| I was watching The Hollywood Master, this episode was an interview with Ken Burns, the documentary filmmaker. He said something which I found very interesting. “The man who wrote “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.” wrote it while owning over 100 slaves.” We wonder why this country is so lost in its impression of who it is or was. Simply put, we were founded by people with blind spots as to their own flaws and to this day we have carried that malady through. We, in many ways, are still that arrogant white man writing about how wonderful we should be and how enlightened we want to believe we are while in reality, we have a little slave girl kneeling beside our chair offering up the cup of tea dozens of human property toiled to bring to our table. I think when Jefferson wrote “the pursuit of happiness” which people internalize what he was really saying was not personal but as a country, we need to see ourselves for who we are and the shortcomings we have and over time learn to let them go, apologize for them, and move past them, for then, and only then, will we find that happiness we so seak as a country.
Ok, my rant is over. |
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