Princeton prof Eddie Glaude says he dreads America’s 250th birthday

MS NOW guest Eddie Glaude, an author and professor at Princeton, said Tuesday that he feels “great trepidation” about celebrating America’s 250th anniversary because he feels the country is being “destroyed” and questions what they are celebrating.

“I’m having a hard time figuring out what we’re actually celebrating,” Glaude told the hosts of “Morning Joe.” “I think about Donald Trump, who kind of blends his cult of personality with a celebration of the nation, and I wonder what exactly we’re celebrating? Is it a storybook version of America?”

“You know, is it the idea that we are a beacon of freedom and that our perfection is secured in our salvation, or are we looking at how our ideals don’t match our practices, our current practices?” he continued. “And so I enter the Fourth of July, Mika, grappling with whether the ugly ghosts of our country have us by the scruff of the neck.”

Host Mika Brzezinski asked Glaude if he still had hope in the country.

DAVID MARCUS: WHILE THE NATION IS UNDERSTANDING, SMALL TOWN AMERICA STILL LOVES PASSAGES

“I don’t know how to explain that the country that made my life possible was being destroyed before my eyes,” he said.

Glaude argued that those who imagined the country as a “White Republic” were actively trying to do so, and that diversity was no longer seen as a strength.

“I believe we need to have an election in this 250th year,” he said. “America has to leave behind in many ways [this] Guaranteed innocence, Willie. And let’s face who we really are so we can allow ourselves to be otherwise. “Otherwise it seems to me we won’t get to the other side of this madness.”

“So I approach the Fourth of July with great trepidation, but I am hopeful that the great diversity of this country will make itself known and that we can push back some of these ugly forces,” he added. “Because remember, J.D. Vance doesn’t believe that faith defines who we are. He believes in something more malevolent. There’s something more fundamental to who we are as Americans that I think we should reject outright,” Glaude said.

MS NOW’s Mike Barnicle told Glaude that he still sings “The star-spangled banner” at sporting events and enjoys seeing the American flag fly on a sunny day, but he also wrote a slave owner’s words, “All men are created equal.”

“I also know that we are a country that does not remember what Lincoln once said. We cannot escape history. We cannot escape our own history, but I think we can improve it,” he said. “And we can celebrate without thinking that we carry a millstone around our neck because of the political activities that have occurred in the last, especially the last six or seven years.”

WASHINGTON POST ARTICLE: CELEBRATING AMERICA’S 250TH BIRTHDAY WILL BE ‘MORE DIFFICULT’

Barnicle asked Glaude if he sees optimism “at the end of the July 4th rainbow.”

“No, Mike, I don’t know. And I think that orientation comes from my own makeup. I don’t think I’ve ever shed a tear about patriotism, I don’t think I’ve ever found joy in singing the ‘Star Spangled Banner.’ It has something to do with the tradition I come from,” he replied. He added that he had to experience “the contradiction of America itself, even as we strive for the promise of America.”

He said he had a “blue hope” that the world was ugly and the United States had a heavy past up its neck, but he had some faith in people.

In addition to those expressing discomfort with celebrating America’s 250th anniversary, MS NOW host Ali Velshi and far-left journalist Joy Reid and MS NOW host Al Sharpton also expressed uncertainty about the Fourth of July, especially for Black Americans.

CLICK HERE FOR MORE NEWS ON MEDIA AND CULTURE

“They’re going to celebrate the nation’s 250th anniversary on July 4, but that’s not our celebration,” Sharpton said at the National Action Network’s 35th Anniversary National Convention in April. he said.

CLICK TO DOWNLOAD FOX NEWS APPLICATION

He continued: “We were slaves then, and they’re celebrating the signing of the Declaration of Independence in 1776. We didn’t even get emancipated until 1863. So I don’t know what everyone is getting ready to celebrate. [for]. You know I think it’s crazy to wear a birthday hat to your birthday party. This is not my party.”

Reid said during a podcast conversation earlier this month: “I can promise you, black folks, we’re going to take that day off, we’re going to have a barbecue because [are] closed, but no one I know is really excited about Black 4th of July.”