In an interview with Oprah Winfrey earlier this year, comedian and talk show host Stephen
Colbert was asked whether or not he was hopeful for America during these tough times.
He said that he was indeed hopeful, and this was his reasoning:
[COLBERT:] We're based on an idea.
That we imperfectly--a harrowing idea, a harrowing challenge that we imperfectly embody at all
times, which is that all men are created equal.
And that they have equal access to justice.
And as long as that idea does not disappear, as long as our Constitution is not changed
from that idea, and of course the non-constitutional inspirational document like the Declaration
of Independence.
As long as we always keep that, there will be good presidents, and there'll be bad presidents.
There'll be good Congresses and bad Congresses.
There'll be good judiciaries and bad judiciaries.
But if we can all agree on that thing, then America will always be the last best hope
of mankind.
[T1J:] Now I think, Colbert is doing a lot of good work for political discourse in this
country, don't get me wrong.
Colbert's the homie.
But honestly, I found this response pretty annoying.
Hi, I'm T1J.
[WEIRD VOICE]: Follow me!
[T1J:] I feel like Colbert's idea is such an awful standard for what makes a country
great.
It's like no matter how awkward and unjust the laws are, or how much inequality we have,
no matter how many people die unnecessarily, Some dudes wrote some shit down 400 years
ago that vaguely implies an ambiguous idea of freedom and justice.
So America number 1.
Not only is this obnoxious, but it's potentially dangerous.
It encourages complacency.
It's as if America is this self-fixing machine, and all of our problems will instantly be
solved with a sprinkle of magical Constitution dust.
[COLBERT:] Because every bit of darkness is only for now.
The light always wins.
[T1J:] Does it Stephen?
How can you really be sure?
And even if this is ultimately true, how much darkness are you willing to tolerate until
that light comes?
Also I imagine it's easier for a couple of gazillionaires to weather the storm than
it is for a lot of other Americans.
Just saying.
But this attitude isn't unique to rich people.
This idea that "America is the greatest country in the world" is something that
is quite common across classes, races, and genders.
It's sometimes believed by people who aren't even American.
Although, these are often people from developing countries who see the USA as the ultimate
land of opportunity.
For others however, American customs can seem pretty random and bizarre.
[FIONA:] Why is there military support everywhere?
It is so confusing.
This is the only country--I've lived in multiple countries by the way.
I have my receipts, I've earned my position to talk on this.
We would go to a movie cinema, and they tell us that they support the troops.
You go to a supermarket and they're like, "We support our troops!"
I'm like, I'm just tryna buy some milk!
I just want to see a film!
I want to see Peter Rabbit, and I'm reminded that the military exists?
Why?
In America, it's so weird, like if you're driving around California, you'll see stickers
on people's cars and they voted for Bernie or Hillary.
Or picket fences -- picket fences, is that the right word?
Pickets.
Little signs in their garden telling us that they voted for Trump.
I can't imagine.
Firstly it's weird that you guys vote for the person and not the party, but I can't
imagine in Australia being like, "I vote for the Labour Party!" and put that on my window.
You don't care that much!
But it is bloody weird to advertise to the world from the front of your house, or from
your car, who you support politically.
I can't imagine wearing merch from my President.
Or Prime Minister as we have in Australia.
In America, people have Trump hats and people would wear Obama shirts.
I have an Obama shirt to be honest.
But I could never ever imagine wearing one for an Australian politician.
Apart from Penny Wong, Penny Wong is amazing.
I'd wear her merch.
Now because this is the internet, I need to make it clear that America is obviously not
the worst place in the world to live.
I'm generally happy and safe and have lots of opportunities that I wouldn't have in
a lot of other countries.
But Americans talk about this country as if no other country is even in its tier.
Like if the USA was a Smash Bros. character it would be Bayonetta.
The first things people always bring up when talking about how awesome America is, is "freedom"
and "democracy."
This notion that America is exceptional because it was founded on the principles of the Declaration
of Independence and its assertion that all men are created equal,
or the Constitution which guarantees us basic freedoms and rights; is kind of absurd.
Because those ideas are definitely not unique to America.
In fact, there are many free countries throughout the world where the people have basically
the same rights and privileges that we do in America.
I literally think that some Americans imagine people from other countries as if they're
still stuck in the 19th century, and somehow we're the only ones that progressed.
Like I actually think a lot of Americans still imagine English people to all be basically
Bert and Mary Poppins.
[BERT:] Mary Poppins, you look beautiful!
[MARY POPPINS:] Do you really think so?
[BERT:] Cross my heart you do!
Like the day I met you.
[T1J:]i'm not even British and even I can tell that's a bad accent.
So then people elaborate, they say, 'Well America is not the only democracy, but it
is the oldest democracy."
This specific phrasing, "oldest" democracy, is intentionally used because anyone who has
taken high school world history knows that America was not the birthplace of democracy.
I'm not here to give you a history lesson, but elements of democracy or rule by the people
can be traced as far back as Mesopotamia.
But what we now vaguely refer to as democracy is generally agreed to have begun in Ancient
Athens.
So, yeah America didn't do it first.
But is America the oldest existing democracy?
Well it depends on how pedantic you want to be about what qualifies as the oldest democracy.
Some places like San Marino and Iceland established republics centuries before America did.
However, this democracy was not continuous as there were periods where both were under
authoritarian rule.
Also, San Marino is not technically a nation.
So does it even really count?
I'm just kidding.
No disrespect on the off chance that I have viewers from San Marino.
And even though the United States of America and other European countries eventually established
democracies, these were democracies that only certain people could participate in.
Generally, only white men.
So if we want to be accurate then perhaps the oldest true democracy is actually Finland,
which was the first country to implement full universal suffrage in 1906.
So even the notion that America is the oldest democracy, is pretty dubious.
There's no doubt that the formation of the United States was a historical event, but
the concept of democracy was not born here.
But even if they were, being the oldest doesn't mean that you're the best.
Vince Carter is the oldest NBA player, and that dude only got like a 73 rating on 2K,
come on now.
In fact, I feel that that might work against you, because newer adopters can improve upon
all the mistakes that you've made.
And according to the Democracy Index, which is compiled in the UK , the United States
isn't even in the top 20 of the world's most effective democracies.
We're officially categorized as a "Flawed democracy."
Of course all of this implies that having a well-formed democracy is necessary for a
country to be considered great.
This is something that I believe, but the more time I spend on social media, and the
more people I meet, the more I realize how varied the political spectrum can be.
And it's not something that everyone agrees with.
But the Democracy Index is not the only index out there.
There are many ways to measure the success of a nation.
Like how free are the people?
Well the United States is ranked 17 on the Human Freedom Index.
How healthy are the people?
The United States has the worst healthcare outcomes out of the top 11 wealthiest nations,
even though we spend the most on healthcare.
America is 14th in education.
We're 4th in median income.
And I understand I'm doing the meme from The Newsroom, but it's true.
[WILL MCAVOY:] When you ask, 'What makes us the greatest country in the world, I don't
know what the fuck your talking about!"
[T1J:] And look, none of these rankings are like that bad in the grand scheme of things.
Well, the healthcare thing is pretty bad.
But obviously there's room for improvement, and there is for any country, but the point
is, I'm failing to see the 'exceptional' part.
America has a unique, fascinating history and has definitely played a large role in
the story of humankind.
But so have other nations.
And quite objectively, we're not the best, at anything.
Or at least anything that's measurable.
The only thing America seems to be literally the best at is producing billionaires and
blowing shit up.
And while a lot of Americans think both of those things are pretty cool, I'd argue
that they actually count against our greatness.
I think we take a lot of things for granted in the United States just because we're
used to it.
We just assume that everything we do is done in the best way because that's how we do
it.
But when you look from an outside perspective you might see things a little differently.
[FIONA:] Why do your drugstores sell things that aren't drugs?
When I go into a pharmacy, I'm expecting to pick up either some over the counter medicine
or some prescription medicine.
Just medicine.
Sometimes they have jellybeans.
Is that an Australian thing?
There's always jellybeans at the pharmacy.
But in America, the drugstore has like an entire clothing aisle, you can buy so much
chocolate, you can buy cigarettes!
There are cigarettes behind the counter sold in a pharmacy!
The obvious one, tipping.
Tipping is dumb.
Your system is broken.
Fix that.
I shouldn't have to go and pay for my meal, and they pay the servers so they can have
a living wage.
Like I will do it, because I don't want them to not have money to live.
But it shouldn't be the consumer's responsibility.
It should be the business that just pays their staff a living wage.
Another one is people to bag your groceries?!
This has never happened in any other country I've been to.
You have the person who scans the groceries and then you have an extra person to put them
in a bag!
It should either just be that first person, or you just do it yourself!
You've got a bag, thank you for the item, pop it in there.
Why is there an extra person to fill your bag at the grocery store.
I feel like all your issues are down to individualism by the way, that's just like the main thing.
Like you're out for yourself, if that makes any sense.
"Oh I don't want MY guns taken away" but you don't think about the wider impact, cause
you're a good gun owner.
But the wider impact of there are not good gun owners doesn't register.
or "I have good health care, why do we need to give health care to the poor people, I
just worked my way here" Like have you thought outside of you?
Anyway [laughs] but what's a whole other topic!
[T1J:] So a person who, in spite of all the problems, and all of the weird bizarre shit
we do here, still wants to say that America is the greatest country in the world would
have to appeal to some vague, intangible idea about what makes a country cool.
And I think this is what people like Stephen Colbert have done.
Bret Stephens, a columnist for the New York Times wrote that "Greatness, like happiness,
lies less in the achievement than in the striving—and in the question of what we are striving for."
That sounds very poetic, but again it's impractical and complacent.
If we "strive" for centuries and still end up doing a shitty job of protecting the
health and well being of our citizens, ensuring social and economic justice, or preventing
needless deaths in wars – to name a few things.
At some point, someone has to say, "Hey maybe this country isn't that great at what
it claims it wants to do."
Especially when other nations in the world are demonstrably closer to that ideal than
you are.
Look, as far as world nations go.
America is more good than bad.
There are many, many issues, and a lot of weird stuff we take for granted.
But we have extensive freedoms, universal suffrage, and relatively high standards of
living.
But I think that we have to do away with this idea that America is the greatest country
in the world.
It's just not.
There are several other countries who are better are doing the things we claim to be
so great at.
Just look at any study or any index comparing countries with regard to, well anything; freedom,
equality, healthcare, happiness, education, wealth--The United States is never at the
top of any of those lists, many times it doesn't even make the top ten.
But that's okay!
I feel like some people are immediately defensive at the mere suggestion that America isn't
perfect.
And that's kind of childish, right?
It reminds me of the kids who used to throw their controllers across the room when they
lost in a game of Mortal Kombat.
If we really want to be the greatest, then we need to get rid of this complacency and
dogmatic belief in the self-fixing magic of the Constitution and actually take some notes
from our world neighbors.
DAS JUS ME DOE.
What do you think?
[FIONA:] Thanks for watching.
Subscribe to my channel.
I'm--a YouTuber?
What the fuck.
How do I end this?
What do you want me to say, Kevin?
What do you want me to say?!
Ok.
Bye.
[T1J:] Big thank you to Fiona for helping me out with this one.
Please go subscribe to her, she's great.
There's a link in the description below.
Congratulations to these people, for winning the t-shirt and wristband giveaway.
I will be getting in touch with you soon!
If you'd like to support this channel and help make it more sustainable, consider becoming
a patron on Patreon, which is a site where you can donate a couple bucks a month to help
me create better content for you guys.
Big shoutouts to all of my existing patrons.
And I will see you all in the next video.
Bye.
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