most powerful words in the English language? When I hear someone use the word “we,” as in “we are all human,” or the word “our,” as in “our resources need to be protected for the next generation,” my thought might be, “What a mature leader.”

When I hear the words “I” and “me,” for example, “I’m so great. I have the best religion. It’s all about me,” etcetera, my thought is, “What a poor leader.” What makes a secure leader? When I say secure, I don’t mean someone being secure about how they look, although that may be part of it.

We need someone who leads with conviction but is also mature enough to recognize that there is room to broaden one’s perspective. Learning to balance one’s thoughts and desires and to stay open is a skill many humans struggle with. But when one masters this skill, one masters not only oneself, in a sense, but also can lead with a sense of security, thoughtfulness, and vision.

“Not everything that is faced can be changed, but nothing can be changed until it is faced.” -James Baldwin (1962)

If you are an American, you have a responsibility to feed America’s soul and starve its ego. This is what feeding America’s soul looks like: voting to protect the most vulnerable, protesting for justice, loving one another, and building strong communities.

What if this darkness is not the darkness of the tomb but the darkness of the womb? What if our America is not dead, but a country that is waiting to be born?” — Valarie Kaur

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