The woman fell from the sky, from the world above, through a hole amid the roots of the great tree. And the birds broke her fall and the great sea turtle carried her on its back and the fish of the sea brought up soil and roots from the sea bed to make her the land to walk upon. And there she had a daughter, who grew up to marry the west wind and bear him two sons, the right-handed-twin and the left-handed-twin. But the left-handed-twin’s birth was too violent for her, and she died.
The sky woman buried her daughter, and from the grave sprang the life givers, corn, beans and squash, and also the sacred tobacco used to send messages of thanks back to the skies above. And the right-handed-twin created the rolling hills, the gentle glades and the still waters, while the left-handed-twin created the thorns and venom and the thunder and the lightening. And together they created man. And when the sky woman died they cut off her head and threw it into the sky where it became the moon and shines still today.

An Iroquois creation myth

America was never innocent. We popped our cherry on the boat over and looked back with no regrets. You can't ascribe our fall from grace to any single event or set of circumstances. You can't lose what you lacked at conception.

James Ellroy

Perhaps there has been, at some point in history, some great power whose elevation was exempt from the violent exploitation of other human bodies. If there has been, I have yet to discover it. But this banality of violence can never excuse America, because America makes no claim to the banal. America believes itself exceptional, the greatest and noblest nation ever to exist, a lone champion standing between the white city of democracy and the terrorists, despots, barbarians, and other enemies of civilization. One cannot, at once, claim to be superhuman and then plead mortal error.
I propose to take our countrymen's claims of American exceptionalism seriously, which is to say I propose subjecting our country to an exceptional moral standard. This is difficult because there exists, all around us, an apparatus urging us to accept American innocence at face value and not to inquire too much. And it is so easy to look away, to live with the fruits of our history and to ignore the great evil done in all of our names.

Ta-Nehisi Coates

American history is longer, larger, more various, more beautiful, and more terrible than anything anyone has ever said about it.

James Baldwin