Create a 10 page paper that discusses the shameful past of America. “Someone has to say it or we are never going to get out of this rut. I am sick and tired of the founding fathers and their intents” (Kurlansky, 2006). This quote from Mark Kurlansky, found in an L.A. Times article, reiterates the notion that we as a country seem compelled to glorify the intent or mission of our founding fathers when what we should really be doing is using them as examples of how treacherous a patriarchal, class-based society really is.
Additionally, we should remember them for who they who in reality, slaveholders and misogynists. It is true that they were involved with establishing this country from meager beginnings but at great cost to humanity. The founding fathers of America built a country through slave labor and the virtual genocide of the Native American people. Today, if we watched overseas, as another group of settlers invaded a country and killed its inhabitants, we would most likely act repulsed and challenge that country to war. Incidentally, that is exactly what we did in Desert Storm in the 1990s when Iraq invaded the small but wealthy country of Kuwait! “Whether the revolt was right or wrong, the way the city, state and government officials conducted themselves after the revolt ended, has left a lump in the throats of American Negroes”(McKeller, 1967).
This quote pertains to a revolt that took place in a specific city known as Watts. Watts is one of many examples of a city with less than adequate public schooling, not to mention low income and poor race relations. Thanks to the standards set by our founding fathers, we still have deeply rooted racial issues today in America. Had our founding fathers not sat precedence of racism, intolerance, and inequality. we might actually live in a country where individuals were able to live harmoniously with one . another despite the difference in their national origin, skin color, gender and so on.