Blog Post 7

In tribute to a fallen Issei soldier who served during World War II, Ronald Reagan said "America stands unique in the world, the only country not founded on race--an ideal. Not in spite of, but because of our polyglot background, we have had all the strength in the world. That is the American way" (Takaki 403). It is interesting, however, that such an idea was not brought forth until the late 20th century, when America began to realize that they probably weren't going to get rid of those darn Asiatics any time soon. In other words, the ideological transition from America as a "white heterogeneous society" to a "cosmopolitan society" was a purely political move, not a moral change. Today, America is the most powerful nation on earth, and only propagates the idea of "cosmopolitanism" and "multiculturalism" to maintain her power over other nations. The old saying "all roads lead to Rome" sprung from the same cosmopolitan ideology in ancient Rome, and for the same reasons. There is no such thing as a truly multicultural society that gives equal opportunity to all. To borrow a phrase from Marx, the doctrine of "diversity" is the "opiate of the masses"--a facade constructed by the strong to exercise their power over the weak. Underneath our supposed "civilized society" exists meaningless hodgepodge of warring clans where one is always dominating and oppressing the other.

Over the past month, I have struggled with two CRT tenets in particular and have found them impossible to reconcile: 1) Racism is ordinary and cannot be eradicated, and 2) Race is a social construction. These two statements cannot both be true. If man invented race, man can eradicate it. If man can eradicate race, man can eradicate racism. Racism has existed since the beginning of human history and has shown no signs of being eradicated. The only attempts to eradicate it on a widespread scale is in America, and as I stated earlier, the attempt is not really an attempt, but a political move to establish and maintain the dominance of a single race. It is there is something fundamental in the human psyche that is wired to be racist, racism cannot possibly be a mere social construction. If anything, it is a curse that will keep human beings divided against each other till the last syllable of recorded time.

Before taking this class, I had a foggy notion in my head that America was once, by human standards, a moderately good nation. Now I realize it was rotten to the core from the very beginning and only serves as a 300 year social experiment that proves that human beings don't deserve nice things. Takaki writes "these struggles of Asian Americans have been a continuous rebellion against the exclusive constructions of 'we, the people' and a constant resolve to help make this 'a more perfect union,' an ethnically diverse yet unified society" (509). But we only have to look around us to realize that this ideal is crumbling apart before our very eyes, a million miles short of achieving its' goal. In one of the plays we read, and old man says "America is just a thing in the mind."  Race is not a social construction, but America is. And like all social constructions, it is destined to fall apart.