The United States Needs A Flawed Hero!

Just wondering, now that the legacy of McCain and family has been secured for national posterity and the recitation of the American myth of unreproachable exceptionalism has again been orated, will Everett Alvarez, Jr., the first PoW in Vietnam (8-1/2 years), be treated so presidentially by the news and the political base when he one day passes from the land of the living? Or will he be lucky to even be mentioned to a national audience? Will we ever embrace what happened in Vietnam and why, and the significant role the United States played in this deathly colonial atrocity within Asia?

I have my doubts, seeing how we are, yet again, white-washing history for the sake of having another white hero to reverence as a true all American. We need better choices on who we nationally reverence as an American hero, on who represents an inclusive United States. White-washing McCain’s anti-Civil Rights, anti-immigrant, and anti-LGBTQ political history and turning him into a spotless champion of the People – an American example – seems disturbingly wrong to me. So, too, does white-washing documented American history of its racist and imperialistic undemocratic national sins, both within our country and around the world.

To learn from historical figures like John McCain, we need to see his many flaws, too. Sadly, as once again demonstrated here, this act of honesty is repetitiously avoided in our society! It’s okay to honor John McCain’s military service, but let’s be honest about his complicated history in politics. And let’s, for once, start being honest about United States history! For the sake of our national future, we need real imperfect heroes to learn from and be inspired by, not one dimensional textbook mythic heroes that present us with nothing but self-deceptive hubris.

https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.pbs.org/newshour/amp/world/first-american-vietnam-war-pow-need-understand-war

George Washington and Thomas Jefferson may have struggled with the morality of slavery, but they refused to public challenge this immoral economic system, and they continued to personally profit from slavery all their lives. Abraham Lincoln wanted to reunite the nation, the Confederate south and Union north, but he did not want to free the slaves to achieve this – politics forced him to in order to keep the North from losing the war. Woodrow Wilson was a “nadir” era, Klan supporting, all out “Jim Crow” racist, whose presidency was based on spreading segregation and white colonial influence upon the world.

Lyndon Johnson tried to do right by history domestically, but fell way short over his bloody and costly obsession with forcing white “democracy” upon an Asian nation that rejected our nation’s presence. Ronald Reagan and George W. Bush continued the Johnson legacy of a futile imperialistic influence by their actions in the Middle East, while at home taking back up the mantle of African American repression and imprisonment. Barack Hussein Obama was clearly one our best presidents, but was embattled by his need to be a perfect gentleman and statesman in response to white political racism against him and his colorful administration.

Now we have that Donald Trump guy, who broke campaign laws to swing the Electoral College vote against the voted will of the citizen majority. With, of course, the enthusiastic endorsement and complicity of the white Republican party of this nation. And, as a nation, we are struggling to understand how this happened.

The reason we are where we are at today, as a nation that is still plagued with the resurgence of white religious supremacy, is because we do not honestly and accurately teach history to our citizens and to our children. We, instead, teach the ahistorical “Confederate myth” of pre-Civil Rights era within our schools and homes. We preach to the nation, through “patriotic” events, the ahistorical American myth of “democracy for all” and our national “moral exceptionalism” within this world. Add to this, we prop up sinless American “heroes of the people” using the politically famous – whose social, moral, and legislative acts are demonstrably questionable.

We need as a nation to do better and to be, from now on, more honest – about our national history and about the people who make up our history! So, that we can learn not to repeat history any further, both as individual citizens and as a nation together. We owe this to our future citizens, and to the entire world around us. When will we start?

#resist white American hero worship – unless that “hero” has actually stood patriotically for the U.S. Constitution applying fairly to all U.S. citizens, for standing against laws that encourage an elitist class of citizens, and against #maga and white-ly #inhisimage influencing U.S. government! #JohnMcCain #Vietnam #EverettAlvarez

.