I'm not an apologist for Chinese repression, but America still has or once had slavery, child labor, torture (Abu Ghraib), patent medicine and unsafe food, racist policies that prevent wealth accumulation (redlining), mass pollution, racism and mistrust of non-white-skinned people, a terrible healthcare system for most, and still debates over the utility of vaccines, has a poor K-12 education outcome, refuses to severely punish notorious white-collar criminals and make their victims whole, immunizes its law enforcement from prosecution when it violates others' civil rights, and vests the President with absolute immunity or a presumption of immunity in exercising its powers. And those are just the embarrassments and atrocities I can think of right now.

We still have a lot to answer for.

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asdfman123 10 hours ago | parent [-]

If it's already changed don't you think it's answered for? What level of performative apologetics will make it better in your estimation?

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otterley 10 hours ago | parent [-]

I don't want performative apologetics; I want the still-existing problems to be remediated. I also want my fellow Americans not to deny our history and present reality. Recognition and apology are not identical.

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asdfman123 10 hours ago | parent [-]

You seem to be not distinguishing things that have happened hundreds of years ago with things that are present, exaggerating the scale of things that are still present, and not acknowledging that those things are widely recognized and even taught in American history classes.

	▲	otterley 10 hours ago \| parent \| next [-]
		I made clear that some of these were past (and they reverberate still today), and some are present: "America still has or once had" > exaggerating the scale of things that are still present What am I exaggerating, exactly? https://www.washingtonpost.com/graphics/investigations/polic... https://mappingpoliceviolence.org https://www.healthsystemtracker.org/chart-collection/quality... https://www.npr.org/2026/03/14/nx-s1-5734051/measles-outbrea... > not acknowledging that those things are widely recognized and even taught in American history classes In some states, yes. In others, the content is being censored (another embarrassment for America, which once censored the teaching of evolution!). See, e.g.: https://pen.org/educational-censorship/index-of-educational-... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Censorship_of_school_curricula... https://www.pbs.org/newshour/show/a-look-at-whats-behind-the...
	▲	forgetfreeman 8 hours ago \| parent \| prev [-]
		The For Profit Penal System (tm) and the resulting recidivism rates associated therewith, while not technically slavery, isn't exactly not slavery either. Anyway was there something specific you're trying to defend here or is this merely an exercise in performative nitpicking?