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White privilege is American exceptionalism
"America, uniquely among all other nations, was founded on freedom and liberty. ... Joseph Dobrjan and Aniele Slezak came to America in the first decade of the 20th century from opposite ends of the Polish speaking world ... They met and married. ... They assimilated. They embraced America. They learned English, gained citizenship as soon as they could, and brought their children up as Americans. Why, do you suppose?
"American exceptionalism is real."
— Joseph Dobrian, "We should embrace American exceptionalism" (Press-Citizen, July 12, Opinion)
I abjure ad hominem attacks, but Elmer Davis states: "The newspaper is not giving the reader his/her money's worth if it tells [them] only what somebody says is the truth, which is known to be false" — making an exception, I challenge Dobrian's bigotry. French President Emmanuel Macron invited American President Donald Trump to celebrate Bastille Day in Paris and the 100th anniversary of the U.S. military entrance into World War I. African-American soldiers were part of the French Army during WWI, not the American. Woodrow Wilson and his generals strenuously objected to the French decorating black soldiers for bravery. A USA Today article from June details a study that shows even over the last decade that black soldiers were far more likely to face military punishment than white soldiers.
America, like all Western nations, has a history of slavery. Chattel slavery was established in colonial America by reversing the Common Law in 1658, assigning the status of the child to that of the mother, labeled the child "slave for life," changed "servant" to "slave" at Ephesians 6:5 as biblical witness/encouragement to their "crime against nature's god."
Enslaved Africans became Americans via constitutional amendments but not citizens (citizens can vote unhindered) until the Civil Rights Acts of 1964 and Voting Rights Act of 1965. The U.S. practiced de facto slavery (segregation) until it was embarrassed worldwide in 1957 when African diplomats traveled to segregated Washington, D.C., where they were refused public accommodations because of their race/color.
Frans and Marilyn Shevin-Coetzee ("World War I: A History In Documents") acknowledge: "Our world is built upon the hopes, aspirations, and even the disappointments of the [WWI] era. ... Despite prominent isolationists ... the United States could not disengage itself from European concerns. ... Another dilemma which the war threw into stark relief but which would not go away was race. ... American officials reluctantly recruited African-Americans to sustain the war effort. But such service met with renewed intolerance, not gratitude ..."
Post-WWI found several returning African-American soldiers in uniforms lynched in the South for "killing white men" (the enemy) in WWI (a testimony to American exceptionalism where lynching was born).
Americans are good at making war but impossible at (soft-power) maintaining peace, and WWI revealed this. Novelist James Baldwin ("The Harlem Ghetto") critiques that black music and culture have been the only truly effective soft power the United States has exported, and between WWI and WWII, jazz and African-American entertainers were the most popular exports to Europe.
The Coetzees agree, noting that Lt. James Reese Europe and his jazz band, members of the 369th Infantry (the Hellfighters) spread the joys of jazz throughout France, "lifted soldiers' flagging morale and further strengthened the French-American alliance."
Exceptionalism declares the U.S. since WWI has been an inspiration for oppressed peoples. Contradistinction: this "inspiration" dates to the "the Russo-Japanese War of 1904-05" outcome. The country that inspired freedom for oppressed peoples is Japan.
Lothrop Stoddard ("The Rising Tide Of Color") relates, white power was menaced, "Russia was diplomatically isolated and militarily beaten in the Russo-Japanese War. Thus the Russo-Japanese War, that destroyer of white prestige whose ominous results" — WWI — "was precipitated mainly by the reckless shortsightedness of white men themselves."
"What a triumph. ... What revenge for the little Nippons [Japanese] to see thus humiliated these big, splendid men who, for them, represented, not only Russians, but those Europeans whom they so detest!"
Immigrants Joseph Dobrjan and Aniele Slezak's Euro-American assimilation has little to do with American exceptionalism. Baldwin ("The Price of the Ticket") writes: "They come through Ellis Island, where Giorgio becomes Joe, Pappavasiliu becomes Palmer, Evangelos becomes Evans, Goldsmith becomes Smith or Gold, and Avakian becomes King. So with a painless change of name, and in the twinkling of an eye, one becomes a white American.
Later, in the midnight hour, the missing identity aches. One can neither assess nor overcome the storm of the [white] middle passage."
White privilege is American exceptionalism. History! Mr. Dobrian, look it up.
Mary Gravitt is an Iowa City resident and member of the Writers' Group.