The United States was established with a declaration of equality and fairness for everyone.
For centuries, people in the United States have worked to alleviate one individual hierarchy at a time, concentrating on such issues as genocide, slavery, child labor, job safety, suffrage, poverty, or global imperialism.
We've made significant progress at lessening hierarchies over the last two and a half centuries. Our success brings us much pride.
Much to Celebrate
When we examine the successes of past generations in the United States, their accomplishments are impressive and encouraging. Just to name a few:
Bounties for dead bodies or body parts of American Indians are no longer offered. Legalized slavery has been abolished. The age of legal consent for sexual relations was raised from seven years old. People of color can take an oath and testify in court. American Indian children are not forcibly sent hundreds of miles away from their families to white-run boarding schools. Men of color and women have the legal right to vote.
Current Generations
In our lifetimes, many of us have also refused to accept our assigned place in line. In addition to individual actions, national, state, and local organizations are making important inroads toward dismantling hierarchies.
Over the past decades, the civil rights movement, peace demonstrations, the women's movement, farm workers' boycotts, labor unions, and support for a healthy environment and family planning have made significant impacts on the United States.
People with disabilities can now attend local public schools. Communities welcome diversity of families, such as single people, same-sex couples as parents, and blended families. People are prosecuted for torturing animals.
We make small yet important differences in our everyday lives. We take public transportation, become friends with a person of a different race or culture, or treat animals as honored members of the family. We join a boycott or protest, champion renewable energy, study more than one religion, or support local agriculture and local businesses. We critically evaluate political candidates according to their support of top-of-the-hierarchy perspectives.
Today’s Opportunity
People who want to conserve hierarchies serve a vital purpose as we pass through our 250th anniversary. Prominent hierarchists are showcasing the problems of top-of-a-hierarchy perspectives in ways that are too obvious for a diverse and far-reaching audience to overlook.
Those on the authoritarian side are moving so desperately, quickly, strongly, and obviously that they are creating huge masses of people motivated to join together against them. They have generated enormous opposition domestically and around the world, united against a common enemy – the Trump administration, the wildly hierarchical Project 2025, and their allies and supporters.
We have an unprecedented impetus to come together to move the country significantly closer to the founder’s promise of Liberty and Justice for All.