I'm Major Jackson and this is the slowdown.

And this is the slowdown. out.

Watching a World Cup game, a man next to me at the bar dragged what he proceeded. Watching a World Cup game, a man next to me at the bar dragged what he perceived as acting by the opposing team.

He made a generalizing remark, there go the Italians again, flopping around.

The Spaniards, the Greeks, the Swedes.

Whenever I hear a person refer to people by their geographic or cultural or

national association, I wince. In doing so, we falsely implicate everything

from intelligence levels to physical appearances.

This strikes me as crude, reductive, unintentionally demeaning.

Just denoting people by their citizenship

calls forth what are supposed to be

intrinsic characteristics of a people that all in that region do not share.

It renders static what we know of human beings,

that they are not a monolith,

but a composite of differences and shared traits, customs, and rituals.

What cultural attributes once defined a group, eventually calcify, and play into unintended stereotypes.

Yet, at the same time, I do not want to uproot people.

Where is the line?

Today's poem hints at the individuality of people facing shared challenges, which may ultimately tie us together, more than our borders.

Americans by Katie Peterson.

He lost his job.

He didn't know what to say to his family,

...