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November 11th, 2024

Insight

Building Superman Back Better

Greg Crosby

By Greg Crosby

Published March 28, 2022

Building Superman Back Better
I often listen to the JWR columnist Dennis Prager's radio show because I find his common sense, logic, and analysis on politics and cultural issues intelligent and insightful.

At certain times he does an hour on what he calls "ultimate issues" in which he chooses a subject or a situation to explore in depth. This morning Mr. Prager posed the question, what are the sources of anti-Americanism? Why have we gone from loving our country's values to abhorring its values?

As an example, he cited Superman, the ultimate superhero. Created in the late 1930s Superman's credo for more than 80 years had been, "fighting for truth, justice, and the American Way." Then last year DC Comics decided to drop "American" from the motto making it "Truth, Justice, and a Better Tomorrow" (which interestingly sounds a little like Biden's "Build Back Better" motto). The people who own Superman clearly no longer wanted the hero linked to America or American values, never mind that his colors are red, white and blue. (Maybe they'll change that too?)

The point is, America and its traditional values of independence, hard work, equality, strong nuclear family, and love of G od are no longer honored by many young Americans today. Those values are too often held in contempt. So, returning to the discussion topic, what happened to change to that?

Mr. Prager correctly observed that the erosion of the America that our founders created began as early as the late 19th Century when Germany first introduced the idea of big government taking care of its citizens. But the belief in the nanny state really accelerated in the 1960's (along with an increasingly anti-American viewpoint).

Finally, it culminated in what we see today, Founding Fathers statues and memorials being torn down and desecrated, American history wiped out or completely altered, and the decimation of the American family ideal of one mother and one father. Add to that a far more secular and left-leaning society than ever before and you start to appreciate how far down we've fallen from the dreams and ideals of those great men who formed the United States of America.

As to the question of WHY this has happened, to me is a rather easy one to answer. It happened because we now have a couple of generations of people who have gone through the educational system and have been, to use a line out of a Rodgers and Hammerstein song, "carefully taught."

None of this is an accident. Our teachers and professors have been indoctrinating the young impressionable minds of our children for more than fifty years. It started in the colleges and universities and it is now part of the curriculum taught in public school textbooks from elementary school on up. The "educators" have been feeding students socialistic ideas, anti-American history, and what we now call "woke" or politically correct upside-down values that have shaped their views on just about everything. Not least of all, is what constitutes a man and a woman and how should we address those who identify with being of another gender.

You can thank popular culture for aiding and abetting this effort. Music, movies, sports, publications, television, social media, and even big business have all had their hands in it. It's getting harder and harder to find a company, organization, or any other large entity in American life that espouses what we think of as American ideals and values. Some still exist, but you really have to dig deep to find them.

So, in answer to Dennis Prager's question, what is the source of anti-Americanism? It's simple. It happened in the schools. Actually, Dennis knows this all too well, in fact he speaks and writes of it frequently.

But the more important question concerning anti-Americanism might be, after more than 50 years of brainwashing, how do we change it back?

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