Reply #90: I reject that construction. [View All]

I believe that it's a sloppy use of language, not to mention a little bit lazy. I don't mean that to be insulting or taken personally, but here is how I think it parses:

Discrimination does not spring from the founding principles or documents or covenants upon which the country and its form of government are ostensibly based. In fact, exactly the opposite is true. "We hold these truths to be self-evident," and all that. (Yes, I know only white male property owners were allowed to vote originally. We changed that. It was wrong, and didn't fit in with the rest, so we fixed it.) In that sense, discrimination is not American.

We are not the only place on earth where discrimination has taken place, or continues to take place. That means that discrimination is not unique to America, and in that sense, discrimination is not American.

Discrimination does not fit in with the ethical underpinnings of the largest religious group in the country, or for that matter with any of the religious groups in the country. If we are in fact a Christian nation (or more accurately a religious nation), then in that sense, discrimination is not American.

What it is, is an American problem. To ignore it is to enable it, and thereby become accomplices in it.

If the American story is supposed to be about the struggle of freedom against tyranny, of equity against the divine right of kings, and of justice against anarchy, then discrimination is un-American.