Friedrich Nietzsche once said, "God is Dead!" This was not an act of heresy, sedition, or anything that would put him in the canto reserved for traitors and mutineers. He meant that the fear of God that drove man to do good works had failed. Man doesn't feel the consequences of their actions, or they don't feel them until their judgment day. People who believe God is a coping mechanism don't have the drive to good, yet pray when they fear His/Her wrath. God, the living phenomenon that no human will ever be able to contemplate, is not dead. But God, the symbol, is dead.
So, when I say, "America is Dead," I am not issuing a threat or a warning. All I'm saying is the ideals of the Framers, freedom, diversity, unity, truth, justice, "The American Way", "The American Dream", and all the other things that made us Americans is dead. Sure, we went to war to prevent the use of "weapons of mass destruction," in an act of self-defense. That is the key word, self-defense. America went to war to protect itself, and only itself, from destruction. We didn't send soldiers to foreign lands when others were in danger, but when our skins are threatened we're Johnny On-The-Spot. Even more to the point, America invades countries to rid the world of nuclear weapons and yet, we have thousands. The American Dream becomes the American Hypocrisy, and we are no different than the "terror" we claim to be fighting. You, as readers, may notice that I use "we" when referring to America in the above paragraphs. When 9/11 occurred, I had no complaints that we had nukes to defend ourselves. That is because I find myself just as hypocritical and no better than those who pull the trigger.
A colleague of mine met my argument with his own theory that America was never born. That the promises of freedom and unity were "empty promises" and the ideal of the American Dream was a complete hoax. I agree with him indefinitely. But, there in lies the rub. If the American Dream is not real, why do our leaders impose it upon the general public so much? They use the American symbol to win you over to their side, democrat, republican, liberal, conservative, and independent alike. Despite the empty promises of freedom and unity made by our forefathers, they created a symbol, the American symbol. Today, that symbol is manipulated to serve some men, not all men.
译文:
美国死了
弗里德里希·尼采曾经说过：“上帝死了！”这不是异端行为，不是煽动骚乱，也不是把他自己列入叛逆者和反抗者之中。他指的是由于对上帝的敬畏而驱使人们行善的动力消失了。人们意识不到他们行为的后果，或者说他们直到审判日到来时才能意识到。把上帝当做是应对机制的人们没有行善的驱动力，却在惧怕上帝发怒时才祈祷。上帝，作为一种从来没有人仔细去深思的现存现象，并没有死，但是作为象征的上帝已经死了。
因此，当我说“美国死了”时，我不是在提出威胁和警告。我所说的是美国人的理想：自由、多元、联合、真理、公正、美国方式、美国梦以及所有那些使我们成为美国人的东西死了。当然，我们为了阻止使用“大规模杀伤性武器”而采取自卫去战斗。自卫，这是个关键词。美国为了保护自己而战斗，只是保护自己免受破坏。在其他国家面临危险时我们不会派出部队增援，但当我们的汗毛刚受到威胁时我们会马上到场。说得更直白些，美国侵略别国是为了消除世界上的核武器，然而我们却拥有着上千的核武器。美国梦变成了美国伪善，而我们与我们声称要与之战斗的恐怖分子没有什么区别。作为读者的你，可能注意到了在上面的段落中，当我提及美国时，我使用了“我们”一词。九一一事件发生时，我并没有报怨我们用核武器来保卫自己。那是因为我发现自己就是个伪君子，一点也不比那些扣动扳机的人好哪儿去。
我的一位同事用他“美国从未诞生”的理论回应我的论点。他认为所承诺的自由和联合都是些“空头支票”，美国梦的理想也不过是个彻底的骗局。我不完全赞同他的观点。但在谎言中有谴责。如果美国梦不是真的，为什么我们的领导人们把它如此强加于公众身上？他们利用美国象征赢取你的支持，民主党、共和党、自由党、保守党、独立党都是一个样。不去管我们的祖先留下的关于自由和联合无法兑现的承诺，他们确是创造了一种象征，美国的象征。而今天，这种象征被篡改后，用来为一些人而不是所有人服务。