“it burned down before this is more of the same hurrrummmph.”
Democracy cannot rest or it is eroded, so yes bad things happened. American is flawed but over time has worked towards improving itself and going towards its ideals of equality. But every inch forward is hard fought against the likes of the current administration. Suffrage, voting rights, environmental regulations, abolition were all won as huge battles against those clinging to and abusing power.
The way these “but America has always been…” post are toned, if we listened to the likes of them then none of those victories would have occurred.
Listening to them, we backslide. Dwelling on past imperfections instead of fighting today’s fire? Thats Self sabotage.
These posts are never framed in a constructive way, like how do we right the wrongs of the past, how can we make reparations for them. No, they’re framed like “we’ve always been bad, so this current bad is not so bad”
They seem to be insidiously on the side of injustice, trying to diminish current ills so that they may continue.