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Oh no, say it ain’t so!
How is America different as far as ■■■■ are concerned? Three ways matter most.
First, the United States evinces an unusual form of nationalism best described as civic nationalism. There are hearth cultural roots and associated bloodlines here, of course; but the United States is an immigrant society tethered more tightly to an abstract concept of the public realm than is the case in typical ethnic nationalisms. The American concept of the public realm is derived from the Enlightenment, as embodied and conveyed in social form through Anglo-American Protestantism. That concept of citizenship has been generally broad, expandable, and ultimately quite inclusive: That has been useful for ■■■■■
Second, an historically remarkable feature of Anglo-American Protestantism has been its Judeophilic orientation. That has been useful too, notwithstanding its occasional passive-aggressive character toward real extant ■■■■■
And third, America has been different for ■■■■ because while the most prominent “other” in Europe for purposes of social and political scapegoating and identity maintenance were ■■■■■ the most prominent “other” for those purposes here have been African Americans. Blacks have taken in the neck the brunt of what the “worse angels” of the American personality have dished out. In doing so, they have served as a deflector shield of sorts for ■■■■■ ■■■■ of course did not create this circumstance, but they have benefited from it all the same.
American ■■■■ also benefited enormously from the anti-discrimination laws of the desegregation epoch. Those laws, written to protect blacks, destroyed most of the quotas and glass ceilings that had hemmed in ■■■■■■ professional mobility.
As a more abstract form of the genre, civic nationalism is more fragile than its standard ethnic-based counterparts. It needs to be liberal to endure as a democracy at all, and liberalism is an historically acquired taste. That makes the American way in such matters more vulnerable to shocks.