Minisode 16: What does it mean to be "Anti American"?

“America Hater”? There’s a lot of silliness being spread around like “teachers are teaching kids to hate America!...when they’re told about some of the terrible things that have been done to Americans... by other Americans. The premise is preposterous.Why would showing the horrors many Americans endured and overcame, cause someone to hate America? I mean unless we equate “America” with the evil in our history. Most Americans do not want “America” to be a name reserved for bad behavior, nor would we want bad actors to keep the name “America” for themselves. It’s a hard name to claim anyway - the Latinized, feminine version of an Italian man’s name, given to the continent by a German mapmaker, after a Portuguese explorer landed on Brazil. A bit absurd to try and enforce one definition of the word — other than that it represents a LOT of complexity.We teach and learn the real history of America because we love all Americans. And all the people whose land this was before it was America, and who call the place Turtle Island. Another great name for it.Learning American history in all its glory and terror, means knowing about all the great Americans of every stripe, in every century, who’ve been working toward the greater good – toward liberty and justice for all. Celebrating that - both as an American and as a part of the global tribe of humanity is a pretty loving act.