{"id":319,"date":"2009-02-19T07:45:29","date_gmt":"2009-02-19T05:45:29","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/fascinating-america.com\/blog\/?p=319"},"modified":"2015-04-18T21:20:25","modified_gmt":"2015-04-18T19:20:25","slug":"one-size-fits-all","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/fascinating-america.com\/blog\/one-size-fits-all\/","title":{"rendered":"One size fits all"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>A few years ago, author <a title=\"Thomas L. Friedman official site\" href=\"http:\/\/www.thomaslfriedman.com\/\" target=\"_blank\">Tom Friedman<\/a> talked about a trip he&#8217;d taken to Tehran. Demonstrators passed by his hotel, shouting &#8220;Death to America!&#8221; Friedman asked one of them why so many people hated his country. The Iranian told him that he didn&#8217;t hate America at all; in fact, he has family in the US and would like to go there someday. The demonstration was only against America&#8217;s <span id=\"tooltip551e28dfce378\">foreign policy<\/span>.<\/p>\n<p>Why does America do the things it does? How is it possible for Texans and New Yorkers to feel they&#8217;re part of the same country? What is it about America that makes foreigners and even many Americans have strong, often <span id=\"tooltip551e28dfce762\">contradictory<\/span>, emotions about it?<\/p>\n<p>Musician <a title=\"Laurie Anderson official site\" href=\"http:\/\/www.laurieanderson.com\/\" target=\"_blank\">Laurie Anderson<\/a> found a way to describe these contradictions in her 1981 song &#8220;O Superman&#8221;.<\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube-nocookie.com\/embed\/0hhm0NHhCBg\" width=\"420\" height=\"315\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen=\"allowfullscreen\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>&#8220;O Superman!&#8221; she calls out. &#8220;O <span id=\"tooltip551e28dfceca8\">judge<\/span>! O Mom and Dad!&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>The song describes the United States as &#8220;the hand that takes&#8221;, but that also provides. It&#8217;s a country that welcomes immigrants, but makes them work hard. It&#8217;s a country whose size and power make us safe, proud and a little afraid at the same time.<\/p>\n<p>It&#8217;s easy to <span id=\"tooltip551e28dfcef2e\">appreciate<\/span> \u2014 or <span id=\"tooltip551e28dfcfb74\">demonize<\/span> \u2014 America, but it can take a lifetime to understand it.<\/p>\n<div class=\"simplePullQuote right\"><p>It can take a lifetime to understand America<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p>The United States exists because of compromise. The British colonies were very different in size and climate. A small group of radicals needed to persuade other colonists not to pay <span id=\"tooltip551e28dfcfef7\">taxes<\/span> to an overseas parliament. <a title=\"Thomas Paine (Wikipedia)\" href=\"http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Thomas_paine\" target=\"_blank\">Thomas Paine<\/a> wrote: &#8220;We must <span id=\"tooltip551e28dfd02bc\">hang together<\/span>, or surely we shall hang separately.&#8221; <a title=\"Join, or Die (Wikipedia)\" href=\"http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Join,_or_Die\" target=\"_blank\">Benjamin Franklin<\/a> expressed these alternatives more directly: &#8220;Join, or die.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>The large states made <span id=\"tooltip551e28dfd06b0\">concessions<\/span> to the small states, and all agreed to respect certain fundamental rules and rights. The country&#8217;s motto became <i>E pluribus unum<\/i> \u2014 &#8220;Out of many, one [is made].&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>A modern cartoon character named <a title=\"Zippy the Pinhead official site\" href=\"http:\/\/www.zippythepinhead.com\" target=\"_blank\">Zippy the Pinhead<\/a> tries to make sense of this. In the 1985 book <i>Are We Having Fun Yet?<\/i>, he meets an American named Claude who &#8220;lives in a <span id=\"tooltip551e28dfd0ed2\">mobile home<\/span> and knows nothing about cubism&#8221;. Claude is wearing an <span id=\"tooltip551e28dfd1260\">adjustable<\/span> baseball cap.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/fascinating-america.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/zippy.jpg\"><img decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" class=\"alignleft size-medium wp-image-1166\" src=\"http:\/\/fascinating-america.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/zippy-300x241.jpg\" alt=\"Zippy the Pinhead: Are We Having Fun Yet? by Bill Griffith\" width=\"300\" height=\"241\" srcset=\"http:\/\/fascinating-america.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/zippy-300x241.jpg 300w, http:\/\/fascinating-america.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/zippy-150x121.jpg 150w, http:\/\/fascinating-america.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/zippy.jpg 956w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px\" \/><\/a>&#8220;Zippy became helplessly fixated on the <span id=\"tooltip551e28dfd1644\">snap-tab<\/span> at the back of Claude&#8217;s acrylic hat,&#8221; the <span id=\"tooltip551e28dfd1a2d\">narration<\/span> reads. &#8220;It spoke of many things. He followed it to the <span id=\"tooltip551e28dfd1f2a\">parking lot<\/span>.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Written on the tab are the words &#8220;One size fits all&#8221;. Zippy says, &#8220;I have to talk to you about the United States.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Each week, right here, you and I will talk about the United States. Post your comments and questions, and together we&#8217;ll explore the many sides of America that make it so fascinating.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>A few years ago, author Tom Friedman talked about a trip he&#8217;d taken to Tehran. Demonstrators passed by his hotel, shouting &#8220;Death to America!&#8221; Friedman asked one of them why so many people hated his country. The Iranian told him that he didn&#8217;t hate America at all; in fact, he has family in the US and would like to go <a class=\"more-link\" href=\"http:\/\/fascinating-america.com\/blog\/one-size-fits-all\/\">&#8230; >><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mi_skip_tracking":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_active":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_note":"","_exactmetrics_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[93],"tags":[135,22,136],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/fascinating-america.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/319"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/fascinating-america.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/fascinating-america.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/fascinating-america.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/fascinating-america.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=319"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"http:\/\/fascinating-america.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/319\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1169,"href":"http:\/\/fascinating-america.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/319\/revisions\/1169"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/fascinating-america.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=319"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/fascinating-america.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=319"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/fascinating-america.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=319"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}