Summary

We are interconnected in the USA. We have strengths and vulnerabilities. Our vulnerabilities can destroy US. We need to unite as a country to vanquish the billionaires who are trying to subjugate US. Let’s stand together for US.

Vulnerabilities and Strengths Affect Our Wellbeing

In the USA, we have many strengths. And, we have many vulnerabilities. Wellbeing in the USA is connected to our vulnerabilities and our strengths. Let’s explore how vulnerabilities and strengths affect our wellbeing and why I believe that our vulnerabilities are destroying us.

Our Strengths Promote Our Wellbeing

The USA has been perceived as being strong, at least in the past. Our strengths are diverse. Our strengths derive from our actions and our lack of action. Our strengths do not always make us strong.

A Welcoming Spirit

In my opinion, one of our strengths is our history of welcoming people from all over the world.

“Give me your tired, your poor.

Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,

The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.

Send these, the homeless, the tempest-tost to me,

I lift my lamp beside the golden door!”

(Emma Lazarus: November 2, 1883)

https://www.statueofliberty.org/new-colossus/

But, that strength is silenced by some other realities of the USA, namely enslavement of our fellow human beings and the attempted annihilation of the First Nations’ Peoples who have lived on the soil of the USA for tens of thousands of years. I will address this further when we explore our vulnerabilities.

Everything, everyone is interconnected.

The US Constitution

In my opinion, another strength of the USA is our Constitution, a living and breathing document which has been revised with Amendments and whose tenets have been delineated in our codes of law. I am not a lawyer so forgive me for any misuse of legal terms. The Constitution emerged as the European settlers clamoured to distinguish the form of government in the USA from the shackles of the British monarchy. The Constitution is not perfect and its intent is perfectly clear: never, never, never will we return to being governed by an omnipotent monarch.

Luck, Pure Luck

A third strength has nothing to do with our actions and rather is our good fortune. The land is rich with resources. We are damn lucky. And, we are tasked to be stewards of our environment. The resources are plentiful. Abundance begets enormous responsibilities for the preservation and safeguarding of those resources for the benefit of all of US and for all living matter.

Our Innovative Spirit

A fourth strength has been our willingness to be innovative. We have embraced new technologies, sometimes with dire consequences as during the Industrial Revolution. We faced the economic fallout of fewer jobs as mechanization progressed; overcrowded and unsanitary living conditions; unsafe workplaces; discrimination against women and minorities in the workplace; poor access to healthy food; and the damnation of child labour. We wrote laws and implemented programmes to try to redress these problems. We did not always succeed but we tried.

Our Diversity

A fifth strength, in my opinion, is our diversity. Call me what you will: I believe that our diversity is a strength. Why? Because diversity diversifies our perspectives, stretching the ‘muscles’ employed in looking at things from a different angle. That translates into neuroplasticity which makes us a resilient people. We learn from each other and that makes us better as a people.

The caveat to all of these strengths is that we have many vulnerabilities. Our vulnerabilities will destroy US If we do not take action, now.

Our Vulnerabilities Risk Our Wellbeing

We have many vulnerabilities in the USA, in my opinion. I believe that we can counter these vulnerabilities and vanquish the authoritarianism which is in our midst. It’s going to require a lot of work. Are We, The People, up to the challenge?

I believe that we are because we are interconnected.

Individualism

The foremost vulnerability of the USA, in my opinion, is our individualism. This is a damning problem. For so many people, the idea of 15 minutes of fame underscores their every action, whether they realize it or not. And, this extends to the peer group and beyond that to the larger community group. From ‘me, me, me’ to ‘us, us, us’. This over-definition of a sense of identity then leads to the use of despicable terms like ‘you people’.

Confession. I am American born. I was not raised in this country. Sometimes I feel like I am a fly on the wall watching the dynamics play out. One of the weirdest dynamics to me is this idea of ‘me’ being superimposed on a ‘us’ which is also exclusionary. ‘Me’ attached to a group which distinguishes itself from the American people as a totality is exclusionary. Bizarre and a problem, in my opinion.

Our Slavery History Affects Our Wellbeing

The enslavement of people has flavoured the development of institutions in the USA. The enslavement of people did not end with Emancipation. The Jim Crow era perpetuated the slave patrols and the federally sanctioned discriminatory housing practices fueled continued discriminatory housing practices by local politicians and realtors, among other discriminatory practices. I saw this segregation in neighbourhoods with my own eyes as recently as 2023 in several areas of the Northeastern United States.

Our Obsession with the Power of Wealth Affects Our Wellbeing

Class distinctions also prevail in the USA. Poverty itself continues to dictate where someone lives and the quality of housing to which they have access. Financial freedom determines the quality of education and the safety of neighbourhoods and the access to healthy foods and the tree coverage in a community and the proximity to hazardous materials and the presence of industries emitting hazardous wastes.

So, the elites have multiple angles by which to divide and conquer US. Sometimes, too often, we let them succeed. Why?

Our In-Group/Out-Group Alliances Affect Our Wellbeing

Elites can succeed in profiting from US when we allow them to pit us against each other.

Because we align with some bogus in-group and deem everyone else to be a member of the out-group. Because in the USA we have been captured by the holy grail of appearances and this extends to colour of skin. I am not sorry if I offend some people when I assert my conviction regarding appearances.

Remember that in-group and out-group belonging is a socially constructed concept which we can overcome, if we desire to do so. We can build a collective social capital by broadening our coalitions and inviting people to join US.

Our Adulation at the Altar of Appearances Affects Our Wellbeing

There is something very wrong with a society which promotes appearances as being reflective of competence, worthiness, intelligence, capability, and authenticity. We need to step back and take a deep breath and close our eyes.

Yes, close our eyes.

Because the person who does not have a particular skin colour is not less competent than another person. The person with missing teeth is not less intelligent than a person with perfectly aligned teeth. The person who wears jewelry and dresses in fashionable clothing is not more capable than the person who cannot afford to wear something different every day or cannot afford to buy stylish clothing. The person who speaks with a Southern accent, a lisp, a foreign accent, or using ASL is not less worthy of a living wage than someone who speaks ‘standard American English’. The person with a physical disability is not less worthy of safe housing than a person who is able bodied. The person with Mar-a-lago face is not more authentic than the person who has aged naturally, as we all have witnessed from the Donald’s Administration.

Playing the Victim Affects Our Wellbeing

Playing the victim is the final vulnerability I wish to explore. To a certain degree, I believe playing the victim incorporates many of the afore-mentioned vulnerabilities. It is the most insidious vulnerability. This vulnerability plays right into the hands of the elites. Again, as a fly on the wall, it is the most salient characteristic affecting our unity and our collective wellbeing.

Look around you. Look at yourself. How many times have you blamed someone else for your misfortune? How many times have you noticed that people around you, even in the public eye, blame someone else for their misfortune?

And, listen to my choice of words. ‘Misfortune’. Something happened, you don’t like it, it may not have advanced your life the way you wanted your life to progress, and it’s always someone else’s fault. That’s the American way.

Reframe. Shit happens. Sometimes you are to blame. Sometimes you simply had bad luck. Learn from the situation and keep it moving.

Well, I just lost my readership of one. I don’t care because I believe this is worth repeating. Americans love to play the victim. By doing so, we latch onto some socially constructed in-group. We blame someone else. We do not hold ourselves accountable. We pretend that we are superior to someone else or to another group. And, we play right into the hands of the elites.

In reality, our interconnectedness is our strength.

A few examples of our superiority complex/victimization complex, you request? Okay. Let’s go for it.

Remember how the USA did not enter WWII until the attack on Pearl Harbour.
Recall how every single new immigrant group to the USA is first banished, then bastardized, then finally accepted, and each group repeats the cycle by targeting the next incoming group. For example, Italian Americans, including Bovino, wake the hell up and remember the history of Italy and the history of how Italian Americans were treated when they first arrived in the USA.
Ah, yes. Have to blame Black Americans for the fact that Johnny is not a good student and cannot get into college. We need to maintain segregation was the answer of those who felt victimized and who felt superior.
Don’t marry someone who does not look like you, who practices a different religious faith, who speaks a different language. The age-old story: from ‘Romeo and Juliet’ to Leonard Bernstein’s ‘West Side Story’. The person who belongs to a different in-group is a threat to us and we are the victims.
The creation of the Department of Homeland Security, that very Nazi term for something to distinguish US from them, starting after the World Trade Center attacks. Because we believe that we have been victimized by some obscure ‘them’.

As long as we embrace our victim role, as long as we pledge fealty to our superiority complex, we are doomed to fall. We will fall together and the elites will rise up.

Why do I speak of our victimization complex as a nation? Because it is so apparent to those of us who were not raised here. We see how the USA has exploited its own people and other nations. We see how the USA loves power and does not realize that its attachment to world power is an Achilles heel because the power is acquired at the expense of other people.

Our vulnerabilities and our strengths affect our wellbeing.

Taking Perspective of Our Vulnerabilities

Americans would benefit from cultivating an interest in learning about the experiences of people who have lived in another country where conflict may have existed for generations based on religious differences, differences in primary language, ethnic differences unrelated to skin colour, and social class differences. We would benefit from not prioritizing physical appearances.

Our vulnerabilities including our focus on physical appearances are employed to divide US. Think transgender. Think Latino immigrant. Think skin colour. Think pretty privilege. Think the blame game.

America, we have a problem. The positive is: we can fix it.

Take Action: Wellbeing in the USA

Take a moment to reflect on my words and let them sit with you. Oh, I have heard a certain speaker say this and it irked me because the goal of that person was to unsettle and to conjure a sense of superiority over his readers and his listeners. And, he does this with the goal of asserting some sort of monopoly on wisdom and suffering.

That is exactly what I do not intend to evoke.

My goal is to ask you to open your mind. Look at the world using a different lens. Change the angle of your gaze and consider that as Americans we have a lot to learn about the history of the world. We have a lot to learn about how our viewpoint is tinged by our history. We are myopic to how the rest of the world has operated for thousands of years. I say this with confidence and in humility to other cultures and other nations.

American history delivers horribles. The history of the world has not always been like the horribles in American history. The history of the world is not mirrored by American history. Fellow Americans, open your eyes and stop wallowing in self-pity. Let’s stop our inclination to adore appearances and our inclination to embrace the dichotomy of victimization/superiority. Let’s be introspective and learn from our vulnerabilities and from our strengths. Only then will we vanquish the billionaires bent on subjugating all of US and all of the world.

Our vulnerabilities and strengths affect our wellbeing. We are strong together. Our collective wellbeing depends on our commitment to US.

Remember Berenike. Honour the legacy of Berenike.

Berenike existed in the past. Berenike will exist in the future.

Lady Gaga presenting plans for her version of “Won’t You Be My Neighbor”

Always, surround yourself with music to inspire you to be kind, grateful, generous, compassionate, peaceful, and truth seeking.

Please give generously to your local food pantries. Your neighbours will thank you.

Disclaimer: The content of this post is not meant to substitute for a consultation with your healthcare professional team.

If you are thinking of hurting yourself or of hurting someone else, please CALL 9-1-1; CALL 9-8-8; or GO TO the nearest emergency room.

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Nota Bene:

USA Government websites are being purged by the current Trump Administration to align the website content with the regime’s political agenda. Please note that any government website cited in this and other posts on this website may no longer contain evidence based or historically correct information. Thus, I am trying to avoid including any references or resources which derive from a USA government website. This is not bias; I take this action in an effort to maintain a factually sound content in my posts.