American Culture on the 4th of July

By John E. Carey
Peace and Freedom
July 4, 2007

I am never sure whether it is our American culture that shapes our TV, movies and other media or whether our media shapes our thinking to such an extent that it changes culture.

Probably a little bit of both.

What is culture? One very good online dictionary calls it “The totality of socially transmitted behavior patterns, arts, beliefs, institutions, and all other products of human work and thought. These patterns, traits, and products considered as the expression of a particular period, class, community, or population.”

On July 4, 1963, as a young lad, I was fortunate enough to be at Gettysburg, PA. The Centennial of the greatest land battle in the history of North America had just concluded. That Centennial event was marked with religious services, re-enactors in uniforms and period clothing from the 1860s, and my Dad’s gigantic Ford “Country Squire.”

Just as a reminder, on July 4, 1863, some 50,000 Americans lay dead on the fields and in the town of Gettysburg. The slaves had been freed but the issue of one or two nations sharing this part of the continent was still undecided.

In 1963 at that Centennial, America had a vastly different culture than it has today. JFK was president and the Republican Party largely cooperated with the government called “Camelot.”

In 1963, at Gettysburg, there were no protesters, many men wore a “crew cut,” homosexuality was not discussed, girls wore skirts to the knee, and the Beatles were still hot.

In 1963 there was no Paris Hilton (whom we admire for what? I forget.), no Brittany Spears, and our sex lives and drug use and times in rehab were private matters.

In 1963 there was no internet, no chat rooms, no U-Tube, no talk radio, no Jerry Springer and no Oprah. And Vietnam had not yet become a common word in America.

In 1963, a survey said the most valued and cherished things about a marriage was children. Abortion was illegal and people went to worship their own God in their own way on Sunday – in droves.

In 1963, movie giants like John Wayne, Kirk Douglas, Jimmy Stuart and Robert Mitchum were still on the silver screen or in re-runs on TV.  The stars where big and tough, Hollywood filmed epics, and the themes were often based in hitory.  In 1962 and 1963 movies like “Cleopatra,” “Lawrence of Arabia,” “Birdman of Alcatraz,” and “H.M.S. Defiant” were made.

It seems to me, but I could be wrong, in 1963, most adult Americans were married and not divorced, people didn’t live together in “alternative life styles,” families ate dinner together (and Mom actually cooked — she didn’t bring home pre-made food from the grocery) and we Americans were no so preoccupied with money, big houses and whiz bang cars.

In 1963 we had time for each other and discussed in diners and bars.  Forget about magically disappearing from a face to face talk with your cell phone or lap top.  People were more “really connected” I think: not digitally enhanced.

In 1963 America was an industrial powerhouse, we made most of the cars in the world, and the auto workers and steel men were protected by powerful unions.  Everything that came from China was junk.  Now, junk or not, everything in Sears and WalMart was made in China.

A woman born in Japan who has lived here in the United States most of her life reflected on all this to me just yesterday. She recalled to me the human sacrifices made during World War II but reminded me that we might be living in a Nazi and Japanese warlord world had it not been for D-Day, Stalingrad, and Iwo Jima.

Think of that: a Japanese American stood telling me how import it was that her homeland lost World War II.Then she went on to bemoan our current culture, born in the protests and LSD of the late 1960s.

What some liberals do not seem to understand is why there is now such a phenomena as “Conservative Christians.” The answer is pretty simple: some people reject the America we have become and long for the greatness of the America we once were.

Personally, I ignore most of our current culture as the stuff found on the floor of a horse barn. I never did see one episode of “The Sopranos,” I missed entirely “American Idol,” and I was reading American history while others gobbled up “Harry Potter.”

I am not a reactionary and I love America and Americans very deeply but I do not wallow on the barn floor either.

The younger generation can make of America what it will and take from America what it wants: but there are consequences and there will be more (like when China surpasses the U.S. entirely in everything).

The conservative http://www.spectator.org/ had this to say regarding American culture recently:

“John Wayne reigned as one of Hollywood’s kings for nearly 40 years, and his support of his country’s war efforts — from American settlement of the West to stopping Communism both here and abroad — got him into trouble as the nation’s ideas about patriotism took a sharp turn to the left. …

“[W]hy then is there no John Wayne today? Anyone who surveys the current scene and is old enough to remember the days of the Duke surely knows the answer. The sublime Katharine Hepburn summed it up more eloquently than anyone:

” ‘John Wayne is the hero of the ’30s and ’40s and most of the ’50s. Before the creeps came creeping in. Before — in the ’60s — the hero slid right down into the valley of the weak and the misunderstood. Before the women began dropping any pretense to virginity into the gutter. With a disregard for truth, which is indeed pathetic. And unisex was born. The hair grew long and the pride grew short. And we were off to the anti-hero. John Wayne survived all this.’”

— Lisa Fabrizio, writing on “The Duke of America,” June 27 in the American Spectator Online at http://www.spectator.org/

So I long for heroes this 4th of July.  Harry Reid, Tom Cruise and others like them just are not doing it for me.

And we have a post-script for this rant.  Today we attended a small town family Fourth of July Celebration and parade.  It was campy and quaint and I cried.  It seemed like every child and dog participated; yet in keeping with America’s diversity and understanding, we also saw: a “Gay Band” (They call themselves the “Different Drummers”); Chinese Dragon Dancers; Scottish Bagpipers; and representatives from several civic and city groups (a Dump Truck and several Fire Engines were just as a part of the celebration as the kids and dogs).  It was very American and just great!