What America did you grow up in? [View all]

[Caliman73]

I have seen a few comments recently, in response to the horrible laws passed in Texas, and other parts of the country which seem to be going after vulnerable people. The comments are usually something like: "This isn't the country I remember.." or "... I grew up in" or something to that effect.

I am American of Mexican heritage. I live in California which is presumably a very "liberal" state. However this is the country I grew up in. A country where when I spoke Spanish at school, I was scolded. Where when I interacted with White people until maybe 5 years ago, I was asked "No, where are you from..? after having told them I was born and raised in the US / California. I grew up in a country where in the 1940's Latino men were called "hoodlums and rioters" and arrested when Sailors attacked them because of the suits they were wearing. Where the last lynching in my liberal state, took place in 1947, the year my mother was born. Anti-Miscegenation laws were only struck down, the year my sister was born. Our own Californian "papers please" law, Proposition 187 was passed in 1994 though it never really took effect because it was challenged in court and found to be unconstitutional.

So, what America did I grow up in? An America that has A LOT of potential and A LOT of wonderful people, but also A TON of problems with race, gender, poverty, and other equality issues. A country that has a good human rights framework that it has absolutely failed to live up to.

A country worth fighting for, but a country where people need to really wake up to the history of.

What America did YOU grow up in?