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People Are Meme-ing Americans Who Say 'This Is Not Who We Are' To Make An Important Point

The Digital Artist/Pixabay, Twitter @pourmecoffee

From the beginning of the Trump administration, many Americans have looked on in disbelief at what the country has become. But the truth is America's problems go back a lot further than two years and it might be time to admit that.

As a Presidential candidate, Donald Trump was little more than a joke to any seasoned political player: the unpolished New York real estate mogul and reality TV star who wanted to put "America first."

But for many Americans who felt forgotten for the last half century, Trump looked like the man they had been waiting for, and suddenly a wildcard candidate was elected to highest office in the land.

To the other half of America, the election of Donald Trump was a devastating blow, not only to our future, but to our identity as a country. People predicted the worst and, in many cases, were proven right.

Over the next two years America would watch as the country was transformed by each new unthinkable act, and they just kept piling up: the President's call to ban transgender people from serving in the military, his continuous war against the free press, the attempted ban on Muslims entering the country, the Charlottesville car attack, the call to end DACA, the separation of migrant families, the gassing of immigrants at the boarder, and mass shooting after mass shooting.

After every tragedy, many could only look on in shock. This wasn't America. This is not who we are.




But these assertions of American identity did not begin with President Trump. As early as 2007, then Senator Barack Obama used the phrase when talking about the war in Iraq, and later in 2014, when reacting to a CIA torture report. In fact, the phrase was often a part of the President's rhetoric. Each time America failed to live up to itself? It wasn't us. It was not who we are.

The phrase has been echoed repeatedly as an assertion of our more noble ideals and a call to do better, but many no longer see it that way. Instead of aspiring to do better, all we are doing is erasing shameful truths about the past and absolving ourselves of responsibility.

Marginalized people have had enough and are calling out the hypocrisy.









When confronted with history, it's impossible to deny the darker moments of the American identity.




Our achievements as a country are irrevocably tied to the sins of our past, but aspiring to be greater is just as much a part of the American identity as the times we have failed to do so. Instead of denying who we are, we can work towards being better by embracing who we want to be.


H/T - The Daily Dot, The Guardian

People Break Down The Best $20 They Ever Spent

Image by Mary Pahlke from Pixabay

There are few things more satisfying than a crisp $20 bill. Well, maybe a crisp $100 bill.

But twenty big ones can get you pretty far nonetheless.

Whether it's tucked firmly in a birthday card, passing from hand to hand after a knee-jerk sports bet, or going toward a useful tool, the old twenty dollar bill has been used for countless purposes.


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$20

People Share The Dumbest Rule Their School Ever Enforced

Image by Jan Vašek from Pixabay

I realize that school safety has been severely compromised and has been under dire scrutiny over the past decade and of course, it should be. And when I was a student, my safety was one of my greatest priorities but, some implemented rules under the guise of "safety" were and are... just plain ludicrous. Like who thinks up some of these ideas?

Redditor u/Animeking1108 wanted to discuss how the education system has ideas that sometimes are just more a pain in the butt than a daily enhancement... What was the dumbest rule your school enforced?
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dumbest school rules

Doctors Break Down The Worst Thing They've Diagnosed That Another Doctor Missed

Image by Angelo Esslinger from Pixabay

One of the golden rules of life? Doctors are merely human. They don't know everything and they make mistakes. That is why you always want to get another opinion. Things are constantly missed. That doesn't mean docs don't know what they're doing, they just aren't infallible. So make sure to ask questions, lots of them.

Redditor u/Gorgon_the_Dragon wanted to hear from doctors about why it is imperative we always get second and maybe third opinions by asking... Doctors of Reddit, what was the worse thing you've seen for a patient that another Doctor overlooked?
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missed diagnosis

People Share Their Absolute Favorite Historical Facts

Image by nonbirinonko from Pixabay

When we think about learning history, our first thought is usually sitting in our high school history class (or AP World History class if you're a nerd like me) being bored out of our minds. Unless again, you're a huge freaking nerd like me. But I think we all have the memory of the moment where we realized learning about history was kinda cool. And they usually start from one weird fact.

Here are a few examples of turning points in learning about history, straight from the keyboards of the people at AskReddit.

U/Tynoa2 asked: What's your favourite historical fact?


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historical facts