| Topic: |
Religions > Atheism |
| User: |
"stoney" |
| Date: |
05 Nov 2005 04:08:06 PM |
| Object: |
OT: Patriotism |
http://www.canadiancontent.net/commtr/article_793.html
The Pledge of Allegiance to the U.S. Flag
Commentary with Naman Crowe
Senior Editor Naman Crowe
ncrowe at canadiancontent dot net
“I Pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and
to the Republic for which it stands, one nation under God,
indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.”
I hate saying that. But I go ahead and say it anyway and hold my right
hand over my heart and face the flag like everybody else. But I hate
it.
Why do I hate it? Because it is a fake and phony thing to say, right
from the beginning and all the way to the end of it.
Why should anyone have to recite a pledge of allegiance to one’s
country? Shouldn’t that be taken for granted?
If everyone in the room recites the pledge, does that mean that there
are no traitors among them? Is that the purpose of it? To weed out
traitors?
But wouldn’t a traitor be happy to recite a pledge? What difference
would it make to him? Having to recite such a fake proof of patriotism
wouldn’t bother a traitor, or an idiot either.
The only type of person that it could bother would be one of those,
such as myself, that believe that true patriotism is diminished by
such fake and phony proofs of patriotism and allegiance to one’s
country.
From Oct. 1967 through Oct. 1968, I was an LOH (light observation
helicopter) crew chief assigned to the Scouts, B Troop, 7/17th Air
Cav, stationed primarily at Camp Enari, near Pleiku in the Central
Highlands of Vietnam.
During the time that I was there, three of the Scout helicopters
assigned to me were shot down, killing everyone aboard. Each time it
just happened to be on a day when I was assigned to some other duty on
the ground.
But I flew enough to get the Air Medal. And I was there long enough to
know the most courageous men that I’ve ever met and what it’s like to
be in combat and have to face the reality of people dying and bullets
being fired at you.
Did all that prove my patriotism? Not really. I was against the war
but I was drafted into the Army and was left with no other choice. I
preferred to take my chances as a soldier than go to jail or leave my
home and escape to another country.
In my opinion none of those who died in Vietnam or served in Vietnam
did it out of patriotism or because they felt they were defending
America’s freedom.
Those that died there and those that served there did it because they
were caught up in that great, big black hole of fake patriotism which
is at the hot core of American politics and government of, for and by
the people – that required them to go along with the program, even at
the risk of their lives.
That program is still in effect today and it just keeps getting dumber
and dumber. And who can you blame except government of, for and by the
people doped up on fake, phony patriotism that doesn’t have a thing to
do with true patriotism or love of one’s country, or of individual
thinking or sacred honor.
Where do we get these dumb thinkers that program this dumb machine
that spits out these robots in such great numbers that think such dumb
things as “We’re fighting them over there so we won’t have to fight
them here,” and we’re fighting for our freedom and to spread freedom
around the world.
I believe they come straight out of the belly of government of, for
and by the people and have been brought up programmed to recite fake
patriotic pledges every morning in their schools as some sort of
required proof of their Americanism and goodness, rather than being
respected as free individuals whose patriotism should be taken for
granted until proven otherwise, and who should be expected to think
and reason according to the ability that God gave them.
Patriotism itself is not a bad thing. In fact, it’s a natural thing
that doesn’t have anything to do with the Pledge of Allegiance or the
waving of flags. The love of one’s country comes as natural as the
love of one’s mother and father. And yet, no one has come up with a
daily pledge for that.
I hate it when I see our Congressmen and Congresswomen all standing
together like school children in the morning with their hands over
their hearts facing the flag and reciting the Pledge of Allegiance.
To me, this is something that would seem more reasonable if this were
Germany during the reign of Hitler instead of being the United States
of America. It’s a dumb ritual that doesn’t prove anything except that
we love our dumb rituals.
I don’t think George Washington and the other founding fathers would
have ever imagined such a thing. They knew what patriotism was. It was
part of their character and actions and sacred honor and didn’t have
to be recited as part of some two-bit pledge written up by some
two-bit writer of some two-bit boy’s magazine.
I hate that Congress begins it’s sessions with a prayer written up by
some hired preacher with the gall to believe that he is officially
responsible for dragging God into this mess and giving God
instructions as to how God should enter into the minds of everyone
present and lead them to intelligent thinking and wise decisions.
I hate it all, just because of the dumb, stupid hypocrisy of it. I
really do believe that the greatest evils that have plagued the world
from the beginning is because we feed our young on the same dumb,
stupid hypocrisy that we grew up on.
If that’s not so, why can’t the American mind realize that terrorism
is the killing of innocent people and that through our illegal and
unjustified attack on Iraq we’ve killed more innocent people, in the
form of acceptable collateral damage, than all the terrorists will be
able to do in our lifetimes?
How else can it be explained, that America is bleeding itself to death
with unnecessary war on Iraq (and more to come on the drawing board),
and unknown billions for prisons and police in our stupid and
hypocritical war on drugs, and unknown billions because we’re too
stupid to plan and take care of the responsibilities we owe to our
poor and the middle class and the challenges of nature and the
continued existence of life itself on the planet?
America needs to get smart and a good place to start would be to just
throw all of our fake and phony ideas of patriotism overboard, along
with our incredible and insane self-righteousness, and put our minds
to thinking.
Yes, thinking. Even in our schools. Education, regardless of how much
money and effort is thrown into it, doesn’t mean a thing if we can’t
figure out some way to trigger the thinking mechanism inside the minds
of our young people, instead of just turning out robots that can
recite the Pledge and keep us going in the same direction of world
destruction the way we’ve been going since the Second World War.
That is what true patriotism is, even more than doing one’s duty as a
soldier or raising a family of good citizens or serving in Congress or
as the President of the United States, it’s using one’s mind to help
bring about a better way for one’s country and all the peoples of the
earth, “under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.”
© 2004. Canadian Content Interactive Media
--
Contempt of Congress meter reading-offscale.
Hello, theocracy with a fundamentalist US Supreme
Court who will ensure church and state are joined
at the hip like clergy and altar boys.
America 1776-Jan 2001 RIP
"As democracy is perfected, the office of president
represents, more and more closely, the inner soul
of the people. On some great and glorious day the
plain folks of the land will reach their heart's
desire at last and the White House will be adorned
by a downright moron." --- H.L. Mencken (1880 - 1956)
Religion is the original war crime.
-Michelle Malkin (Feb 26, 2005)
.
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| User: "APOCALYPSE" |
|
| Title: Re: OT: Patriotism |
05 Nov 2005 04:24:03 PM |
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I learned the pledge in school. I knew what the words meant but no one
taught us any significance about it other than knowing to say it every
morning.
I don't contribute to debates about the pledge because its essentially
pointless. It doesn't affect my political opinions. It was just a few
words we said at the beginning of class. Nothing more.
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| User: "johac" |
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| Title: Re: OT: Patriotism |
06 Nov 2005 07:52:05 AM |
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In article <a3mpm15ua048l9brpt3usa8c6pgem9loi7@4ax.com>,
stoney <stoney@the.net> wrote:
http://www.canadiancontent.net/commtr/article_793.html
The Pledge of Allegiance to the U.S. Flag
Commentary with Naman Crowe
Senior Editor Naman Crowe
ncrowe at canadiancontent dot net
<snip some>
Yes, thinking. Even in our schools. Education, regardless of how much
money and effort is thrown into it, doesn’t mean a thing if we can’t
figure out some way to trigger the thinking mechanism inside the minds
of our young people, instead of just turning out robots that can
recite the Pledge and keep us going in the same direction of world
destruction the way we’ve been going since the Second World War.
This reminds me of when I was in parochial school. At the start of every
day, the nuns would make us clasp our hands, bow our heads, and recite
prayers. Then we would all stand place our hands over our hearts and
recite the pledge. In each case it was just mindless repetition of
meaningless phrases learned by rote. Just as the prayers didn't make us
any more 'holy' the pledge didn't make us any more patriotic. Even back
then, I found the exercises to be quite boring.
That is what true patriotism is, even more than doing one’s duty as a
soldier or raising a family of good citizens or serving in Congress or
as the President of the United States, it’s using one’s mind to help
bring about a better way for one’s country and all the peoples of the
earth, “under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.”
I agree. Patriotism to me is trying to make ones country a better place
to live and not mindless flag waving while uttering meaningless phrases.
© 2004. Canadian Content Interactive Media
--
John Hachmann aa #1782
"Those who can make you believe absurdities can make you commit atrocities"
-Voltaire
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| User: "stoney" |
|
| Title: Re: OT: Patriotism |
07 Nov 2005 01:20:57 AM |
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On Sat, 05 Nov 2005 23:52:05 -0800, johac <jhachm@ixpres.remove.com>
wrote:
In article <a3mpm15ua048l9brpt3usa8c6pgem9loi7@4ax.com>,
stoney <stoney@the.net> wrote:
http://www.canadiancontent.net/commtr/article_793.html
The Pledge of Allegiance to the U.S. Flag
Commentary with Naman Crowe
Senior Editor Naman Crowe
ncrowe at canadiancontent dot net
<snip some>
Yes, thinking. Even in our schools. Education, regardless of how much
money and effort is thrown into it, doesn’t mean a thing if we can’t
figure out some way to trigger the thinking mechanism inside the minds
of our young people, instead of just turning out robots that can
recite the Pledge and keep us going in the same direction of world
destruction the way we’ve been going since the Second World War.
This reminds me of when I was in parochial school. At the start of every
day, the nuns would make us clasp our hands, bow our heads, and recite
prayers. Then we would all stand place our hands over our hearts and
recite the pledge. In each case it was just mindless repetition of
meaningless phrases learned by rote. Just as the prayers didn't make us
any more 'holy' the pledge didn't make us any more patriotic. Even back
then, I found the exercises to be quite boring.
Yes.
That is what true patriotism is, even more than doing one’s duty as a
soldier or raising a family of good citizens or serving in Congress or
as the President of the United States, it’s using one’s mind to help
bring about a better way for one’s country and all the peoples of the
earth, “under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.”
I agree. Patriotism to me is trying to make ones country a better place
to live and not mindless flag waving while uttering meaningless phrases.
Yes.
© 2004. Canadian Content Interactive Media
--
Contempt of Congress meter reading-offscale.
Hello, theocracy with a fundamentalist US Supreme
Court who will ensure church and state are joined
at the hip like clergy and altar boys.
America 1776-Jan 2001 RIP
"As democracy is perfected, the office of president
represents, more and more closely, the inner soul
of the people. On some great and glorious day the
plain folks of the land will reach their heart's
desire at last and the White House will be adorned
by a downright moron." --- H.L. Mencken (1880 - 1956)
Religion is the original war crime.
-Michelle Malkin (Feb 26, 2005)
.
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