Reflections on Obama-Era Patriotism

[marmar]

from the American Prospect:



Reflections on Obama-Era Patriotism

Loving your country does not mean waving a flag and singing the anthem. True patriotism comes in the form of genuine, once-and-for-all integration.

Courtney E. Martin | February 16, 2009 | web only


President's Day is an opportunity to bore children with that old story about George Washington and the cherry tree (entirely fabricated by Mason Locke Weems, a turn-of-the-century Deepak Chopra, by the way), save on the new car you've been eyeing (must we always link patriotism with spending?), and most important, reflect on the deeper meaning of being American.

Patriotism has gotten a spirited resurrection in the last year thanks to the longest and one of the most closely watched presidential campaigns in history, which led to an election with the highest turnout ever (128 million). From local restaurants to political blogs, water coolers to car pools, Americans were constantly chattering about who would be the best-equipped and most visionary leader for this country. We asked ourselves and each other, who do we want our president to be? The sometimes implicit, sometimes explicit core of these discussions was an even deeper question: Who the heck are we?

This is the question that has defined the ebb and flow of patriotism for the last century. In the 1930s and 1940s, loving your country was framed as the antidote to communism; President Harry Truman's obsession with pledges turned patriotism into a safety blanket. Sen. Joseph McCarthy took it to the next level, selling patriotism as more of a bromide than a blanket -- a sedative so effective it put even free-thinkers to sleep. Vietnam was the alarm bell that awakened a nation; young people all over the country questioned the wisdom of using patriotism as an excuse to kill innocent people. It wasn't until the attacks of September 11 that a 21st-century patriotism was born. On that day, we fled to public places -- parks and bars and churches -- and held hands with strangers. Despite the president's framing that the proper response to terrorism was consumerism and retaliation, Americans wrested a deeper meaning out of the unfathomable violence. We wanted to be together and safe. ........(more)

THe complete piece is at: http://www.prospect.org/cs/articles?article=reflections_on_obama_era_patriotism

[babylonsister]

1. So recommend, and here's the last three:

In 2009, a year of so much peril and promise, it's time to define patriotism as our capacity to have social courage in our day-to-day lives, to learn from folks across the many fault lines that carve ignorance and indifference through America. We are only as patriotic as the company we keep, by which I mean, if you live in a homogeneous bubble, then you are missing out on the lived experience of what it means to be American today. Your understanding of this country is stunted and incomplete.

There are many things more patriotic than singing the national anthem or sporting a flag pin on your lapel: introducing yourself to a maintenance worker in your office building, calling up that diehard Republican cousin and asking her to breakfast, becoming friends with someone 30 years older than you or many tax brackets below you. And beyond the critical one-on-one interactions, it is profoundly patriotic to support big-picture policies that attack the class divide, strengthen public education, and fight discrimination on every level.

I cannot tell a lie. This country is amazing, but it's also still painfully segregated and will remain so until Americans collectively decide that true patriotism is treating one another -- regardless of status, political affiliation, or race -- like the potential teachers that we are.

[movonne]

2. K and R....

[woodwrite]

3. Two words

Lexington. Concord.

That was patriotism

[marmar]

4. Umm.....OK.

:wtf:

[Captain Hilts]

5. Odd he condemns Truman - who commited the Govt's first major act of integration -

integrating the military, though it had started under FDR.

And it's also odd that WOMEN are not mentioned at all. If I see one more post saying that Obama's election proves that anyone can dream of growing up to be president, I think I'll throw up.

This column is apples and oranges. Nice sentiments, but it doesn't work.