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We Have All Won the Historical Lottery2/28/2021 MORGAN HUNT
In the summer of 2017, I cycled through the fields of western Cambodia. A little over 40 years before, around 2 million native Cambodians were stripped away from these fields and killed in death camps by the Khmer Rouge. As I was cycling, I pictured parents being taken away from their children, knowing that in an hour they would be dead. I wondered how many people from each village I passed had been slaughtered by Pol Pot’s regime. It was a horrifying experience. I came back to America with one distinct conclusion: everyone living today in this country, or any other free country, has won the historical lottery. Whether one is rich or poor, white or black, male or female, everyone in this country is free to speak, interact, travel, and work without fear of going to jail or being killed. The vast majority of us have access to healthy food, a comfortable home to live in, a phone to communicate with friends and family, and a car to travel safely in. We neither fear execution from those in power, nor live in miserable poverty. Yet today, many take this all for granted. Instead of counting their many blessings, members of the public critique society with a vengeance. They say that America as a society is oppressive to everyone who isn’t a straight, white, wealthy, male. They maintain the social structures of America are comparable to that of Hitler’s Nazi Germany. According to them, our country is so terrible its independence day shouldn’t be celebrated. I would invite anyone who revels in this mindset to take a trip to the killing fields of Cambodia. I would invite them to travel to Auschwitz to see the remnants of the Holocaust, travel to rural Asia to see the atrocious living conditions people have to face daily, or read up about the Soviet gulags and the Holodomor. All in all, I would ask them to reconsider their level of appreciation for what America has given them. I would ask them whether the freedom and prosperity America’s citizens currently possess has been the norm throughout human history, or the notable exception. Perhaps then, progressive activists wouldn’t be so sanctimonious to burn buildings and yell out “no justice, no peace” in critique of a police force that is rarely discriminatory and unjust. Perhaps then, they would refrain from saying “all countries matter” on the Fourth of July in defiance of our country’s independence and exceptional founding values. Instead, they would focus on using their influence to prevent the ongoing genocide of Uighur Muslims by the Chinese Communist Party, or the near-complete subjugation of women in Saudi Arabia. An honest study of the history of human living conditions and God-given rights around the world provides us with one important conclusion: the quality of life in the 21st century in a select few countries (the US included) is by far the best in human history. Therefore, rather than critique what current society has not done for you, reflect on, and give thanks for, what it has. Comments are closed.
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