Patriotism
As I was leaving campus last night, I walked by the flagpole at the center of campus. The DPS officer had just arrived, at dusk, to take the flag down for the night. I started a stream of consciousness about the flag and its symbolism and patriotism.
First of all, I've never been an overly patriotic person. I'm grateful to live in a country where I have freedom of speech and choice, and can basically be anything I want to be. Sure I have my gripes, but on the whole, America is a pretty nice place to live. My patriotism however, is not something that I've thought about very often. I don't believe America is better than the rest of the world and I don't always believe in the stances or actions we take as a country.
When it comes to the flag, last night I was struck by how many rules and regulations we have about one of our main symbols. Did you know that flags cannot be flown at night unless they are lit? Obviously there's the whole flag burning issue. Now mind you, I'm not advocating defacing our nation's flag. (As a side note - sometimes I think representations of the flag go too far - do we really need to wipe our feet on an American flag doormat?) A certain incident that still irks me came to mind however.
I grew up in an affluent suburb of Los Angeles. Within a few days of 9/11 city officials had put up American "flags" around the city. I use flags in quotations because they were not real flags - rather they were banners with a few stripes and a few stars in red, white and blue. These "flags" were hung from plastic poles throughout the city. After the horrific event that the US had endured, I found it a tremendous show of patriotism and sympathy. Though I've never been a patriotic person, it brought tears to my eyes. So I was shocked to find out that the flags were gone a few days later, because members of the community were up in arms that these "flags" weren't lit at night and had demanded their removal. Even now, 3 1/2 years later it still irks me that a simple unifying gesture, that was in no way intended to harm the national symbol, was perceived as such a threat. And they weren't even real flags, but representations of flags!
I guess it just goes to show you that you can't please anyone any of the time.
First of all, I've never been an overly patriotic person. I'm grateful to live in a country where I have freedom of speech and choice, and can basically be anything I want to be. Sure I have my gripes, but on the whole, America is a pretty nice place to live. My patriotism however, is not something that I've thought about very often. I don't believe America is better than the rest of the world and I don't always believe in the stances or actions we take as a country.
When it comes to the flag, last night I was struck by how many rules and regulations we have about one of our main symbols. Did you know that flags cannot be flown at night unless they are lit? Obviously there's the whole flag burning issue. Now mind you, I'm not advocating defacing our nation's flag. (As a side note - sometimes I think representations of the flag go too far - do we really need to wipe our feet on an American flag doormat?) A certain incident that still irks me came to mind however.
I grew up in an affluent suburb of Los Angeles. Within a few days of 9/11 city officials had put up American "flags" around the city. I use flags in quotations because they were not real flags - rather they were banners with a few stripes and a few stars in red, white and blue. These "flags" were hung from plastic poles throughout the city. After the horrific event that the US had endured, I found it a tremendous show of patriotism and sympathy. Though I've never been a patriotic person, it brought tears to my eyes. So I was shocked to find out that the flags were gone a few days later, because members of the community were up in arms that these "flags" weren't lit at night and had demanded their removal. Even now, 3 1/2 years later it still irks me that a simple unifying gesture, that was in no way intended to harm the national symbol, was perceived as such a threat. And they weren't even real flags, but representations of flags!
I guess it just goes to show you that you can't please anyone any of the time.
Labels: Political Statements
posted by littledevilworks at 10:30 AM
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