'We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.'
The Declaration of Independence, July4, 1776
And within these lines lies the American Dream. This dream about hope that everything is possible in the land of great opportunities if you work hard and fight for the things you want.
There's this one certain thing I find quite astonishing about the Americans (besides their environment policy and eating culture):
the American patriotism. In terms of that we could learn a lot from them these days.
Look at the elections, at the people on TV, their emotions. I've seen such people in Germany in 2006 on the streets celebrating the World Championship. Unlike that event was about football.
As though we would ever be satisfied with politics. Most of us calling themselves apolitical (or nonpolitical) don't even care (nor even know) about politics but they do know very well how to decry current situations.
Did you know that the voter participation in the US election 2008 was about 66%? It hasn't been that high since 1908 (for a hundred years!!).
Could we imagine emotions, we see in the USA in our homecountry as well? Would we hug each other being happy for having elected a new president? Would we go celebrating on the streets; drive around with our cars honking?
Sounds much more like football, doesn't it?
'Hope is that thing inside us that insists, despite all evidence to the contrary, that something better awaits us if we have the courage to reach for it, and to work for it, and to fight for it.'
Barack Obama, Victory Speech
Yes, the Americans have something we don't have. They have a dream: A dream of Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.
Yes, they can have a dream and yes, we can!
3 comments:
Hi Chrissy.
Perhaps you should campaign for president. What you wrote could be a speech to a country or people.
Very encouraging.
Yours.
I agree with what you say in many parts, but I think we should keep in mind, that we never had a participation less then 75 %. I don´t know if you can call that apolitical compared to the US.
But still german elections aren`t that emotional...
I think the Germans are basically less... emotional. Just look at the preachers coming from America to our church. You could say that our pastors are not that less emotional but I think we as church are more "american" in that way than the avarage German citizen. So that's why political speeches have not been that "emotional" in Germany ever since.
Btw: Have you seen the original (not translated) version of Obama's victory speech in Chicago? I really liked it (if he'll do like he said).
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