Though there isn’t much overtly patriotic about standing around watching colored explosives after a barbecue, celebrating the Fourth of July nonetheless stirs our rebellious hearts in some subtle ways. It’s almost impossible to think back on the audacity of our Founding Fathers and not ask ourselves how we are reacting to oppression and injustice today.
It’s also hard to accept that a person or a society is powerless to effect change when we look back at the weak and unorganized colonists daring to confront the mighty imperial power headquartered in the British Isles in 1776. And yet they did, and they won. Matter of fact, American imperial domination isn’t looking terribly hale today either, despite all that hardware and those many “boots on the ground.”
There is a spirit stirring throughout the land, and it is a Spirit of ’76. It is not terribly articulate, and it is not well organized. It is not a single thing, and the fissures and divisions within it are more obvious than the unifying threads. The manifestations of this spirit are not uniformly benign, and sober leadership is not immediately apparent. The ruling elites, to judge from their arrogance and crude displays of grotesque excess, are spectacularly insouciant about any threats to their continued pursuit of limitless greed.
What is missing is an emblematic incident, a case that symbolizes and embodies the unfairness baked deeper and deeper into our polity, something to electrify the vast majority that sees its conditions of life steadily deteriorate while the uber-rich accumulate power, wealth and kitschy art.
We await the Rosa Parks of the 99 percent.
1 comment:
Ironic that the president we hoped and expected would do practically nothing did so much damage and the one we hoped would do so much has been able to do so little...Hope
Post a Comment