Heidi Li Feldman
@heidilifeldman@mastodon.social  ·  activity timestamp 2 months ago

J.D. Vance, the heir apparent to dictatorship Trump is creating, had some nauseating things to say about U.S. citizenship today. talkingpointsmemo.com/news/jd-

"Identifying America just with agreeing with the principles, let's say, of the Declaration of Independence — that's a definition that is way over-inclusive and under-inclusive at the same time," Vance said. He explained that such a definition "would include hundreds of millions, maybe billions of foreign citizens who agree" with the principles of the Declaration of Independence, dubbing it "the logic of America as a purely Creole nation." By the opposite token, Vance said, conceiving of American citizenship "purely as an idea" would "reject a lot of people that the ADL would label as domestic extremists, even though those very Americans had their ancestors fight in the Revolutionary War and the Civil War," he said, referencing the Anti-Defamation League, a nonprofit that was founded to combat antisemitism and that, among other activities, tracks far-right groups. "I think the people whose ancestors fought in the Civil War have a hell of a lot more claim over America than the people who say they don't belong," he concluded.
"Identifying America just with agreeing with the principles, let's say, of the Declaration of Independence — that's a definition that is way over-inclusive and under-inclusive at the same time," Vance said. He explained that such a definition "would include hundreds of millions, maybe billions of foreign citizens who agree" with the principles of the Declaration of Independence, dubbing it "the logic of America as a purely Creole nation." By the opposite token, Vance said, conceiving of American citizenship "purely as an idea" would "reject a lot of people that the ADL would label as domestic extremists, even though those very Americans had their ancestors fight in the Revolutionary War and the Civil War," he said, referencing the Anti-Defamation League, a nonprofit that was founded to combat antisemitism and that, among other activities, tracks far-right groups. "I think the people whose ancestors fought in the Civil War have a hell of a lot more claim over America than the people who say they don't belong," he concluded.
"Identifying America just with agreeing with the principles, let's say, of the Declaration of Independence — that's a definition that is way over-inclusive and under-inclusive at the same time," Vance said. He explained that such a definition "would include hundreds of millions, maybe billions of foreign citizens who agree" with the principles of the Declaration of Independence, dubbing it "the logic of America as a purely Creole nation." By the opposite token, Vance said, conceiving of American citizenship "purely as an idea" would "reject a lot of people that the ADL would label as domestic extremists, even though those very Americans had their ancestors fight in the Revolutionary War and the Civil War," he said, referencing the Anti-Defamation League, a nonprofit that was founded to combat antisemitism and that, among other activities, tracks far-right groups. "I think the people whose ancestors fought in the Civil War have a hell of a lot more claim over America than the people who say they don't belong," he concluded.
WesDym
@wesdym@mastodon.social replied  ·  activity timestamp 2 months ago
@heidilifeldman And as usual, he's wrong. This is a form of the 'sins of the fathers' fallacy, though not immediately recognizable as such.

If your father commits a sin or crime, it is his, not yours. You are not called to answer for it. That was a trope of the pre-modern world, with only a few vestiges remaining (chiefly material, such as debts).

Likewise, your father's virtues and accomplishments are not yours, either. That, too, is a trope of an older world we no longer live in.
athena_rising
@athena_rising@beige.party replied  ·  activity timestamp 2 months ago
@ChemicalEyeGuy @heidilifeldman I stopped my dad from bringing this crap up with me any more by pointing out this:

If those in the South were "still Americans," then they took up arms against their own country, they were traitors, and they do not deserve statues to mark them. How many statues are there of the Rosenbergs?

If, on the other hand, they were their own nation, then they were enemy combatants, and so do not deserve statues in this country. We don't have statues to the English general Cornwallis, the Mexican general Santa Ana, or to Hitler, so why are they deserving?

He has never brought it up again.
Jamison Alexander
@JamisonAlexander@mastodon.social replied  ·  activity timestamp 2 months ago
@heidilifeldman not only citizenship, he clearly is avoiding the idea of why the US fought the Revolutionary War and Civil War. Both were for freedom from dark ideals whether the rule of a tyrant or tyranny of slavery. He does not mention the native Americans, freedmen, and immigrants who fought and died for those ideas of freedom when they did not have them.

The core of his and the right’s belief is that everyone who isn’t them, or their white archetype is weak or wrong. He is a disgrace.