Dang. This is a real Captain America from a “What If?” Published in 1983. “What if Captain America was thawed out today (1983)?”
Please save us, Cap. Oh wait, I guess now Disney owns you, too.
Much like Jesus would not recognise his “followers”, Cap would not recognise the “america” he was fighting for…
Considering he went to war in the 40s, I think he would recognize this America. For all of our flaws, we’re doing better now than we were then.
Like he said - he fought not because America is great, but because it is fragile. America is not some shining precious jewel, it’s a deeply flawed creature - the only thing that marks it as worth saving is the ideal that all people are equal. The further we get from that, the closer we come to being nothing more than trash and a rag.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fiorello_La_Guardia
New York City in the 1930s was full of Socialists and Communists.
Much of the 1950s Red Scare was set up to punish the ‘premature anti-fascists’ who a young Steve Rogers would have listened to.
For all of our flaws, we’re doing better now than we were then.
Really? How many Palestinians were the US helping to murder back in the 40s? How many Afghans? How many Iraqis?
Or are you just happy that the people being murdered happen to be brown people and not ones you think should be included in the “white enough” club?
I agree with your statements on ideals, but I do not think America was on the precipice of becoming a fascist dictatorship in the 40s.
Sounds like pinko commie talk. Am I right?
“American exceptionalism is when you think that America, a country founded on a handful of documents, relates to the ideals expressed in those documents.”
I don’t know, it seems pretty great to have a rebuttal that half-baked edgelords can’t formulate an answer to.
I’ll offer a cautionary note on that take. We really need to meet our heroes, in this case our founding fathers, and frame their words and mindset in the time they said what they did. Those “ideals” revolved around landed white males and not the sugar-coated “I can not tell a lie” history we got in 4th grade.
Those ideals are largely enlightenment-era ideals which still resonate today.
The bosom of America is open to receive not only the opulent & respectable Stranger, but the oppressed & persecuted of all Nations & Religions; whom we shall wellcome to a participation of all our rights & previleges, if by decency & propriety of conduct they appear to merit the enjoyment.
- George Washington
Can sweetening our tea, &c. with sugar, be a circumstance of such absolute necessity? Can the petty pleasure thence arising to the taste, compensate for so much misery produced among our fellow creatures, and such a constant butchery of the human species by this pestilential detestable traffic in the bodies and souls of men?—Pharisaical Britain! to pride thyself in setting free a single Slave that happens to land on thy coasts, while thy Merchants in all thy ports are encouraged by thy laws to continue a commerce whereby so many hundreds of thousands are dragged into a slavery that can scarce be said to end with their lives, since it is entailed on their posterity!
- Ben Franklin
It is much to be wished that slavery may be abolished. The honour of the States, as well as justice and humanity, in my opinion, loudly call upon them to emancipate these unhappy people. To contend for our own liberty, and to deny that blessing to others, involves an inconsistency not to be excused.
- John Jay
The origin of all civil government, justly established, must be a voluntary compact, between the rulers and the ruled; and must be liable to such limitations, as are necessary for the security of the absolute rights of the latter; for what original title can any man or set of men have, to govern others, except their own consent?
- Alexander Hamilton
The Founding Fathers were deeply imperfect men who were, in many ways, products of their time. But as far as ideals and not specific policy positions go, they’re worth the naming.
