We’re a Bunch of Wimps

Driving home from work the other day, I started thinking about my parents. I thought about a huge risk they took many years ago – uprooting a family of five and coming to a foreign land more than an ocean away. There had to be a very good reason. There was - opportunity. It’s an interesting thing, opportunity. It can only exist in an environment where risk is present. To enter willingly into such a dichotomy, my parents must have been pretty dam tough.

So as I thought about my folks, my stream of consciousness led to other Americans that (one way or another) left home for America. The first Americans, the Indians. The Europeans. The Asians. The Africans (I challenge you to find a tougher bunch than those that survived the middle passage and their progeny that endured slavery). All of these people were a hell of a lot tougher than we are now. We are, by comparison, a bunch of wimps. We bitch and moan about things that are in our control. We wait for help and ask for others to ease our pain. We watch the news and see families and businesses, begging as if from a choral song sheet, “all is lost unless the government helps us”. Even our President jumps in and implies that man alone cannot and will not succeed.

When did this happen? How did we get here?

Getting closer to home, I started to think about some state mottos. I knew a few by heart: New Hampshire, Virginia, North Carolina, Missouri, and others. Man, the people that wrote those mottos were a hearty bunch! What’s up with us now? Did the emasculation of America happen right before my very eyes? Were my parents the last generation with a figurative pair?

• Virginia: Sic semper tyrannis (Thus always to tyrants)
  Thus as in ‘you will lay dead at my feet’. By the way – it’s a woman carrying the sword on my state’s flag. Tougher than me and you? Uhhh, yeah! Now I’m not advocating that we slay tyrannical government officials - we should however vote them the hell out of office!
  


• Alabama: Audemus jura nostra defendere (We dare defend our rights)
  I sense an implied “…by any means necessary”!
  


• Massachusetts: Ense petit placidam sub libertate quietem (By the sword we seek peace, but peace only under liberty)
  Hard to believe how far this state has come. People there once knew that freedom is not free.
  


• New Hampshire: Live Free or Die
  My personal favorite. I love its brevity and poignancy. I also concur – our freedom is more valuable than my own life. It’s the reason I disagreed with W on the Patriot Act.
  


• Arkansas: The People Rule
  That’s it. Any questions?
  


• Mississippi: By valor and arms
  In other words, our bravery and our military are enough to protect our way of life. At least that’s my interpretation.
  

As I read through these mottos and others, four themes stood out to me: liberty, defense, equality, and piety. My God, what on earth has happened to us? We value security over freedom. We apologize to our enemies for defeating them. We take from those that achieve. We deny the reverent their rights to be so.

What will it take to get this country out of our skirts?