Before You Light The First Firecracker

Summary: When I was growing up in rural Kansas and Oklahoma, July 4, Independence Day, was billed as the one holiday that brought us all together. Regardless of our origin, our heritage, our belief system, we were all Americans, damn it, and July 4 gave us a chance to all celebrate our freedoms. That was the way it was billed. We had something that no other country in the world could claim. Over the years, though, what I’ve learned, individually, and what we’ve learned and begun to talk about as a nation, is something far removed from the idyllic picture that was painted for us. There has never been a point in the history of the United States where everyone was free. The country itself is founded upon stolen land. The blood of genocide soaks the soil of every farm and every city that dots the landscape from sea to shining sea. The eternal stain of enslavement discolors all the 13 original colonies and fostered the racism that still, to this very day, keeps people of color from being genuinely free. Now, I’m not one to say don’t celebrate the birth of this nation. That’s not my place. You celebrate what you want to celebrate today. But before you light that first firecracker or grill that first hot dog, or wave your flag in that parade, let’s take a moment to get real about what the true history and status of this country is. My country ‘tis of thee, embraced misanthropy, of thee I scream. Pull back the covers, take a look at the wounds and the disease. Then, if you still have the stomach, we’ll talk about celebrations. Stolen Land, Stolen People Thievery is at the heart of what we now know as the United States. Of course, not many people call in that. Instead, we hear words like conquered and settled, and explored. But who was conquered and what was settled? Exploring sounds like an innocent enough activity, but the reasons for doing so only worsened the crimes being committed. North America was not unpopulated when the first Europeans landed here. From Jamestown to Plymouth, the people who dared to cross an ocean, looking for freedom from their own oppression, considered themselves better than those who were already calling this land home and didn’t care that in order for them to establish what they wanted in a country, those they called savages would have to die. History tells us that the number of indigenous peoples was reduced because of diseases most likely introduced to the continent by Spanish explorers in what we now call Florida. They were weak, their numbers too few to provide any real resistance to the light-skinned invaders. While that is true to some degree, what is also true is that many tribes only wanted to live peacefully. If the Europeans had made an honest effort to work alongside the indigenous tribes rather than trying to steal their land and their means of livelihood, they might have found surprising amounts of cooperation among people who wanted to preserve their way of life, not become converts to some foreign religion. Unfortunately, the invading forces from Europe weren’t inclined to cooperate, share, or leave well enough alone. They wanted everything for themselves and if that meant they had to eliminate the natives already here, well then, that was just the way they had always operated, from the Roman Empire forward. There was no reason in their mind to think differently. Then, as if it wasn’t enough to steal the land and kill its people, they had to bring over other people of a different color, people stolen from yet a different continent, because they simply couldn’t survive in the manner to which they were accustomed if they had to do all the wo...

Before You Light The First Firecracker

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