In America today, the citizens of our country seem to be becoming increasingly separated each day. With racial tensions surfacing after a police shooting, the Democrats and Republicans running to opposite ends of the political spectrum, and a widening of the gap between the upper and lower class, it looks like we are becoming less of a united nation, and more of a people concerned with our own selfish interests. No one wants to listen to another’s perspective if it differs from their own. This is concerning because the American people are supposed to be an example to the world of different people coming together in national unity. We are supposed to be diverse, but still together. As one of our mottos states, “E pluribus unum,” or “Out of many, one.” However, it looks as if the American people are focusing more on our differences rather than our similarities.
I wasn’t alive during the time when the United States developed into a superpower, but in everything I have been taught by teachers and professors, we were able to become a superpower because the people of the United States put aside their differences and saw themselves as Americans, not anything else. During World War II, young Americans fought and died for one another. Liberals took bullets for Conservatives, and Conservatives jumped on grenades for Liberals. Even with a segregated home, African-Americans fought for Whites, and Whites fought for African-Americans. These brave people didn’t do this because they saw how different they were. They did this because they saw the similarities in each other. They did this because they looked at each other and saw Americans, not Blacks or Whites, Democrats or Republicans, nor rich or poor. Women, who hadn’t previously done the kind of labor men did in factories and other jobs in the workforce, now became important on the home front, making sure they could provide not only for their children, but for those fighting the war. The unity the American people had at that time is a beautiful thing which bettered lives then, and could better lives now if we could regain that sense of togetherness. How can we get that back?
When I look at the different things which have brought the American people together in the past, and what separated us, I see a trend. We were most unified when we stood together against a common enemy; we are most divided when we don’t. In the end of the eighteenth century, thirteen colonies came together against the British government, because they saw a sense of togetherness. In the nineteenth century, instead of seeing Americans when we looked at one another, we saw Northerners and Southerners. Seeing this division caused us to try to kill each other. In World War II, the American people came together and stopped a madman from conquering Europe.
History isn’t the only place I can observe this. The last college football game I attended was at the University of Georgia. Sanford Stadium, the football arena at the University, holds over 90,000 people. While there, everywhere I looked, I saw Georgia fans. Every time Georgia scored, I could see people, different in color, creed, and status, celebrating with one another for a small victory over their enemy - the team Georgia was playing. I think this could help Americans reconnect. While I’m not suggesting we go fight another country or go to war, I think that if the American people could choose something we are all against, we could fight it. Think of what would happen if the entire US population came together to end bullying. Or cancer. Or depression. Or AIDS. Or childhood obesity. If the American people could come together, as a whole, against something we could all stand against, we could positively change the world. So why should we continue to distance ourselves from one another? If we could all fight for a universal goal, we would reunify the American people and change the world.
