June 29, 2002
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The trouble I had as a very young child with the Pledge of Allegiance was not with the currently disputed language about a divinity, but with making a solemn pledge or taking an fervent oath to “The Flag” itself. That always, as the words poured out of my mouth, struck me as a form of the most primitive animism. And it seemed equally comparable to the ritual of praying to stone statues which, as a child, by my religion, I was also trained to due.
So as we stood there as diligent children promising The Flag that we would honor It, I used to imagine that It would magically start to undulate under Its own power, or burst into flames like a Burning Bush, or begin to drip with the blood of fallen patriots. After all, I was pledging, praying, swearing blood-oath-to-the-death to a holy and untouchable fabric. I pledge allegiance to you, Flag! Flag! A word almost as powerfully evocable as “God” Himself! Flag-damnit! May the Flag strike you dead! That was magic. And like primitive islanders who, when honoring the island volcano, wait for it to speak to them, so I waited for The Flag to do something, hey, even just wave to me!
In time, as I grew wiser and animism ceased in my mind to serve as a competent explanation for the full spirituality of life, I stopped praying to statues and stopped pledging to flags. Which doesn’t mean I stopped praying or pledging—I just stopped investing such deep spiritual commitment in “inanimate things” and redirected it towards loftier constructions. I started pledging only to “the Republic” leaving the “to the flag” animistic revelry to die a dusty unspoken death in my brain.
So for me, the current “divinity controversy” is neither politically correct or incorrect, merely politically inept. Like the Capulets and Montagues, a curse on both your houses! After all, what kind of “God” can you be “under”—or not—if you are still giving prior sacred oath to relic-quality cloth Flag-essence itself? Don’t get me wrong. I’d die for my country. And I’ve flown the flag on my truck post 9-11 with the throngs. But I don’t want to sacredly swear to it and I’d never die for the flag. I refuse to die for an animistically-infused symbol. (The only exception of late being when I almost died for the flag while it was serving as the design on the thong of a deadly blonde who was doing what she did best in a tiddy bar).
Oh—I know: You’re going to tell me that many a true patriot died for the flag in the country’s defense. Well, if they really died for the flag and not rather really in defending their country-bound way of life, they were fools. Remember the proverbial flag-bearers marching into war on the battlefield, and if the bearer fell, another would come along to raise the flag, and if he fell, yet another after him, etc. ? Well, do you think they do that anymore? Hell no. And why not? Because a soldier is too valuable to waste on a mere symbol.
“You bled with Wallace . . . now bleed with me.” Thus ends the movie Braveheart with the ultimate call to battle: Freedom! I’d rather go into battle with two swords—one in each hand—than with a pole with cloth attached and batteries not included.
Comments (55)
Hmmm, interesting as always.
Great post... and kudos for living thru the torture of watching the blonde in the flag thong...
What an amazing little boy you must have been to think such things back then!!!!
I never really thought of the flag quite like that. I must admit that in your words I can see your point.
On the same lines, but different case...my husband has been taking offense because I have not been wearing my wedding rings. I stopped because of my work. I say that the rings do not make me married, nor does a piece of paper, but what is in my heart. Symbols...it's all just symbols.
I've had that thought, too, when reciting the pledge as a young person. But then I think at some point we all realize that it is not the actual flag to which we are really pledging allegiance, but our country, no matter how the pledge actually reads. You do have a valid point, though. The pledge might need a little revamping, but don't tell anybody I said that.
Symbols have as much reality as one invests in them. Thus the communion bread and wine become ritual cannibalism, metal circles make an eternal commitment, and people die for a rag of a flag. I love my land, the people, but not very much about the system under which it muddles along. I used to know people who burned flags in the 'sixties, and bras in the 'seventies. I didn't join them. Symbolic action just never seemed much like action to me.
You rule.
This animism you describe is also why the idea of a constitutional amendment to prohibit flag-burning ticks me off every time it resurfaces. People get so attached to the actual material object they sometimes lose sight of the fact that what's really important is not the symbol, but what it symbolizes.
Nice one.
thanks
I'm all apathetic towards all this patriotic crap...so I'm not gonna comment on it. I am here for a deeper more meaningful purpose. You and I have been nominated over at Miss Becky's (link it your damn self...I'm tired and need to go to bed). We are in the same category of Most Creatice Name. I voted for you...not only because I thought it would be selfish to vote for myself (and everyone knows I'm the farthest thing from selfish
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I remember reciting the pledge with the show "Romper Room" every morning. I didn't give the words much thought. It was just memorization. You must have had the inside secret to genius then.
Man, when I was that little, all I could think about was how well i could *FAKE* the pledge of allegiance, because I still didn't know what half the words meant, let alone what half of the words were. In my opinion, we're not really pledging allegiance to the flag....but to the idea behind it, like freedom and all that mumbo jumbo.
However, you do bring up an excellent point. So, here's two e-props because you rock.
(nods) Oh I know ... it was tough for me to roll my words around it too. "I pledge allegiance to the flag ..." my thought process always stopped there, and I couldn't quite get it to "and to the country for which it stands for" ...
When I stated this dilemma to my outstanding fifth grade teacher, One dynamic Mrs. Callahan ... we did an impromptu *let's study the flag* project.
Some of the earlier models were made with hemp, did ya know that? I'd pledge allegiance to that flag ... oh yeah. "I pledge allegiance to the flag and to the cloth it was made from ..."
I learned a new word here today! This is like Sesame Street for the blog mob...
>animism...and yes, I looked it up.
I guess I don't have a problem with the Pledge either staying the same or dropping 'under God'. I don't think though that, when we pledge, we pledge to die for the flag in a literal sense. What we're pledging to do is to protect what the flag represents...the country. At least that was the way I always interpreted it.
Good blog...nice to think once and awhile...
Like most Americans, I view the flag as a symbol of what America is all about. Like a team jersey. Allegience to the team, that sort of thing.
Patriotic Props for ya!!
**
I don't think the us flag is very pretty anyway..
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that is like SOOO weird cause I'm watching BRaveheart right now
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Well said. Too many rote reciters and too few free thinkers. Still, I think there is a place for symbols as intermediaries that objectify abstract concepts or hard-to-see realities. How does a child pledge allegiance to its country--declaring it to a wall map? Ideally, we'd have a pledge via satellite broadcast to all of the other 230 million or so Americans, but that would provoke another tax hike, so I'm content to have our young'ns pledge to the flag, and to the republic for which it stands. To each his/her own...
I never understood this flag thing. To me it seems rather silly and out of time. As Europe is united I would like to think of myself as belonging to a band of free thinking people and screw borders and flags.
It's not the flag, it's what it stands for. That has always been my understanding of that sort of thing, both here and in the Soviet Union where I grew up and we had to do a hell of a lot more flag-pledging, but where the teachers took the time to carefully explain that the flag stood for the sacrifices of those who died in the revolution, and that's what's important, not the physical fabric.
That was a runon sentence.
Yeah, I think God (at least the one in te bible) says something or other about how you're not supposed to worship idols. All rather ironic.
Damn, I never looked at it from that perspective before. Prior to your commentary I always thought that I was the perfect example of one who does not practice idolatory. Live and learn. sheesh!
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