> a moved to pure individualism built around selfishness

The US was founded on individual rights and freedoms, not community sacrifice. Meanwhile, during the 1800s, scores of millions of people moved up from poverty into the middle class and beyond.

(Immigrants to the US arrived with nothing more than a suitcase.)

> Funny how we keep forgetting the past and reject what benefited us as a whole

Oh the irony!

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ivan_gammel 2 hours ago | parent | next [-]

> The US was founded on individual rights

Excluding those whose land was stolen and redistributed by government.

> not community sacrifice

Excluding government-funded infrastructure projects like canals that enabled growth. And support that immigrants received from ethnic communities.

> Meanwhile, during the 1800s, scores of millions of people moved up from poverty

Yes, fifteen tons, we know that song.

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seizethecheese an hour ago | parent [-]

This comment is sort of weird. Like you’re finding technically true rebuttals that don’t really refute the high level point.

	▲	ivan_gammel an hour ago \| parent [-]
		The high level point is idealism not grounded in historical facts and probably not worthy spending time and going deeper with criticism, because full rebuttal isn’t some expert knowledge - ChatGPT can do that for you. America of 1800s is everything but libertarian paradise and is not truly exceptional. Industrialization in Europe increased prosperity while building welfare states at the same time.

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jjk166 42 minutes ago | parent | prev | next [-]

> The US was founded on individual rights and freedoms, not community sacrifice.

Approximately 25,000 americans gave their lives in the revolutionary war. Every signer of the declaration of independence was signing their own death warrant should they have lost to the strongest military in the world. This country was 100% founded on community sacrifice.

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sdsd 2 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

I mildly disagree with your take but it's still mindblowing how I can read some random political flame on HN and it's WALTER FUCKING BRIGHT. Your one of my tech heroes, so cool to spot you on here. If this were real life I'd ask for a selfie to prove that this happened but maybe you could, idk, sign a message with your PGP key so I can prove I interacted with you

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insane_dreamer 9 minutes ago | parent | prev | next [-]

> The US was founded on individual rights and freedoms ... during the 1800s, scores of millions of people moved up from poverty into the middle class and beyond.

Woah! The US was founded on occupation and slavery. How do you think millions of people were able to move up out of poverty? Because the US was abundant in land and natural resources, which during the 1800s we stole from the native Americans and exploited in large part with slave labor (at first, later pseudo-enslavement as sharecroppers).

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selimthegrim 2 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

> The US was founded on individual rights and freedoms, not community sacrifice.

You clearly didn’t grow up in an immigrant neighborhood in the city

	▲	sdsd 2 hours ago \| parent [-]
		I disagree with Walter here but the US wasn't founded by urban immigrants. There's a difference between pioneers, like the Mennonites in Mexico, and immigrants, like digital nomads in Mexico. The former are almost always more popular than the latter.