Last week, Campus Reform ran a survey of Harvard students asking them which was the bigger threat to world security: America, the leading world super-power of the modern age, or ISIS, a radical Islamic group that’s gaining some traction in the Middle East. And because they have brains in their heads and not spaghetti, of course they said America.
What else could they say? America is a bigger threat than ISIS because America is working on a completely different level than a radical terrorist group. The potential for America to cause problems on a worldwide scale is going to be astronomically higher than ISIS.
The more pertinent question to be asking would be whether or not America is a bigger threat to world security than, say, Russia. Or China, or Great Britain or some other comparable entity. Then you’d have a conversation. Or, better yet, comparing America to the supposed all-encompassing Islamic state ISIS hopes to set-up that would include the world’s entire Muslim population. Something beyond a simple “America is bad” answer.
This is mostly because America, honestly, isn’t that bad. We’ve done some horrible things as a nation, and we’re doing some horrible things right now. There’s some major blood on our hands to be sure, but what nation doesn’t have a little blood on their hands? However, our potential to do some good in this world far outstrips anything good ISIS could ever do. Mainly because we aren’t the ones beheading journalists like it’s the Dark Ages; we are some three hundred million people trying to do what’s best for ourselves, and trying to get along with our neighbors.
It’s funny listening to how the students who spoke in the video talk about America. They’re talking like they aren’t a part of the country. Like if America is just a bunch a suits in Washington and an arsenal of drones. Well it isn’t. Assuming they aren’t international students, they’re as much a part of America as you or me. And if America is a threat to world security, then we need to change that. There are these elections coming up in November. I hear that’s a good place to have your voice heard. If you don’t think that’s good enough, give Enzi, Barrasso, or even Lummis a call. The ball is in our court; it has always been in out court. We have all the power, and if our country’s a bully on the world stage, then it’s our fault it’s like that. Throwing the blame onto previous generations isn’t helping either. We need to accept the faults we’ve made as a nation and move on towards a brighter future.
And if you truly believe that you have zero control or say in how this nation is run, then you deserve the tyrannical world-bullying police state that we supposedly live in.
