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Reverse Birthright


Jews value a couple things; a nice pastrami on rye is one and tradition is another. Jews value Israel as their homeland. It’s the land where we became a people. American Jews love this land so much they send their children over via a program called Birthright. It’s heavily funded so price is of no matter for families. This ensures that the Jews in America have a tangible bond with the Jews in the motherland. America politically backs Israel. Israel is not liked by surrounding neighbors. These neighbors have societies that differ in their attitudes from us. Women just got the right to drive in Saudi Arabia; yet, America is the oppressive sexist country… I may add though that Israel is the only country in the region that has Jews and Muslims serve in government together.

Birthright is a beautiful idea. How else do we demonstrate the transcendent beauty of this land without seeing it? A trip like this can reveal empirical truths that one might have trouble finding in newspapers, especially if it’s the New York Times. Thomas Jefferson once said, “Dissent is the highest form of patriotism.” We live in a free society. We should be able to dissent. We should exercise this in order to keep putting out a better and better product. That product is America. I don’t believe that bashing America, especially with a false narrative, is the answer. We have a whole generation of youth who funneled straight into college. Many haven’t worked low-end jobs, and many earned trophies just for showing up. We lost something vital in this. I think it would be fantastic to establish a new program. I’d like to call it Reverse Birthright. These young people inherited a beautiful country, but don’t seem to recognize it. I totally get it. How could they? Most of them haven’t traveled much; they haven’t read a diverse amount of material; they lack life experience; college tells them that America is a lousy racist/sexist place. It’s funny how people who’ve fled Communist countries love this land so much. They have a marker of comparison. Sometimes, we need empirical data to sort out the nonsense.

So, Reverse Birthright would offer this opportunity to all American youth. They would have a list of countries to pick from. We’d send them for free! They could choose between North Korea, Russia, Sudan, Pakistan and Iran.

In North Korea, they could take a walk in the park. They would have to be very careful if they walked the park, and said something critical of Kim Jung Un (no matter how benign it may be). If they made this statement while walking with their parents and grandparents it would be even worse. The 1972 edict would indicate that the whole family be punished. It’s known as the “three generations of punishment” rule. This is to ensure that the ‘seed’ of class enemies be thoroughly wiped out!

In Russia, you could send good old Putin a post card thanking him for the hospitality. Only you better be sure it isn’t seen as offensive. I’m sure you wouldn’t want to spend three days in a Russian prison. Haven’t we all seen Eastern Promises? Those prisons are filled with proper gangsters. If I’m too soft to survive ten days then college kids don’t stand a chance.

In Sudan, you could sit at a café and have a lovely mint tea. Maybe you’d open your big ignorant western mouth to the waiter. You would pose some questions about Islam. You could criticize Christianity or Judaism, but you’d better be careful with their faith. I hope you had time to eat in that café, because they don’t feed you in prison. You have to figure out your own food situation… good luck to you. I guess that would be considered a hunger strike in some draconian society.

Pakistan, seems fun this time of year! According to the Diyat or Qisas laws a murderer can go free if they pay money to the family of their victim. So, make sure you’re useful to mom and dad. If you don’t wash your dishes or take out the trash then money may seem more enticing than having you around. Kids are expensive enough as it is. It might not be a bad idea to get a “refund” on this child.

Iran, is another great idea of a travel destination for Reverse Birthright. You have so many options on our list of places to go. This one is an absolute delight. We may advize you not engage in same sex romance though. It’s different in the U.S.A. where it’s legal, and broadly socially acceptable. Don’t even think about expressing yourself romantically in Iran if you’re LGBTQ. This is an offense punishable by death. Try telling the judge you were only doing mouth-to-mouth resuscitation… good luck with that one.

I think Reverse Birthright would be a real swell program to get kids into America again. Let’s dissent, but let’s also value our nation. The best part of Reverse Birthright is that we’d only have to pay for a one-way ticket in most cases. Many of these kids probably wouldn’t be coming back. The ones who do make it back would kiss the soil, see how great they have it, understand the complexity of a free society and not take the stars and stripes for granted. I may need a Reverse Birthright trip myself if I forget what I have here. It’s easy to not appreciate our liberty. Anybody can lose sight of the good when we focus only on the glaringly bad. We have plenty of good reason to dissent, but let’s not throw the stars and stripes out with the bathwater.


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© 2017 Zach Danesh

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