To anyone paying attention to American politics and the culture war, it’s no surprise that the past eight years have been chaotic. With the modern Republican party embracing the values of the Make America Great Again (MAGA) movement, citizens of the United States now find themselves amid a culture war unlike anything ever seen before in modern American history. Among MAGA values, such as harsh immigration policy and isolationist foreign policy, there is an internal culture war raging within the United States and testing all Americans to discover what it is we truly value as a country.
Social movements and extremist groups across America declare their views on which specific values make America Great for them. One particular movement, the LGBTQ, is at the heart of a constitutional paradox. The right to identify as a man or woman despite having sex and gender determined at birth is a prime example of how Americans seek to pursue their version of happiness or go against being content with who they are naturally. Do we value life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness in this country? Or do we value accepting ourselves for who we are in the name of contentment? Herein lies the constitutional paradox for all Americans in the culture war.
Pursuing Happiness is Obstructed
The second paragraph of the Declaration of Independence reads, “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that their Creator endows them with certain unalienable rights, that among these are life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.” For many Americans, pursuing happiness is interpreted as the American Dream. If you want something, you have the right to go and get it. If you are unsatisfied with the hand that life dealt you, you can change your destiny to the best of your ability and within the confines of legality.
It’s interesting to note that this idea of pursuing happiness is at the fundamental core of both liberal and conservative political ideologies. Yet, it seems to be the right wing that rejects it most. The movements of pro-choice and the LGBTQ are advocating for their rights to decide what to do with their bodies. Still, they are continuously obstructed and opposed by MAGA and other members of the Republican party. Why, then, would Republicans choose not to acknowledge these choices as a means of pursuing happiness, a constitutional right?
The most direct answers are usually tied to morality and the idea that America is a Christian Nation. Still, even these ideas are potentially dangerous to entertain because they directly conflict with the separation of church and state. Even during the culture war, we must realize we are not a Christian nation. We are a free nation.
Culture War Continues
Concerning morality and terminating human life, the right accuses the Pro-Choice movement of murder via abortion. Yet the right doesn’t see the hypocrisy of supporting the military and warfare as a “necessary evil” where even innocent life is taken in greater numbers. Nor does it acknowledge the danger of mass shootings from citizens possessing military-grade assault weapons and being able to access those weapons with ease.
Despite these conflicting views, modern Republican extremists will continue to ridicule LGBTQ and Pro-Choice groups because they deem their choices as harmful to other American citizens. However, the right to choose how you identify yourself or protect your own life from potentially dangerous, life-threatening pregnancies are personal choices that have nothing to do with people who aren’t the personal doctors of those individuals. It shouldn’t have anything to do with the culture war as it doesn’t involve slaughtering innocent people in mass.
Is the pursuit of happiness obstructed for the LGBTQ? Yes. A man who wants to become or identify as a woman (or vice versa) is not free to pursue that choice, says the Christian Right because they should have learned to be content with who they were from birth. While self-acceptance isn’t exactly a pessimistic perspective, it begs the question of whether Right-wing extremists genuinely understand the American value of what it means to pursue happiness.
In the Right’s defense, however, their concern is more attentive to issues regarding the unfair biological advantages transgender people have while participating in sports and which restroom to use. Those are issues where pursuing one’s own happiness may impose on others, even if it’s unintended. Is the pursuit of happiness obstructed for women? Yes. Victims of rape, incest, and/or abnormal pregnancies are not accessible to rid themselves of harm involuntarily bestowed upon them, which would make anyone unhappy.
Contentment Doesn’t Always Apply in America
Ask any conservative what they think when entertaining the idea of capping income at 10 million dollars and earning a trophy for winning capitalism. Odds are you will be accused of being a communist, socialist, or someone who disagrees with free market capitalism, as happens in the culture war. In America, we believe in free enterprise and entrepreneurs. You can become as wealthy as you wish if you are a successful conformist. On the contrary, the idea of being content and happy with almost nothing is a spiritual perspective, but it conflicts with the American Dream of pursuing and owning material wealth.
Indeed, it is interesting that the far right will lecture LGBTQ and Pro-Choice activists on being content with who they are and their situations before abortion or surgery, yet the same doesn’t apply to them when they strive for millionaire and billionaire status even if it’s through illegitimate means. Perhaps it’s the LGBTQ communities who should all realize that they don’t need to be different, and they don’t need to reject themselves as they were when they began life. There is no need to change or achieve new status, but there is a need to pursue material wealth because that’s the American Dream, and we all desire that dream, or so it’s assumed.
No Option is Safe in a Culture War
Conservative ideology is conflicted in the culture war, where marginalizing groups like Black Lives Matter, LGBTQ, and Pro-Choice groups is ok because they aren’t choosing to be content with the status quo. Pursuing happiness is okay if it involves the American Dream of acquiring material wealth, but it’s not OK when pursuing human rights, diversity, equality, inclusiveness, and other small, insignificant things. If these ideas are values that create happiness, then they shouldn’t be pursued but avoided.
On the other hand, being content with the status quo is extremely dangerous to the modern-day Republican party. After all, the Department of Justice is corrupt, the electoral system is rigged, education is tainted by teachings of critical race theory, and Disney is “woke.” Suddenly, being content with the status quo is also unacceptable and requires us to pursue immediate change for one group to be happy. How odd this sudden call for action doesn’t apply to preserving the right to healthcare or supporting the freedom of expression for civil rights activists.
Where Do We Go From Here?
In the United States, we are left with a paradox that complicates American politics and hinders our ability to determine what we value most as Americans. There is a growing awareness that happiness is a choice and not something you seek externally. Yet the United States of America is established on the notion that we can change our lives as we see fit.
In the case of LGBTQ rights, is a woman not free to choose to become a man or a man becoming a woman? Is it wrong to not accept yourself for who you are? There is no easy answer, and this is only one example of the challenges Americans face in this culture war. Which is it that we should value?
It is important to note that our constitution can change, and the founders made that possible because they anticipated change for our nation’s future in general. MAGA Republicans seem to reject this idea, wanting to return America to a time again when it was considered great. The problem is no one can seem to describe the point in time that they are referencing, which leads progressives, liberals, and leftists to ask, “Was America ever truly great for everyone?” Was the pursuit of happiness possible for everyone, or was everyone content?
