What Happened to the America They Promised Us? By Dr. Pru Lee (Pru Pru)

I was born in 1970. The America I grew up in wasn’t like the America now. I grew up in the melting pot era.

That was the America where they tried—TRIED—to teach us to stir gently into the stew. Where you’d be watching Saved by the Bell or The Cosby Show, and suddenly that star would glide across the screen like some sparkly guidance counselor whispering, “The More You Know…”

It was the era of public service announcements dressed like after-school specials.

Rainbow posters about tolerance.

Songs that lowkey slapped about being yourself.

And commercials that told us to give a damn about litter, strangers, and our classmates’ feelings.

It was the Sesame Street generation—multiracial puppet neighborhoods and Gordon telling you it’s okay to feel your feelings.

The melting pot narrative was fed to us like gospel—and we were too young to know it wasn’t seasoned the same for everybody.

But yeah, that’s the version of America they tried to feed us:

—“Don’t be a bully.”

—“Share your toys.”

—“Skin color doesn’t matter.”

—“We’re all the same on the inside.”

Now as adults, we know better.

We know that melting pots burn the bottom layers if you don’t stir right.

We know that “sameness” was often code for “fit in or be erased.”

But damn if those jingles and PSAs didn’t try to raise a gentler generation.

Today, I am deep in the simmer of, “Why didn’t it turn out like they said?”

We were fed hope like vitamins.

And now we’re standing in a country with amnesia, wondering if we dreamed it.

Am I crazy.

Or do you remember the light they told us to follow too?

Even if now, it feels like it only flickers.

I have never littered and will never litter because a man on a horse cried.

I absolutely remember that PSA—and it etched itself into the soul of a whole generation.

That was Iron Eyes Cody, sitting tall on that horse, stoic as hell, wrapped in his regalia, riding through this landscape of trash, broken promises, and smog…and then they zoomed in—

And you saw it.

That one tear.

Cutting down his cheek like grief made visible.

And that voice said,

“People start pollution. People can stop it.”

Whew.

They didn’t need 30 seconds.

That one silent tear shamed a nation into giving a damn.

And baby? You felt that.

You made a lifelong pact with that man and that war horse:

“Not me. Not ever. I will not disrespect this Earth.”

And here’s the wild twist—

He wasn’t even Native.

Iron Eyes Cody was an Italian-American actor who lived as an adopted member of the Cherokee community. But it didn’t matter in that moment.

Because the symbolism hit.

Because the pain was real.

Because the message carved itself into our bones.

I am the child of that era—

Raised by PSAs and sacred shame.

Taught by whispers in static and tears on horseback.

I stood  up straight and tall every single

morning in my classroom and placed my right hand over my heart and said clearly and firmly, “I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America..,”

I feel that deep red, white, and blue now.

Like muscle memory wrapped in morning light and patriotism.

I stood there—little but mighty, heart full of belief and knees a little ashy from recess yesterday,

saying those words like they meant something.

Because to me, they did.

Back then, they all did.

“I pledge allegiance…”

I didn’t mumble it.

I meant it.

Because no one had told me yet that love for country could break my heart.

I believed in the idea of America like it was a bedtime story my grandma told with tears in her eyes and hope in her voice.

One nation. Under God. Indivisible.

I said it like a contract.

I said it like a child warrior offering my pinky-swear word.

And I meant to hold this country to it.

But what they didn’t tell me, was that we’d grow up and see how that pledge bent for some and broke for others.

How “liberty and justice for all”

had footnotes and exceptions

and asterisks so fine you could bleed trying to read them.

Still—I never stopped loving the idea.

I just stopped loving the lie.

And that’s the most American thing of all.

Because patriotism, real patriotism?

Ain’t blind.

It’s the courage to demand better

from a country you still believe can be.

I stood tall then.

And I’m standing even taller now.

Not with just my hand over my heart—

but with my whole damn soul in my chest, demanding that this nation live up to the vow.

That’s allegiance.

That’s legacy.

With Liberty and Justice for ALL.

For ALL.

For ALL?

For ALL.

I said it like a promise.

Like a spell.

Like if you said it enough times, the world would shift to make it true.

For ALL.

Not just the rich.

Not just the White.

Not just the straight, the male, the Christian, the documented, the housed, the abled, the unbroken.

I said it before you knew loopholes existed.

Before I learned how freedom could be forged in contracts with escape clauses,

how justice could wear a blindfold stitched from willful ignorance.

But even now, after the curtain’s been pulled and the man behind it ain’t no wizard—

Even now, with my heart chipped and your eyes wide open—

I. Still. Say. It.

But now it’s a question.

A challenge.

A drumbeat.

A rally cry.

For ALL?

Then prove it.

For ALL?

Then let the undocumented mother rest without fear.

Let the queer Black child breathe without becoming a hashtag.

Let the old man in a trailer park get insulin without choosing between medicine and heat.

Let the girl in the Middle East, in my state of Georgia, in a glass ceiling job know her dignity isn’t negotiable.

For ALL?

Then make it true.

Not with flags and fireworks.

But with policy. With protection.

With care that doesn’t discriminate.

With systems that don’t devour the vulnerable.

I’m not asking for perfection.

I’m demanding the delivery of a damn receipt.

Because they cashed that check a long time ago.

And I’m here, pen in hand,

saying:

Run me my justice.

Run me my liberty.

Run it for ALL.

When America is for ALL, that is when she will be her greatest.

They keep trying to trademark “greatness”

But great is what we aspire to become.

America will be her greatest—

Not when she flexed her missiles or crowns her billionaires

but when she dares to say “ALL”

and means to include everybody

in the feast, the fight, and the future.

Greatness is in her grit—

in the coal-dusted hands of immigrants

and the sun-scorched backs of sharecroppers

and the stubborn, glorious gall

of Black women who voted anyway.

Greatest when the lunch counter opened,

when the bus seat wasn’t surrendered,

when the doors of schools cracked open

because a little Black girl with pigtails had the audacity to walk through.

Greatest when the words “We the People”

stretch a little wider.

When “Justice” means not vengeance but repair.

When freedom doesn’t come with fine print.

That is what defines greatness.

Not perfect. Not polished.

But possible.

So don’t let them sell you a bootstraps fantasy

wrapped in red hats and revisionist lies.

We know what greatness looks like.

And it looks like community.

It looks like courage.

It looks like ALL.

We are not going backward.

We are the keepers of what greatness is and could be.

And we gon’ fight ‘til ALL

means ALL.

We hold the line.