I don’t understand this weird American obsession with flag. I was looking at some photos of Trump’s rallies. Flags everywhere - on shirts, hats, glasses etc. And this bizarre cult of the flag - “it cannot touch the ground” etc.
At the end of the day the flag is just a piece of cloth. If you worship any flag or take offense to any flag, you need to get a life.
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Coming from a country that doesn’t have this sort of thing it’s really weird as an outside observer. Students have to swear allegiance to the flag every morning too which is the sort of thing I would imagine happens in north Korea or dictator states.
Warning: my takes on this are probably even more unpopular than the OP. I typically don’t mention them to avoid whining, but since we’re in a comm for unpopular opinions, might as well speak my mind.
A country flag is neither a symbol of your people, nor of the general population under the same government as you. It’s the symbol of the government itself - an abstract entity, best seen as some sort of tool.
People who wave flags strongly remind me cows shaking their arses to show that they’ve been branded as property. “MOO! I’M PROUD OF BEING OWNED! MOO!”
Against the above, some might argue that their governments’ flags used to represent some popular movement, or similar. Well, it is not your flag any more; co-opting symbols is bread-and-butter of exerting soft power over you.
And if you do feel the need of a flag for your identity… sorry to be blunt but you have millions of identities at your disposal; if the one that you pick is what subjects you, you probably need to touch some grass.
“But the president/king/minister said that…” - of course governments will tell you otherwise, it’s convenient for them. But, most likely, not for you.
If you want to get technical about it, it’s a symbol of a nation’s military. That was what national flags were originally for.
it’s a symbol of a nation’s military
Not any more. You’re 100% right on the origin, but the symbol eventually became of the whole structure of power that [typically] includes the military.
That’s why for example even countries without an army or a navy still have flags.
I understand your view, but it depends on your country. In Denmark the flag is used in a different way in everyday life I think. And I would say there are good reasons to be proud of Denmark as a country and the people have done well to own the flag themselves in this way. But yea, it can also be used in bad ways.
Sorry for the battering of rhetorical questions, but…
…what is “to be proud of a country”?
Achievements of people from the past? But you see people with laudable achievements through the whole world. Why specifically those associated with your country, instead of, say, another? And more importantly, why aren’t we proud of what we, as individuals, do with our present?
Proud of a culture? I get that people relate to others sharing their culture; but contrariwise to what that Napoleonic meme says (with all its disgusting implications), countries don’t need to coincide with cultures. Cue to Switzerland, a clusterfuck since HRE times, faring far better than a Portugal who has been culturally homogeneous since 1100.
And even demarcating cultures, gets tricky and arbitrary. It’s all a bunch of continua. Eventually this sort of proudness will boil down to “I’m drawing the line HERE. This one is from this side of the line, so I’m proud of them. That one isn’t, so who cares.”
Is it being proud of your impact on others, through your everyday interactions? But most people in a country - even a small one (more like Andorra than Denmark) - are not meaningfully affected by you.
So, to keep it short: every single thing that we could be proud of, as human beings, is better serviced by either a smaller or bigger identity.
No need to be sorry :)
Achievements of people from the past?
[…]
Is it being proud of your impact on others, through your everyday interactions?
Definitely more the latter rather than the former. There is a great deal of trust in Danish society. There is a shared understanding, community and culture that Danes are proudly part of - proud because we believe it is a good culture (and I think the happiness scores that get released every so often for different countries speak for themselves).
But most people in a country - even a small one (more like Andorra than Denmark) - are not meaningfully affected by you.
I don’t see it like that. Yes, someone living in the other part of Denmark doesn’t directly affect me of course. But I do think they meaningfully affect me, even if in a small part. I think Denmark is still small enough that it matters that someone in the big city in the other part of the country is still connected to me by culture and a shared “zeitgeist”, if that makes sense.
Anyways, I hope you can maybe understand that for some people, there can be such a thing as being proud of your country. You don’t have to understand fully though, I understand it can be hard coming from another culture (also it’s not like I speak for all Danes obviously and some would certainly disagree with what I’m saying here). I would encourage you to try visiting Denmark one day and maybe see for yourself :)
Definitely more the latter […] countries speak for themselves).
What you talk about, concerning “trust in the Danish society”, is clearly a cultural matter. And, as I highlighted in the other comment, cultures neither coincide with countries, nor they should.
I don’t see it like that. Yes, someone living in the other part of Denmark doesn’t directly affect me of course. But I do think they meaningfully affect me, even if in a small part.
We could spend weeks discussing what to “meaningfully affect someone else” entails, but that would be pushing a boundary line back and forth between points of a gradient, to force a conclusion for either side. (That’s always a problem when trying to handle quantitative matters with qualitative labels.)
However: no matter where you put that line, it won’t coincide with the country, because some people from other countries affect you more than some people from the same country as you. Perhaps because they’re shaping what you think, perhaps because they have political power (even over other countries than yours), so goes on. (The opposite is also true - you’re likely affecting far some people from other countries than some other people from within your country.)
Anyways, I hope you can maybe understand that for some people, there can be such a thing as being proud of your country.
If I may be honest, the argumentation that you’re using is mostly the same as I’ve seen coming from other people. It is not a matter of “lack of understanding”, but disagreement.
cultures neither coincide with countries
I think that’s very reductionist. Countries clearly have a large influence on culture and culture often forms around countries as people in a country share borders and law and politics and all that.
Anyways, we can agree to disagree if you insist. I do think you’re being slightly closed-minded in this case though, but it’s not a big deal.
Countries clearly have a large influence on culture
To influence is not the same as to dictate. And the ways that a country influences culture of its citizens are, most of the time, shitty - cue to the linked example of Vergonha. (It’s actually a mild example, when you remember that massacres are a damn efficient way to have “a large influence on culture”.)
And, sure, there are even milder versions of that. And considerably less efficient.
culture often forms around countries as people in a country share borders and law and politics and all that.
And it forms also across the borders too, to such an extent that “we have the same head of state” and “we’re subjected to the same laws” become just a drop in an ocean. Food gets shared, people learn each other’s languages (or make a contact language in the spot, that eventually is passed to their children), fashion and architectural trends get mimicked… even the laws get mimicked. Or they simply are born in a place and move 5km next door, and that happens to be the other country already.
Of course, as long as the countries aren’t artificially trying to prevent that from happening.
Anyways, we can agree to disagree if you insist. I do think you’re being slightly closed-minded in this case though, but it’s not a big deal.
I don’t think that I’m being closed-minded, but that I’m taking more things into account than you are.
My vaugue understanding as a dumb American is that folk in other countries by and large aren’t about repping flags in the first place, flying them, wearing them, etc
I’ve seen this in my chunk of South America. It isn’t exclusive to Americans.
I can’t speak for other countries, but here in the UK the National flags tend to be flown for two reasons:
- Sporting events
There are shit loads of St George crosses being flown at the moment, because the England team has got through the Euro football finals. If we lose tonight, they’ll begin to disappear tomorrow.
- “Patrotism”
You’ll mostly see the Union flag being flown in areas of high racism. Deprived areas, where people have been made to believe that forrins took their jobs and welfare money. They display the flag to show that they’re “true Brits”, unlike all those brown folk.
Outside of this it’s quite unusual for regular people to display either of the national flags. I can’t say I’ve ever owned one, and I’m in my 40s. That said, I’m not terribly nationalistic. I’m proud of my country in terms of how it looks, and how we (now) preserve our long history, but I’m also painfully aware of the failings of the UK, and more specifically, England over the past few centuries.
except governments change a lot more than flags do.
When Fascism comes to America, it will be wrapped in the flag and carrying a cross
There is no when. Fascism is already here.
I understand a flag having meaning. What I don’t understand is kids pledging allegiance to the flag everyday. That’s some North Korea shit.
That’s some North Korea shit.
Nope. That’s some American shit. And it was American shit long before the DPRK even existed.
However, that wasn’t the only reason. The Pledge of Allegiance also was created to venerate the flag and “foster patriotism,”
From your own link. To me sounds more plausible than “it was Big Flag!”
I’m no nationalistic fanatic of the flag, but is it really so difficult to understand that the flag is a symbol?
Obviously each flag, be they for nations or other groups, represents more than just a piece of cloth to many people. Taking offence at someone else’s identifying with what a flag symbolizes is not okay. But, I tend to look skeptically at worship of any kind of idol, be it flag, cross, or text. That still doesn’t mean it’s okay to hate or persecute people for their beliefs, even if they appear silly to you and as long as they don’t hurt others.
One group can demonstrate their respect for the nation by physically following some rules around the flag and others can demonstrate their loyalty to their ideals of the nation being violated by flying the flag upside down or burning a flag.
A flag or banner is not just a piece of cloth, never has been.
IMHO human beings are more important than stupid symbols. If you don’t respect humans and their non violent choices, the symbol lost all its meaning, especially the one about being the “land of the free”.
I’m an American and I don’t get it either.
My daughter got in trouble in the fifth grade for refusing to say the pledge of allegiance in class because, in her words, “it’s stupid to say a pledge to a flag.” I didn’t teach her that, she’s just a smart kid. For non-Americans, it is illegal to force a child to say that pledge, which was decided by the Supreme Court in the 1940s.
I let her shitty permanent “substitute” teacher (yay Indiana teacher pay being shit) know about this supreme court case and told her that if she got in trouble again, lawyers would get involved. She got super apologetic and claimed that my daughter wasn’t in trouble, she just took her out in the hall and had a private talk with her about it. Which is totally not punishing a schoolchild as everyone clearly knows. She never apologized to my daughter, but I knew she never would and I didn’t bother to push it.
My daughter never stood up to say the pledge again, as was her right.
Fuck the flag, it’s cloth, like you said. Americans should be revering the founding document and its amendments that gives them their rights, not something designed so that friendly ships wouldn’t fire cannons at each other.
The national flag. What a weird American obsession.
In the UK we call them “flag shaggers” and they are laughing stock.
If you are not trolling and you genuinely don’t see the difference between occasional flag use and everyday cult typical for the USA and for the far right in other countries, you may be even slower than you appear from your comments here.
You seem unaware you’re drunking on yourself here by parroting me.
Zealots are the problems, not the entire population, as I’ve said.
You’re not one of those “readers”, huh?
Did you know that someone lapping you doesn’t mean you’re ahead of them?
You should really try again, that was embarrassing for you.
Real funny on this side, though.
the issue is that even British flag shaggers have nothing on the crazy level muricans take this to.
But that’s not saying I disagree with you.
I doubt that one group of flag extremists is less crazy than another.
I think it’s easy to conflate different groups like Christian nationalists or peppers or the KKK with jingoistic idiots because a lot of them fly flags, but it’s in no way an accurate critique of an entire population any more than someone assuming that everyone in Spain is a fascist because some people who wave the Spanish flag are fascists.
I didn’t say anything about any groups being crazy.
Jeezus christ English is hard. 🤦♂️
the LEVEL. The LEVEL is “crazy”, which means “extremely high”. The amount of flag love shown by the most flag obsessed Brit isn’t as high as the love shown by muricans.
Shown where? In the media?
wow. You are not a native English speaker at all, are you?
“Shown” in this context means “expressed”.
It’s painfully obvious you’ve never been to the USA.
Zealots are the problems, not the entire population, as I’ve said.
You are not the sharpest tool in the box, are you?
In other nations flag cult is limited usually to the far right. Everyone else is using flags sporadically - football events for example.
In the USA flag cult is an everyday occurrence applicable to the most of the population: flags in classrooms, on houses, everywhere. With their bizzare customs “not touching the ground” and other shit. Cult of a piece of cloth.
Do you get it now? If not try to read again. Slowly.
I’m so curious why you think repeating what I said about extremists being the problem and explicitly agreeing with me makes you such a “sharp tool”?
You think the US is the only country that doesn’t want their flag touch the ground? Please, list the countries you think prefer their flag to be flown in the dirt.
You are comedically ignorant.
It’s flattering, but If you want to wade into this argument to prove me wrong you’ll have to
- stop agreeing with my thesis
- get any of your details correct
Fuckin hell, don’t forget to breathe while you are typing 🙄
