One World, One People

If you are a citizen of your town, you probably know at least a little bit about how that town works.  Same goes for the state you live in.  After all, they are collecting your tax dollars.  Around the country, news channels constantly bombard us with endless stories about natural disasters, missing children, and how our government always seems to be stuck in a gridlock rather than getting anything done.  To this degree we know what is happening in our country.  After that there is a huge drop off.  Far fewer people know what is going on in the rest of the world.  Everything that happens in the world affects us, here in America, in some way.  In trade, tourism, business, and many other ways, we interact with people all over the world who come from different cultures and viewpoints.  Where would America be without Italian food, Chinese manufacturing, Japanese cars and the British 3-branch government?  Yet all 7 billion of us have to find some way share the Earth without too much war and conflict, because its the only planet we’ve got.  So to be a good citizen in the global community, you need a basic understanding of how the world works.  This I believe.

As a freshman I joined the speech and debate team and got to research and debate resolutions such as “Are failed nations or stable nations a greater threat to America?”  All the research I did got me thinking about just how big and important these things are.  Before that, events just seemed, well, far away.  I didn’t think it mattered to me what was going on thousands of miles away over in Iraq or Afghanistan.  The politicians could make those decisions.  I gradually came to realize that even though I wasn’t going to be making life-changing decisions, it’s good to know a little bit about global events.  And as I get older and get closer to being able to vote, I want to be informed and understand the issues at hand.  Simple math shows that my vote won’t change the world.  Millions of people vote, and elections are almost never close enough that single votes matter.  Even so, I still want to be informed enough to make the best decision I can.

My belief is reinforced every time I hear about American tourists in foreign countries yelling at and humiliating innocent shopkeepers and street vendors that barely know any English.  I feel for the poor vendors who have to endure getting yelled at in a language they don’t understand.  Unfortunately, this kind of rude behavior has become an American stereotype, and I encountered it several times when I took a trip to Italy.  It is people like this who need to learn a bit more about the world so they can realize, at the very least, that it doesn’t revolve around America.