American Exceptionalism: A Good Concept -- but a False Idea

The Bald Eagle soars across the land of the free, the strong, of beauty, and with longevity. It watches and caws as it calls for small, broken-wing pigeons if they need some help. He can fly high, but there is a limit to how high one can fly even for one of the greatest birds in existence. Once he reaches his breaking point, there is no going farther. He either stays there or flies lower. If he goes up more than he is supposed to, then he will crash and burn. The point here is that the Bald Eagle represents the United States of America, meanwhile the small, broken-wing pigeons represent the people in countries that are in need of assistance, such as Afghanistan and Israel. The United States can definitely take a huge part to helping others throughout the world, but there is a very fine limit that they can go. Although the US is very powerful, democratic, and influential, that does not make America exceptional. There is a difference between nationalism and American exceptionalism, with American exceptionalism being quite a narcissistic view. America, alone, does not have the moral responsibility to help the world through leadership and guidance, otherwise they would be dragged down. Basically, the entire world has this moral responsibility, therefore making all countries either “exceptional” or all being “non-exceptional”, which makes American exceptionalism an invalid concept.

First of all, it is well known that America is the one of the greatest countries on Earth politically and militarily, but sometimes some people take it too far. It makes sense to have pride in your country and have nationalization towards it, but to believe in American exceptionalism is having too much pride. It seems like this idea of American exceptional...

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... their country. However, there should be a balance. There should not be more added weight, and there should not be release of too much weight, but rather the US should reach a medium weight.

Therefore, the US should back down a bit and allow other countries to take action, but still show how good America is by not backing down too much. America is truly a great country, but not so great that they are superior to all. Although American exceptionalism has good intentions towards others, it should be realized that the concept does not do too much good for both parties. One eye of the hawk should be on itself, and the other eye on others. This way, the hawk will be able to rest on a branch, but it will be on the highest branch. From here, the hawk will be able to spread its wings to show its beautiful feathers, but not flying around all over the place flaunting itself.