If someone asked me what it is to be an American I would most likely say that you are born in America, but normally they don’t just mean being a citizen. It’s more of what do you have to be to be considered really American. Some people might say to be an American you have to adopt the social and political values of America, like freedom, equality and the pursuit of happiness. But some other people might say it means you have to embrace an identity where many people of different backgrounds and races coexist, rather than fitting a “normal” mold. I believe both of these arguments are good arguments, but I think it is all up to opinion. Being American can mean different things to different people. Whether someone thinks it means adopting political ideas or embracing the different kinds of people in America they can both be correct.
The argument that you must adopt the ideals of the country’s political and social terms is a great argument in my opinion. This is a broad spectrum though you could say this about every country. Adopting a country’s customs can be multiple things as well whether it is their politics and social or most of their religious customs. Not to mention it is not that easy for most people. If you have been living in america for 20 years and you move to mexico or somewhere and Europe almost everything about that place will be different. Religious customs might be different. Most political structures are much different and social ideals can be very different as well. That goes for anyone moving to a different country and we try to welcome legal immigrants to this country and we as citizens should try to do so as well. That is also one of the customs we have that another country might not. So this argument has flaws but it still can help us determine if we are really American.
The other argument could be that being an American is coexisting with people from different backgrounds or races. Obviously America has not been like this from the start, but this was unique and still is a little bit. Countries to this day hate other religious parties and discriminate for that which we do not do and have not. We still have discrimination in our country though, this argument does not try to say that we don’t, but it is still a problem in this country and other countries. We do not necessarily have discrimination within our politics but we know that citizens do and some of those citizens might be in our politics but the broad spectrum of people in the government do not.
There can be a lot more arguments over what it means to be an American. There are many opinions on the subject. There are a lot of people that talk about things like this but in my opinion there is no definite answer. I think if whatever you believe brings you happiness and helps you determine if someone is american that is just fine. It can mean whatever you want it to mean.
