The whole myth of the American Revolution was that the Americans were fighting for their individual freedoms from the European colonial powers.

It was a myth in the sense that it was what the revolutionaries told themselves. But I don’t think it was a myth in that it was false. The people writing those proclamations were bourgeois and it was a bourgeois revolution they were supporting. If you look at American mythos as only applying to land owning white men, as was intended, it’s a lot easier to see that the founders likely meant what they said, just not seeing anyone outside of their intended ruling class as people deserving of the same considerations.