You’re ret-conning America. Who was Alexis de Tocqueville writing about in “Democracy in America?” It was the people in what you call “middle america.” The America that my parents left their homeland for was created by those people and reflects their culture.

There is nothing great about Queens. It’s just a richer version of Dhaka. Loud, chaotic, fractious, politically dysfunctional cities are a dime a dozen all over the world.

Utah, meanwhile, is a fucking treasure. It’s clean, organized, orderly. The people are rule following, cheerful by default, emotionally repressed, legalistic, and punctual. They’re socialized to be that way from an early age. There’s only a handful of places in the world like it in the world and it’s precious.[1]

America’s greatness isn’t whatever bullshit you’re on about. That’s not why my parents left everything behind to come here. What makes America great is that I can go down to my county office and get a birth certificate printed in 20 minutes. It’s people who are so rule following that they’ll jump off a bridge if you give them paperwork that says they have to do that. That’s what a rarity in the world.

[1] The fact that Mormonism is very different from evangelical Christianity proves that my point isn’t about religion. I don’t care what religion you are. If Little Bangladesh was clean and orderly and efficient like Salt Lake City I would live there myself go to mosque and get fat eating Bangladeshi desserts: https://yelp.to/0XejznQCXp