Race & Region. Artificial Unity, National Division.

Primary superficial traits:
1. race
2. region
3. education

These are the big 3. There are a few others.. gender, sexuality, culture.. but some of those overlap, or are functionally the same.

Race is the most obvious, has been with us the longest, & generates the most division. Region can include dialect & even culture, & stirs local loyalties. Education is supposed to be a healing agent, that exposes the artificial contrasts, but it has become a source of division itself. Instead of being a tool for enlightenment, it has been hijacked into a tool of propaganda, to indoctrinate, not promote critical thinking. Education now promotes this division, rather than heal it, as it used to.

Sports are a substitute for national division & rivalry. You can root for your regional team or hero, & feel pride for their accomplishments. After the game, the sportsmanship that the games teach *should* cause us to shake hands of congratulations, knowing our deeper national loyalties override any feelings of resentment or division over the sports teams. But the division runs deep, & some humans find their loyalties conflicted. They do NOT show sportsmanship, but let their resentment grow to hate, & build artificial divisions. The 'fan' is the poster child for this malady.

America has governance as its source of national pride, or it used to, historically. We are a govt of, by & for the people. Our unity is based not on similarity of culture, race, education, region, or any superficial trait, but our common govt, which has been a source of great pride & patriotism for americans over the centuries. But when other factors upstage the primary loyalty of the nation, national division results. The secondary superficial allegiance overrides the broader national identity, & a shallow pool of parochial devotion divides us.

Lincoln made his famous 'house divided' speech running for the senate in 1858, which he lost.
"A house divided against itself cannot stand.
I believe this government cannot endure, permanently half slave and half free."

It illustrated the division of the day: Slavery. It was a major division, & a very heated issue, which eventually erupted in the civil war. That is the most common 'solution' for man, in our disputes with each other: War.

Man has always been a conflicted, divided creature. Today we have race baiters, regional loyalists, & other dividers pitching us against each other based NOT on our ideology of freedom & self governance, but on race, education, & regional or cultural differences. The detractors of american freedom constantly fan the flames of division, distracting us from the deeper issue of human freedom & self reliance. They mock the less educated, or impugn those they deem inferior intellectually, or they ridicule the snobbish elitism of the educated. They promote absurd differences in race, pounding drums of suspicion & mistrust, based only on skin pigmentation. And these dividers are trying to build a coalition of grievance.. pitting all the big 3 against a trumped up opponent. They try to paint the divisions as these artificial traits, to rally their side against their ideological opponents.

But the real struggle going on is ideological. Will we be a govt of, by, & for the people, or will we promote an elite ruling class? Will we defend & secure individual rights of sovereignty & responsibility, or trample them with redistribution & nanny state solutions? Will we be a nation of free people, or a state centered bureaucracy? THIS is the real choice before us, not the phony superficial divisions the race baiters & dividers try to portray. People of ALL education, region, & racial backgrounds need to wake up to the fake wars over superficials & see the bigger picture.

Once we lose our sense of national identity, & let the dividers run rampant with superficial loyalties of race, region, or anything that distracts us from the central truth of american liberty, we are finished as a nation, as a house divided cannot stand.