Splendid Isolation

My son is in the midst of studying American History. Like a lot of us, he will probably spend the rest of his life doing just that , in bits and pieces, but his eighth grade year is the one that gave him clear focus. It also raised a few dozen questions for him over the year, not the least of which was the genocide of Native Americans. The Middle Passage. It hit him squarely in the spot that cries for justice in a world full of injustice. He's been raised in a world at war. When he reads the accounts of this conflict or that battle, he wonders if any of it was worth the fight.
Then he read the Monroe Doctrine. It took him a while to wrap his head around the idea of a hands-off policy. We won't bug you if you don't bug us. What a nice idea. We'll tend to our business over here while you do whatever you need to do over there. Sounds fair. Unless somebody needs help. Then that notion starts to fall apart around the edges. After two hundred years, it turns out that it's almost impossible to live in the world alone. New Orleans, Japan. Afghanistan, Iraq. We see it there, it happens here. A butterfly flaps its wings on the Mexican border and suddenly gas prices jump a dollar a gallon. Nuclear reactors melt down across the ocean and radiation finds its way to our shores.
It's the problem with an us versus them view of the planet. Before you know it, we are them and they are us. In a historical perspective, it's hard to stay mad at someone who will most likely become your ally in the next war. Or the next disaster. Or the next economic collapse. My son is a citizen of the world, whether he likes it or not. He knows his history book is just one volume in a much bigger story, and he's just starting to learn.