Just Another Deadly Myth

In the last years of his life, my father and I often talked about exceptionalism. I could never understand it, but my father (born and raised in America) told me there was nothing to understand: it was a myth, and like any myth, required no supporting arguments or evidence to back it up.

People believed in exceptionalism, and in their minds, this made it as true as winter or sunshine or the midnight breeze. This made it possible to rationalize any crime, any atrocity, for the sake of Us versus Them. And if he were alive today to read about torture in the United States, my father would be appalled but unsurprised.