Dear America,

I love you…or rather,I  love what you claim to be.This country is a nation born out of war, determination, and a set of values that men were once willing to die for. This country is supposed to be the greatest place in the entire world. I sadly know that this is not but empty words and deceit. Have we forgotten what was written on the statue of liberty?
A mighty woman with a torch, whose flame
Is the imprisoned lightning, and her name
MOTHER OF EXILES. From her beacon-hand
Glows world-wide welcome; her mild eyes command
The air-bridged harbor that twin cities frame.

“Keep, ancient lands, your storied pomp!” cries she
With silent lips. “Give me your tired, your poor,
Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,
The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.
Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me,
I lift my lamp beside the golden door!”
We claim to welcome everyone not welcome anywhere else. We claim to be a safe haven for anyone in need. We claim to help anyone who may be in need of assistance and yet, we close our golden door to everyone from certain places,we blow out the torch in the Mother’s hand when we do not want them anywhere near our supposed welcoming country. The statue of liberty ,that is what we call her today, but we forget her true name,MOTHER OF EXILES.

We forget, or perhaps don’t wish to remember what she stood for. The Mother was a symbol of hope to the outcast and unwelcome ,she was a symbol of a new life, a new world.She was there to welcome anyone to the new world,a world in which EVERYONE was considered “American”.This was it,finally, a country in which everyone could play a part,be they White,Black,Latino,Asian,gay or straight,man or woman.This was a safe place, a new home. What happened to us? When did we lock the golden door and when will we reignite the great green torch? Will we?

I am writing this to show future generations why america has degraded, why your parents seem so jaded and worn down, tired. I was born in a country that was more  paranoid, jumpy, careful. September 11th 2001. Everything seemed to flip after that day, Americans for the first time in our history were afraid to live in our home. I was born a year after that day, my generation was the first to grow up in a scared world. We were warned about everything, to never go out after dark,never leave your drinks or food alone,never get into anyone’s car, we were taught to fear everything, to trust no one.When I have kids I will never be able to tell them stories about my friends and I walking the streets at night,laughing loudly,playing our music as loud as we could,telling them we did whatever we wanted when we were their age. Instead, I will have to tell them of the bombings, I will tell them how we were afraid to go to school for fear we might not come home.I will tell them that I grew up in a country of fear,of mistrust,of hate.My generation has seen shootings,bombs,murders,and worse on the TV screen since 9/11. I grew up in a generation where our president wants to build a wall to separated us from mexico.whether they succeed or not I don’t know. I can only hope that my generation is doing what our previous generation did not. Fixing the problems, not sticking a spongebob band-aid over it and hoping it went away. I should hope that our generation are doing something no previous generation did, listening to people, listening to younger people. We had an adage when I was a kid called make peace not warfare. I sincerely wish that my generation is following that and that we are teaching that to our children. My parent’s country had many problems,education,healthcare,homelessness,addiction and yet, we proudly exclaimed that we were Americans and we were free. Our parents allowed that pride to blind them to the problems our country had.We claimed to be the greatest country in the world.We lied,but I hope that maybe, someday we can once again proudly say we were Americans and that we were the best…and have that be the truth.