Puritans affect on American Society

There were a lot of examples from the book that showed the affect the puritans had on American society.  The first I would like to talk about is the affect that the puritans had on the reasons that America goes to war. When Vowell talks about the seal that Winthrops fleet brought over when they came from England.  The seal that pictured an Indian holding a bow and arrow and saying "Come over and help us."  Then she goes on to talk about how behind that saying is the underlying statement of, "We are going to help you whether you like it or not." Then she talks about all of the different wars that we have started that have just been behind the statement, of "we are going to help you whether you want it or not" and that is what we have based our reasons for starting war in America.  Such as when Vowell discusses our reasons for beginning our war with Vietnam.  Which our reason for doing so was if we don't help them there will be a communist take over.  Then Vowell also discusses our reason for beginning the war in Iraq.  Our reason was to disarm them and free their people and the save the rest of the world from impending danger.  All of the reasons for starting each of these wars can be traced back to the saying, "We are going to help you whether want it,like it, or not." Which can be originally traced back to the puritans.

                   But this is only one of the ways that Vowell discusses the affect that the Puritans had on American society.  But we also took in something good from which the puritans brought which came from this quote of Winthrops' "We must delight in each other, make other's conditions our own, rejoice together, mourn together, labor and suffer together, always having before our eyes commission and community in the work, our community as members of the same body.  Now that quote of Winthrops' that Vowell used spoke of empathy, sympathy, and sacrifice.  It seems like in times of hard ship even though a group of people or one person can try and hurt Americans as a community, Americans always can come together and community members really become members of the same body.  Vowell gives the example of her experiences during 911, but I can think of other moments where this puritan quote has applied itself into american society.  I can even think of local experiences.  During Hurricane Irene almost all members of the community were out after the flood helping one another and commiting selfless acts that bettered the community as a whole, also there was Hurricane Sandy, people donated things and even went to the places that were affected to help clean up.  The Boston marathon, people thought of the community as one and helped one another and volunteers and random people on the street were helping runners and people that had been physically affected.  These are just some examples and there are so many more.  These are just some of the ways that Puritan thinking affected the American Society.