America?

LOS ANGELES — “To be American is to be free” - but whose freedom are we really talking about?

As a white woman in the 21st century from Los Angeles County, I was raised to believe in liberty, autonomy and dignity outlined and “protected” by the Constitution.

But is it the case that being American means living in a country that preaches freedom while systematically stripping it away - particularly from women, people of color and immigrants - all while following a rotting and decaying document?

Thurgood Marshall, the famed Supreme Court justice, said at a speech marking the Bicentennial of the Constitution, “The government they devised was defective from the start, requiring several amendments, a Civil War, and momentous social transformation to attain the system of constitutional government and its respect for individual freedoms and human rights we hold as fundamental today.” 

The Constitution,written in the 1700s by men who owned slaves and considered women property, enables oppression repackaged as legality through loose interpretation. “Constitutional rights” is a moving target - not a guarantee. 

On women - 2022: Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization proved, with its dismantling of Roe v. Wade and the debate on women’s autonomy, that “freedom” in America is conditional.

Another justice, Ruth Bader Ginsberg argued from the start, “Legal challenges to undo restrictions on abortion … center on a woman’s autonomy to determine her life’s course, and thus to enjoy equal citizenship stature.”

Roe v. Wade, decided in 1972 referenced the Due Process Clause of the 14th Amendment, leaving room for considerable dissent, relying on a “right to privacy” that is never even mentioned in the Constitution. 

The 7-2 majority that decided Roe left room for interpretation  to sidestep the dissent in a bid to keep everyone happy. Federal officials walk on eggshells trying to prevent polarization even if this means moving backwards - that is, taking away rights from non-white, Christian men. 

On modern Jim Crow - 1954: Brown v. Board of Education ruled racial segregation unconstitutional.

Redlining, underfunding schools and racializing topography are examples of post-1954 Jim Crow rules, deemed otherwise unconstitutional by the majority.

According to the U.S. Department of Education in 2023, Black children are five times more likely to attend high-poverty schools than white children.

Although the Brown decision deliberately sought to make segregation a thing of the past, it arguably did not do anywhere near enough to squash systemic racism. A lack of elaboration in the decision left room for skeptics and dissents to seek alternate forms of segregation. 

A “Geography of Inequality” study from the National Center for Biotechnology Information reported, for instance, that “schools in redlined areas receive about $2,500 less per student, have fewer experienced teachers, and that's directly tied to property tax disparities”

Furthermore, a look in recent years into police brutality (the George Floyd and Breonna Taylor murders) and the BLM movement- further spotlights the dangers of systemic racism. 

On immigration - The Guardian reported in a recent story about immigrant families, “Federal judges acknowledge open-air ‘camps’ where migrants—including children—wait in unsanitary, makeshift conditions: lacking shelter, food, sanitation, and medical attention.” 

How is that a promotion of general welfare or a securing of liberty, as outlined on the first page of the Constitution?

Half the country rests all its immigration ideals on misconstrued fake news and the right’s fear mongering. Immigration enforcement is celebrated by the right, whose ideas center on villainizing immigrant communities and bureaucratic misruling. 

Fact - the Constitution depends on the 14th Amendment Due Process Clause to guarantee all individuals a fair trial before being deported. This fact makes it even more disturbing to witness ICE raids, impromptu ICE tactics outside of immigration court buildings and deportation to, among other places, El Salvador.

“We cannot give everyone a trial … it would take 200 years.” President Trump said in an interview in April on CNN, asserting there are too many “illegals” to have fair trials in seeking to justify his Administration’s deportations to El Salvador. 

Parallel - “Just doing my job” - arguably the most dangerous excuse in history draws parallels from Nazi Germany to today's modern ICE deportation tactics.

On Freedom of Speech (or lack thereof) - This administration has failed to uphold the Constitution, a dead or alive document. Regardless of interpretation there are basic rights as outlined in the document every American is subject to. Freedom of speech and press (First Amendment) - deemed one of the most crucial - is in jeopardy.

Peaceful protests increasingly seem to be criminalized, surveilled and oppressed.

It makes one wonder whether to be American is drifting closer to a fascist authoritative rule than an open democracy. 

This month, Los Angeles protesters denouncing ICE raids have been met with the National Guard and the deployment of the U.S. Marines along with rubber bullets, tear gas and curfews. The fundamental right to protest is being shunned and replaced with a flex of military power not detailed in the Constitution. 

The Washington Post noted that during a speech this week at Fort Bragg, North Carolina, Trump said he would use force against any demonstrations at the parade (an upcoming military brigade and birthday celebration), calling potential protesters “paid troublemakers” and saying they would face a “very big force.”

Conversely, many of those who took part in the January 6th insurrection were pardoned and the incident celebrated as an attack on false voting pretenses.

It was an attack on democracy. 

Also included in the First Amendment; freedom of the press, the idea being to keep the populace educated and up to date. This administration has attacked this concept, the first executive administration to censure the White House press room and not allow Associated Press to participate in briefings. 

Another parallel to Nazi Germany: utilizing military parades and censored media as propaganda, to push a nationalist agenda. With the upcoming military parade set for Trump’s birthday celebration, America takes an enormous leap towards a totalitarian regime. 

Trump has no shame, according to AP. The administration made sweeping pulls from the Naval Academy library in April, tossing more than 400 titles. Just some of those thrown out: Maya Angelou’s “Why the Caged Bird Sings,” books recounting the Holocaust and books referring to civil rights and racism have been removed.

What remains? Hitler’s Mein Kampf. 

On MAGA antics - Make America Great Again? 

This Trump era phrase assumes there was a golden age.

However, for women, people of color, immigrants, LGBTQ+ communities and the impoverished, that “greatness” often meant systemic oppression, racism and exclusion.

A call to revert back to “Great America” refers to a time where white, Christian, heterosexual men held all control. This ignores the country’s progress towards equity and equality and instead regresses back to a time of Jim Crow, book bans, voter suppression, military parades and propaganda filled         press rooms. 

When protesters are arrested, immigrants are caged and rights are stripped, the MAGA crowd doesn’t mourn democracy. Instead, fueled by fake news and fear mongering, they cheer. 

To be American should be to believe, as the Rev. Martin Luther King proclaimed, “No one is free until we are all free.”

Having said this, unless you fit the mold of a white, Christian, heterosexual man whose values align with those in power, your freedom in America is precarious at best — and under attack at worst. 

The promise of liberty is conditional, and for everyone else, it’s a fight just to be seen, heard and protected under a system designed to exclude them. That’s not freedom. That’s control dressed up as democracy.