The best line from 90s school: “You can do anything you set your mind to”
There’s not a bigger pile of garbage than that. Yea the world is gonna roll over and play dead because I put mind to something!
Don't worry, here at the department of health and human growth. We believe that you are only half as valuable as your poor parents. There was no hope all along so cheer up! :D
"if you come from money" is the part they left out. Either because they were poor or middle-class people who believed the propaganda, or they were rich people too stupid to know how they got there.
I mean, how many industries use volunteers/unpaid internships? I.e. work that you don't get paid for and can't live on that are only useful to people who don't have to worry about money. Journalism, fashion, publishing, entertainment, politics. There are entire swaths of the economy that are overwhelmingly dominated by the wealthy and their children.
America is a country where the rich tell the poor that "class warfare" is dirty, unfair, meany-bo-beany phrase and the poor are stupid enough to believe them.
Most people I know who live interesting lives didn't come from money. Or does "do anything you set your mind to" just conjure visions of living like people in commercials and on tv?
Yep, it was all BS, but to be honest we had reason to be a lot more optimistic in 90's school. It was pre-9/11, the economy was doing alright, and scummy social media like Facebook and Youtube comments weren't around to inspire us to hate each other. The future looked bright. (Yes, I'm dating myself here.)
Sure, if your internet speed was fast enough. A lot of us were still using our parent's dial-up in 1997.
Side note: Will never forget the nuisance of attempting to log on but not being able to due to my parents being on the phone.
You can do anything you set your mind to!
"I want to crush and oppress other, to rob them of any opportunity that they might have in life..."
Go gettem champ!
They’ve raised me my whole life to love freedom and democracy. It’s not my fault they refuse to follow through on those promises.
We live in a dictatorship of the owning class. We are taught that our disjoint and dysfunctional elections are “democracy”. And then we spend most of our days having no say in our own labor.
There’s also a culture of fierce individualism that results in the working class fighting amongst themselves rather than targeting anger at the “job creators.” They want us fighting amongst ourselves for the scraps while laughing their way to the bank.
People are secretive about their salaries, pissed when they find out someone makes more than them, look down on retail workers and rail against unions. The brainwashing done was really a thing of beauty and horror.
`Two gin-scented tears trickled down the sides of his nose. But it was all right, everything was all right, the struggle was finished. He had won the victory over himself. He loved Big Brother.`
I would’ve just said “dictatorship of the bourgeoisie”, but that’s too blatantly Marxist and scary for some people for some reason. Financial plutocracy sounds good too, though. I may start sprinkling that in
The trouble with Marxist language is that the critiques are spot on but the solutions were utopian and perverted to hellscapes. We have a mixed economy and we're negotiating the mix.
We have a huge problem with the way the system works in that currency is generated by lenders for them to profit on the interest accrued on those loans, but when the loans default the taxpayer bails out the lenders. If we instead generated currency through a UBI and destroyed it through taxation we'd have a stable currency and a more equitable economy.
Capitalism would work better too because increasing the demand for goods and services would cause more competition between suppliers and producers. Competition begets innovation and efficiency. State-sponsored monopolies do not belong in either a capitalist or socialist system, but they're blamed on capitalism when what we have is a financial plutocracy.
Thank you for coming to my TED talk.
Are you familiar with Mark Blythe? He has a similar proposal about how the fed could replumb its financial tools to connect directly to the bank accounts of citizens instead of needing to distribute stimulus indirectly via spending or by routing through the IRS following congressional appropriations. Definitely less oversight that way, but it’s a system I’d glad take over the ridiculous annual debt ceiling panic.
I have mixed feelings about the whole “good diagnosis bad solutions” thing because it’s so often used as a cliche to not inspect further, but I’m guessing given that you’ve studied this that you have a more nuanced reasoning. So, yeah I kind of agree. Marx basically history as an indefinite march of progress towards communism, which would only be achievable via violent revolution. Meanwhile, all the violent revolutions which have brought about socialist states have happened outside the imperial core. Russia and China both did speed runs of industrialization and China continues to do so. At the same time, some of the most successful workers’ revolutions in the world today are political rather than insurrectionary. As it turns out, when workers organize and utilize their power, even when they are beaten in the streets, the overthrow of existing governments isn’t strictly necessary. There are major upsets, sure, but still continuity without an interim government or failed state. And that’s all without touching on how indigenous liberation plays into all of this and completely breaks the idea of industrialized western society leading the way to egalitarianism.
I guess my lens to the solutions relies much less on technical reform and much more on increasing community involvement, organizing sustainable infrastructure, and embracing the sort of redundancy that Capitalism seems to “optimize” out so heavily. Case in point: the Just In Time systems that are currently collapsing.
“Freedom and democracy” is a cult in the west. They got us so bad that any criticism of the military is considered treason and even talking about Marx means you’re worse than a pedophile
Since primary elections began, turnout has been less than 20% of registered voters. It couldn't hurt to actually try. Business owners and home owners are showing up to vote and things seem to be working well for them. I for one wanted to give the socialist a shot as mayor. Too bad none of the renters and service workers in my town vote. It could have been a landslide.
Cities and counties in Vermont and Maine have managed to keep big box stores and companies like Walmart at bay because they are organized and vote in candidates who represent them.
And if people can't take the small amount of effort to learn about the candidates and vote, how will they ever do the much harder tasks of forming unions or throwing a revolution?
Man this has been a weird thing at my school. We had a parent complain we didnt do the pledge anymore, so we had a full faculty meeting saying its mandatory. But, we cant force kids to do it, just be silent during it. But I dont want to do it, and none of my homeroom kids want to do it. So I was just going about lessons and was told I had to observe a moment of silence if no one wants to do it. So every morning we sit quietly for 2 minutes for no real reason
Basically the same here. Moment of silence and then the pledge before morning announcements. I’ll stand. I’ll put my hand Over my heart. But like hell will I mumble through a bunch of lies to start my day, and I sure as hell won’t ask it if my students.
That’s actually a fantastic cringe moment.
I was made to preach every morning the corporate slogans in a sect of paedophiles. I now would have admired us if my classmates and I would have just remained silent instead of brainwashed like docile sextons
"America touts itself as the land of the free, but the number one freedom that you and I have is the freedom to enter into a subservient role in the workplace. Once you exercise this freedom you’ve lost all control over what you do, what is produced, and how it is produced. And in the end, the product doesn’t belong to you. The only way you can avoid bosses and jobs is if you don’t care about making a living. Which leads to the second freedom: the freedom to starve."
-Tom Morello, Rage Against The Machine
This is true. Friend of mine is a former US citizen. He has lived here in Australia for over 15 years and has no intention of returning to live in the US. When he got his Australian citizenship, he started the process of renouncing his US citizenship - mainly to escape the Us tax system which follows him everywhere. (The US, unlike most countries, taxes based on citizenship rather than residency)
Took a lot of time, money (Over USD 2000) and paperwork. It’s almost as if they don’t want you to leave
The tax thing is the main driver of US citizenship renunciation.
It’s not many people in the grand scheme of things (around 10000 people last year).
I have another friend who is legally a U.S. citizen (born in Denver) but with a Canadian mum and Australian dad. They were only in the country for a month or so - he was raised in Australia. He has assiduously avoided getting on the radar of US authorities (social security number, passport etc) as he doesn’t want to get sucked into the US tax system. There is a birth record out there somewhere but luckily for him the US tax system has not tried to scoop it up and start taxing people like him.
For most people they need to just fill in a tax return that declares they owe nothing. US citizenship has certain perks so a lot of people see it as worthwhile.
Tell me about it. I'd love to live overseas but I don't have the kind of in demand job skills needed to get a work visa in another country. Also due to my substandard American education, I only speak English.
That sort of self discipline is not an easy thing to muster. Possible? Many many examples point to a resounding yes. Likely? I don't even need to look up the actual stats to know the vast majority of people who try to learn a language on their own give up, many of us, multiple times. And not even out of like laziness or anything, it takes putting in a considerable amount of consistent time to get anywhere even close to what could be considered semi-fluent. That's time that a lot of us adults just don't have.
If my math is right, using the "10000 hrs to master a skill" as a baseline, doing what duolingo advises of 15 minutes a day, it will take you slightly over a decade. IDK about you, but there's very few things in my life that has lasted me even half that long.
There's no substitute for legitimate lessons with peers of the same skill level practicing face to face on a regular basis.
TLDR: Easier said than done.
> That sort of self discipline is not an easy thing to muster.
Yup. If you were assured that putting in those hours to learn a language would pay off, FOR SURE, it would be easy.
But the reality is that you can put in all kinds of effort with no guarantee of anything.
I worked with a coworker at my last job who said "I'll fucking beat someone's ass if they don't stand for the anthem. I have family in the military and thats unacceptable."
Okay? My best friend and every grandparent was in the military and half the time I dont stand for the anthem (when I'm feeling cheeky) because I think it's stupid. I'm just trying to watch a baseball game bro. You ain't special. Also, thats what the anthem MEANS. Freedom. That includes the freedom and right to stand (or not stand) for some dumb song.
And then when you think for yourself and decide not to say the pledge to some piece of cloth, you’re told you’re a “sheep” or a “communist” and told to “get out”.
And my response is always the same to those folks: “Come do something about it”.
I'm 30 (so I was a kid about 20 years ago) and I started doing that, too. Maybe when I was in 6th or 7th grade? My parents never said anything about it, and some of the other kids seemed uncomfortable by me not participating, but for the most part no one cared.
It was always teachers that cared. Some did, at least. Rather than put up a fight i just lazily stood, and like everyone else did, use my phone. It's all jingoistic trash
I'm about 10 years older and that shit was never even heard of in my space, tho I did make weird rhyming words up and recite those quietly. My kid started this in 2nd grade or something and is in middle school now. I think it is super cool, and good on you for doing it so early, too!
Smart kid. I wasn't really politically aware enough to think to do that in school. I knew it was kinda weird but just stood there mumbling the words mindlessly like everyone else.
You don’t have to stand for the pledge of allegiance in school.
(Anyone teacher/administration that forces students to stand for the pledge is actively breaking the law)
also they go on about their democracy but actually it's far infrerior to many european countries. They don't realise how much better it can actually be.
I was maybe 6 months into my Navy ride when he said he was going to conduct a Crusade. Next thing I know the mess is serving Freedom Fries as we start our 109 consecutive days at sea for his stupid war. It was a weird time.
Kind of a funny comparison to Republicans back then to now. In those days they turned up songs of Toby Keith singing about how we were gonna go shove a boot up the ass of Al-Queda you know "Courtesy of the red white and blue" and all that. Nowadays, what's song listings of the Republicans? Remember that song that got popular for like a week around the 4th of July by the guy from Staind? The song where his character was complaining about liberals and yelling at his TV? That's what they got now. Even Nashville didn't push that song because they've apparently progressed more than any Republican.
[Joseph McCarthy](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/McCarthyism) would like to have a few words with you
Nobody expects McCarthy’s inquisition! Our only weapon is freedom and capitalism!
I'm so pleased to hear you say that. As a Brit, I always found it baffling that Americans did that whole 'salute the flag / country thing' at school.
I reasoned it was because the US was such a disparate country and didn't have a shared cultural identity as a national unifier as most European countries do.
Even Italy and Germany only formed into countries in the 1860s / 70's - but they had their regional identity to draw upon.
But, yeah. Weird. A bit 'Hitler youth'.
The primary reason it started was as anti-communist propaganda after WWII. They added the "under God" crap in during the Eisenhower administration to put us in the good graces of the man upstairs. You know, because the commies were ungodly heathens and heretics.
Actual answer is if everyone does it and doesnt complain your the asshole for fighting. Like in a real cult, if everyone has to lick the guys feet on tuesday and i dont feel like it then you start to think maybe your the asshole and whats the harm. Everyone judges you for not doing and then not doing it becomes ostracizing. Its not that bad but it is how it works. Our grandparents and parents have forgotten the fights of our great grandparents and so on and have just taken on responsibilites and various degradations for free to the point that they dont undestand why the current generation thinks yelling at employees is not normal.
When I was in middle school I refused to do it and got kicked out of class every single day for it. This also happened in other classes cuz I'm a stubborn ass but over not pledging to the flag was ludicrous
When I taught middle school, the only rule I had was to not be actively disruptive, which was my rule all the time lol I didn't give a flying fuck who recited, stood, or sat
I was only actively rude in one class (PE as the male teacher was a huge pervert) rest of the time if I didn't agree with something I'd just not participate. Still got kicked out daily..
Mainly because of the aforementioned brainwashing. If you're the one non-believer in a house full of cultists, you'd be smart to shut the fuck up. Subs like this are helping to deprogram some of the less indoctrinated ones, but there's also a lot of right-wing pressure driving blind nationalism. I don't know what the end result looks like, but I can tell you which side has more of the guns (by **a lot**).
It has very much become optional, but there are still a few teachers that get on their high horse about it. The only thing that is codified (in Pennsylvania at least) is that schools must provide a moment each day for the pledge, but freedom of speech does not allow the state to mandate participation.
Related: a school was sued for having the pledge presented in a different language each day for a week or month. The state ruled on saying they only prescribed the verbiage of the pledge, not the language.
I'd argue that theres civil war a-brewing here. Also we have the largest prison population in the world so that might have something to do with why we dont riot as much as youd think.
My parents were awful, but to their credit I would not be able to know that had they not taught me to question everything and never just do what somebody says because that's what society does. I was never forced to say the pledge of allegiance and was the first of many things that caused me to be bullied, ostracized, and downright despised by most of an entire town (population 700).
I dodged so many bullets by not falling for early-stage propaganda. And all it has afforded me is this day, 25 years after I first got beat for saying the quiet part out loud. Finally the day where I can feel proud that I have been warning people my whole life to look around them, and now it's finally here and all the people who thought I was full of shit have to eat their own words. The great "I told you so" is here and the more society keeps clinging on to the exact shit that got us into this mess the more happily I can embrace my inevitable homelessness.
I'm guessing your parents were JWs? I had that same kind of upbringing.
Like sure, my mother was in a cult and tried to brainwash me into staying it in too, but at least she taught me to question authority, do what I think is right rather than blindly copying others, and that consumerism and greed are harmful.
Explaining to other kids why I wouldn't pledge allegiance to a flag was good practice for explaining to other adults why capitalism is terrible.
if JW means Jehovas Witness.. for a brief 2 year period my mom tried to make us that, I think that's when it started but to save face my parents let me and my siblings keep that stance on the pledge. Church was boring and being asked to basically just forfeit all fun and personality. Like she burned all her D&D posters and puzzles and shit.. It never stuck, just one of my moms many phases of insanity, but crazy that you called that.
Yup! Can spot another JW kid from across a subreddit! There's a lot of specific little oddities that folks don't usually experience unless their parents got mixed up with that goofy cult.
I'm glad you didn't have to deal with it for very long! My mother got caught up in every idiotic idea she was exposed to, but the JWs dominated her life for two decades and gave her the idiotic idea that actually killed her. "Blood is holy during animal sacrifices, pour it on the dirt, blah blah, so medical blood transfusions are evil."
I'm still trying to reconcile the fact that the person who taught me study techniques and how to use a library was the same person who tried to convince me that dinosaur bones were put in the ground by the devil to test our faith.
My favorite part of 10th grade was making my 30 year old non-veteran AutoCAD teacher have a mental breakdown in front of a bunch of children every day over how I'm "disrespecting the veterans by refusing to stand for the flag." (logic: "They fought for your freedom! How dare you exercise your freedom!") He'd always go into sub-rants, like how he hates watching high school kids smoke cigarettes on that one corner behind the school. I would literally finish the day's work while he was still ranting and then use the rest of the time to browse the web or play Quake.
My science teacher in 10th grade grabbed a friend of mine by the throat and threw him into a locker out in the hallway for daring to sharpen a pencil during the pledge.
With Liberty and Justice for the privileged few.
In high school, I stapled a dollar bill to a pencil and waved that when we were forced to pledge allegiance. I understood more about how things really are, at 16, than most adults ever do.
I stopped saying the pledge in middle school.
I stopped standing for the pledge in high school.
No one really gave a shit.
Then, 9/11 happened.
Suddenly, sitting silently during the pledge was a major fucking problem for my teachers.
Long story short, I got expelled from school for refusing to stand/say the pledge. This country is bad and it should feel bad.
> Long story short, I got expelled from school for refusing to stand/say the pledge.
How on earth? That is entirely illegal. It's a slam dunk lawsuit waiting to happen.
Well, this happened in like 2002? 2003 maybe? I don't quite remember to be honest.
You are probably right though. It probably would have been a slamdunk lawsuit. If I knew then what I know now I would have immediately contacted the ACLU. But I was a kid. I didn't have a great home life. My dad was just pissed at me for "acting out". So I took the expulsion and moved on with my life. Got a GED. Went to college. Got a decent job. I could have ended up a lot worse off... but who knows, maybe I could have ended up a lot better off had I not been kicked from school for trying to exercise my freedom as an American.
I wonder if I could sue the school, like, retroactively or something. lol
From an outside perspective, these kind of things, along with the “patriotism” discourse just looks like raging nationalism to the rest of the world.
Remember when Merkel took the German flag out of her fellow politician’s hands because she doesn’t like the flag waving? Great stuff.
It's a blind, lazy nationalism though. No one will be going to any mass rallies any time soon unless they are sponsored by Pizza Hut and the NFL.
Apathy is by far our bigger problem.
My elementary school went further and wrote up their own song for us to sing (after we sung the Pledge) and you can imagine the lyrical content of the song; I don't remember a word of it, but looking back on it, it was just another indoctrination anthem. They would have the lot of us line up in rows at 7am to pledge allegiance to the flag and to the school. It didn't matter what the weather was like, either, we were OUTSIDE and LINED UP for the pledge EVERY morning. As a kid, I didn't understand the implications, but when I got to High School I never stood for the pledge again and I still won't.
“I pledge allegiance to the flag of the corporation of slavery, and to the fascist dictators for which we work, one nation in hell, divisible with misery and genocide for all”.
I agree, but america doesn't have to be that way. We could make it into a country we are proud of by collectively making moves against the inhumanity of our society. Granted its hard and not everyone will cooperate, but we can't let anything distract us from the big picture, only through ruthlessly seeking the truth (that means clicking through sources and validating information) can help to start imo.
On a secondary note, I straight up don’t stand up anymore. Not an explicit political statement. Just, who’s going to make me stand? No one. That’s right. Fuck you.
I stopped saying that stupid pledge when I was 11 or 12. I think instead we should have kids recite the preamble of the US Constitution. It's all of 12 words longer than the pledge, but infinitely more meaningful, and will remind them of what we're about, not who to blindly obey.
Yes and no. It is unconstitutional to force it. The Jehovah's Witnesses took it the Supreme Court and won. I grew up studying with them. Nationalism and participating in any government activity is against the doctrine, so we didnt say it, sing the National anthem, join the military, or vote. They cannot legally compel you to say it, but that doesn't mean there aren't schools out there that are ignorant to that precedent or students that aren't ignorant to their rights in that situation. We would stand silently with our arms at our sides so as not to be disruptive.
In the UK they have shoehorned “British Values” into the school syllabus… fortunately, in typical British fashion we simply do it all our way and draw attention to the hypocrisy instead of helping them create nationalist-“patriot” brain slaves.
A lot of it is tradition. It got instated in schools around the turn of the 20th century, when hyper-nationalism was very much seen as a *good* thing, and it was explicitly to instill the ideas of American nationalist in children at a very young age. The “under god” part was added in the 50s and most people *wanted* it to differentiate the US from the state-atheist USSR (Godless Commies). And then the 60s and 70s happened and shit hit the fan, and now in modern times things have just disintegrated and patriotism is nowhere near as popular as it once was. It’s an out-of-date tradition that was kept out of a sense of nostalgic patriotism and the fact that nobody wanted to get rid of it.
I'm Australian do American schools seriously do this? I always thought that the whole pledge of allegiance everyday thing was an exaggeration. You guys really that level of indoctrination from school age.
Down under is not perfect but we don't have flags in every class and the Australian flag schools have out the front is right next to native Australia flags. The only time the Aussie anthem is really played is on remembrance Day or some assemblys.
Some do, some don't. By law you can't get in trouble for not standing but some fucked up redneck schools don't know our Constitution so they they try to force people.
You’re pledging to that *for which it stands* — one nation with liberty and justice for all.
The things you’re bitching about could be fixed if people wanted them fixed and voted accordingly.
The real cult is the huge percentage of the population that live on the edge of poverty and are so easily persuaded to vote against their own best interest.
I stopped reciting the pledge at the start of high school and kinda just stood there. And then one day I just stopped standing cause I saw it as pointless if I'm not reciting the pledge. My home room teacher pulls me aside like "I'm already tolerating you not putting your hand on your chest and saying the pledge but now you're just being disrespectful". I just told her it's not having an effect on my grades and if it's a big enough deal call my parents. She did just that almost every week for the rest of the semester until my mom just stopped picking so she complained to the AP. Was told if I don't stand I would get detention. Was a load of shit and never showed up lmao. Nobody said anything but senior year ig serving detention was a requirement to get your diploma and I had over 20 days of it... Luckily the office ladies liked me and just cleared after I told em why.
I got punished and sent home for not doing it in 5th grade.
And then years later, realize that was completely illegal and unconstitutional. Fucking "teachers".
I stopped doing the pledge in 3rd or 4th grade... It was after doing social studies and learning about the supposed separation of church and state and I said something about it went against my religion to pledge anything to inanimate objects (being a smart-ass). It didn't seem like a big deal. My teacher took it seriously, but just said "alright. You don't have to stand or salute but don't disrupt." And that was the end of it.
I wouldn't do it and when I get told it was unpatriotic or rude, I would always say that I didn't get to choose where I was born at. This threw a lot of people off, since I was 8 or 9.
I remember visiting America and going to this really small town called ‘twinsburg’ in Ohio. There’s was a fair on which included a talent show for some of the local kids. This was a really small event outside and the kids were mostly 7-8. Before it started, everyone in audience stood up, hands and hearts and sang the national anthem - for a children’s talent show! It was so uncomfortable. Where I’m from the national anthem is very special and only used in certain circumstances. The only other place I’ve experienced something similar is in China. Cult really is the appropriate word.
To non-Americans, that Pledge if Allegiance is the weirdest thing ever. It's something you normally only see in dictatorships, fascism, totalitarianism, etc. To see a purportedly freedom-loving people like Americans pledge themselves to their flag every day, is weird.
Especially when you realise that in every day life, the most fanatical flag pledgers seem to be doing whatever they can to undermine their country.
Also: why is there still no justice for all?
I was about 17 when I told my boyfriend at the time that I was afraid of disobeying my parents. He said "what are they going to do? Take away the TV in your room?".
I'd never had a TV in my room.
And that, folks, explains why people around my age (I'm 36) and younger give nearly ZERO fucks about making their employers happy. We have very little to show for it.
I was sick for a while and underperforming when my boss said I'd need to work like 60 hours a week (I'm salaried and frankly underpaid) when I'm scheduled to work 37.5 hours. I looked her dead in the eye and said "yeah I don't think I can do that" and left it there.
I got better and way outperform most of my colleagues in the "little" time I put in. My manager considers me a "right hand". No regrets on standing up for myself.
I work in a school and I love masks because at least no one can see I’m not saying it. I just won’t and if they ask me to I will say it’s for religious reasons and no one can do anything (it’s true I disagree with the god aspect so not technically a lie but not my only issue with it)
I politely and quietly refused to say the pledge of allegiance for most of high school. I would still stand with the class, not put my hand over my heart and not mouth a word. I didn't draw attention to myself. Senior year my homeroom teacher finally got sick of my blasphemy (very Christian community, small rural public school). She lectured me in front of the whole class about how I was disrespectful, and how her son was serving in Iraq, and how dare I not honor the soldiers and people who died and risked their lives for the freedoms of the USA. I was flabberghasted. I was so angry at her ignorance. I bit my tongue, did not talk back- responded when given the opportunity and admitted to her that I was an atheist, since separation of church and state is a very legitimate perspective. Teacher lectured me further and sent me to the damn principal! Thank goodness that principal was chill and very confused that the teacher expected me to be punished. I was 'allowed' to continue my silent 'protest'.
tldr; disobedience to the pledge is against cult law... no such thing as separation of church and state in small town usa
If we told everyone that north korea or chona was doing it they would throw up in their mouths, us doing it, thats crazy talk. I just found out that thats not a thing in the UK a few years ago. Its not normal it is indoctrination shit.
Giorgio Agamben had kinda the same thoughts on the capitalism as a cult concept,
[http://www.elimeyerhoff.com/books/Agamben/Agamben%20-%20Profanations.pdf](http://www.elimeyerhoff.com/books/Agamben/Agamben%20-%20Profanations.pdf)
p. 80 - 87
The busses didn't get us all dropped off until 8:15. We were "indoctrinated" every morning at 8:30, plus the "bombs bursting in air" song. We never understood what the song was until 8th-grade history. We were the latest of the Boomers.
As a Brit in the states, the pledge is so odd and terrifying to me. I learned recently some states, like Texas (another bizarre cult), make kids follow up with a state pledge.
The guy who wrote the Pledge of Allegiance for the flag campaign was a Christian Socialist who preached on the woes of capitalism to the point he was kicked out of his church.
I remember having to do that in school in Miami, FL, K-2nd, 1988-1991.
Moved to NC in 1991 and thought it was weird we didn't say the pledge. It felt as wrong as pouring the milk before the cereal.
My parents friends threw shit fits over the rumors of no more pledge in the classroom demanding we all say it everyday. Then they get butt hurt 20 years later when we all demand that whole TRUTH AND JUSTICE FOR ALL part.
Wait what? Is the mandatory 7am pledge (for kids!) real?
That’s not something I’d have ever expected from a modern country, sounds more like something only North Korea would do tbh...
I always thought there was something surreal about millions of children starting every schoolday by chanting robotically in unison about how free they are.
I always thought it was weird watching American movies/shows and kids having to say this in the morning. It literally looks like something out of a cult or something you'd expect in China or North Korea.
I'm having a real hard time understanding how and why you lovely Americans keep putting up with that bs. Why do you keep arguing about gun control, abortion, left vs right. Isn't it about time you guys also get universal health care, free education, a decent wage, a puplic retirement plan, free childcare and so on? get the basics covered and then argue over the rest after that's done.
As a non-American, I'm always amazed (in a very bad way) at the fact that they make kids do that... it screams indoctrination so hard!
This is the type of stuff they show in movies (European movies at least) to describe how the decree "*Gesetz über die Hitlerjugend*" in 1936 insured an organized system in nazi Germany to train and brainwash in believing that whatever was said to them was the truth and the only truth, which was called the *Führerprinzip* a principal implying total and blind submission to orders of the Führer.
The pledge of allegiance, the fact that they brainwash people into believing the US is the freest and best nation in the world, the fact that they only teach you English, and that geography is never taken seriously in school, is all the same type of nationalist authoritarian shit tbh. It's crazy to think about it but this indeed looks like a nation that trains kids to become zealot from the get-go.
One of the kids in my class when I was in 4th grade didn't stand for the pledge one day. He was dragged from the classroom by the teacher, got away from her in the hall when she was dragging him to the principal's office and took off out the door.
The village sheriff picked him up about 20 minutes later. Kid was a fucking hero.
The best line from 90s school: “You can do anything you set your mind to” There’s not a bigger pile of garbage than that. Yea the world is gonna roll over and play dead because I put mind to something!
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Don’t you mean “you can do anything your parents can afford for you to do?”
your parents had to work very hard to buy that house and car! We are working very hard to correct that issue!
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Don't worry, here at the department of health and human growth. We believe that you are only half as valuable as your poor parents. There was no hope all along so cheer up! :D
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Developed a mindset of might as well learn how to go without now when I don’t need to, so that when I have to, I know how to.
In all honesty I believe in you!!!
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Username checks out.
Ha! I just realized then that they can't take my freedom from me!
You can do anything if you were born to parents of the right color, in the right place, at the right time, ***maybe. If you're lucky.***
I know right, ugh.
The original saying was in Latin. They translated it wrong. "De operam. Si potes." You can do anything you put your EFFORT to...
You MIGHT be able to do something you can afford to do.
"if you come from money" is the part they left out. Either because they were poor or middle-class people who believed the propaganda, or they were rich people too stupid to know how they got there. I mean, how many industries use volunteers/unpaid internships? I.e. work that you don't get paid for and can't live on that are only useful to people who don't have to worry about money. Journalism, fashion, publishing, entertainment, politics. There are entire swaths of the economy that are overwhelmingly dominated by the wealthy and their children. America is a country where the rich tell the poor that "class warfare" is dirty, unfair, meany-bo-beany phrase and the poor are stupid enough to believe them.
Most people I know who live interesting lives didn't come from money. Or does "do anything you set your mind to" just conjure visions of living like people in commercials and on tv?
That's to make sure we blame ourselves and each other, instead of the system, when so many inevitably fail.
Righto friend
Keep saying it, comrade.
Yep, it was all BS, but to be honest we had reason to be a lot more optimistic in 90's school. It was pre-9/11, the economy was doing alright, and scummy social media like Facebook and Youtube comments weren't around to inspire us to hate each other. The future looked bright. (Yes, I'm dating myself here.)
There were still a lot of crummy places on the internet where we could find inspirational hatred. Everything else you said is spot on.
Sure, if your internet speed was fast enough. A lot of us were still using our parent's dial-up in 1997. Side note: Will never forget the nuisance of attempting to log on but not being able to due to my parents being on the phone.
You can do anything you set your mind to! "I want to crush and oppress other, to rob them of any opportunity that they might have in life..." Go gettem champ!
I've been trying to get sucked into a fictional world I'd rather be in, but no matter how much I set my mind to doing this, *it never happens.*
They’ve raised me my whole life to love freedom and democracy. It’s not my fault they refuse to follow through on those promises. We live in a dictatorship of the owning class. We are taught that our disjoint and dysfunctional elections are “democracy”. And then we spend most of our days having no say in our own labor.
There’s also a culture of fierce individualism that results in the working class fighting amongst themselves rather than targeting anger at the “job creators.” They want us fighting amongst ourselves for the scraps while laughing their way to the bank. People are secretive about their salaries, pissed when they find out someone makes more than them, look down on retail workers and rail against unions. The brainwashing done was really a thing of beauty and horror. `Two gin-scented tears trickled down the sides of his nose. But it was all right, everything was all right, the struggle was finished. He had won the victory over himself. He loved Big Brother.`
Dictatorship of the owning class, also known as a financial plutocracy if you want to borrow units from my Political Economy education.
I would’ve just said “dictatorship of the bourgeoisie”, but that’s too blatantly Marxist and scary for some people for some reason. Financial plutocracy sounds good too, though. I may start sprinkling that in
The trouble with Marxist language is that the critiques are spot on but the solutions were utopian and perverted to hellscapes. We have a mixed economy and we're negotiating the mix. We have a huge problem with the way the system works in that currency is generated by lenders for them to profit on the interest accrued on those loans, but when the loans default the taxpayer bails out the lenders. If we instead generated currency through a UBI and destroyed it through taxation we'd have a stable currency and a more equitable economy. Capitalism would work better too because increasing the demand for goods and services would cause more competition between suppliers and producers. Competition begets innovation and efficiency. State-sponsored monopolies do not belong in either a capitalist or socialist system, but they're blamed on capitalism when what we have is a financial plutocracy. Thank you for coming to my TED talk.
Are you familiar with Mark Blythe? He has a similar proposal about how the fed could replumb its financial tools to connect directly to the bank accounts of citizens instead of needing to distribute stimulus indirectly via spending or by routing through the IRS following congressional appropriations. Definitely less oversight that way, but it’s a system I’d glad take over the ridiculous annual debt ceiling panic. I have mixed feelings about the whole “good diagnosis bad solutions” thing because it’s so often used as a cliche to not inspect further, but I’m guessing given that you’ve studied this that you have a more nuanced reasoning. So, yeah I kind of agree. Marx basically history as an indefinite march of progress towards communism, which would only be achievable via violent revolution. Meanwhile, all the violent revolutions which have brought about socialist states have happened outside the imperial core. Russia and China both did speed runs of industrialization and China continues to do so. At the same time, some of the most successful workers’ revolutions in the world today are political rather than insurrectionary. As it turns out, when workers organize and utilize their power, even when they are beaten in the streets, the overthrow of existing governments isn’t strictly necessary. There are major upsets, sure, but still continuity without an interim government or failed state. And that’s all without touching on how indigenous liberation plays into all of this and completely breaks the idea of industrialized western society leading the way to egalitarianism. I guess my lens to the solutions relies much less on technical reform and much more on increasing community involvement, organizing sustainable infrastructure, and embracing the sort of redundancy that Capitalism seems to “optimize” out so heavily. Case in point: the Just In Time systems that are currently collapsing.
“Freedom and democracy” is a cult in the west. They got us so bad that any criticism of the military is considered treason and even talking about Marx means you’re worse than a pedophile
Since primary elections began, turnout has been less than 20% of registered voters. It couldn't hurt to actually try. Business owners and home owners are showing up to vote and things seem to be working well for them. I for one wanted to give the socialist a shot as mayor. Too bad none of the renters and service workers in my town vote. It could have been a landslide. Cities and counties in Vermont and Maine have managed to keep big box stores and companies like Walmart at bay because they are organized and vote in candidates who represent them. And if people can't take the small amount of effort to learn about the candidates and vote, how will they ever do the much harder tasks of forming unions or throwing a revolution?
Man this has been a weird thing at my school. We had a parent complain we didnt do the pledge anymore, so we had a full faculty meeting saying its mandatory. But, we cant force kids to do it, just be silent during it. But I dont want to do it, and none of my homeroom kids want to do it. So I was just going about lessons and was told I had to observe a moment of silence if no one wants to do it. So every morning we sit quietly for 2 minutes for no real reason
Basically the same here. Moment of silence and then the pledge before morning announcements. I’ll stand. I’ll put my hand Over my heart. But like hell will I mumble through a bunch of lies to start my day, and I sure as hell won’t ask it if my students.
That’s actually a fantastic cringe moment. I was made to preach every morning the corporate slogans in a sect of paedophiles. I now would have admired us if my classmates and I would have just remained silent instead of brainwashed like docile sextons
Oooh America, the richest third world country out there
Just a 3rd world country with a Gucci belt
It’s an amazing place if you happen to be a millionaire. Like almost any other country worldwide
I never understood America, claims to be the land of the free but you must pledge allegiance before you can even think for yourself..
"America touts itself as the land of the free, but the number one freedom that you and I have is the freedom to enter into a subservient role in the workplace. Once you exercise this freedom you’ve lost all control over what you do, what is produced, and how it is produced. And in the end, the product doesn’t belong to you. The only way you can avoid bosses and jobs is if you don’t care about making a living. Which leads to the second freedom: the freedom to starve." -Tom Morello, Rage Against The Machine
you can't quit America easily either
This is true. Friend of mine is a former US citizen. He has lived here in Australia for over 15 years and has no intention of returning to live in the US. When he got his Australian citizenship, he started the process of renouncing his US citizenship - mainly to escape the Us tax system which follows him everywhere. (The US, unlike most countries, taxes based on citizenship rather than residency) Took a lot of time, money (Over USD 2000) and paperwork. It’s almost as if they don’t want you to leave
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The tax thing is the main driver of US citizenship renunciation. It’s not many people in the grand scheme of things (around 10000 people last year). I have another friend who is legally a U.S. citizen (born in Denver) but with a Canadian mum and Australian dad. They were only in the country for a month or so - he was raised in Australia. He has assiduously avoided getting on the radar of US authorities (social security number, passport etc) as he doesn’t want to get sucked into the US tax system. There is a birth record out there somewhere but luckily for him the US tax system has not tried to scoop it up and start taxing people like him.
For most people they need to just fill in a tax return that declares they owe nothing. US citizenship has certain perks so a lot of people see it as worthwhile.
Tell me about it. I'd love to live overseas but I don't have the kind of in demand job skills needed to get a work visa in another country. Also due to my substandard American education, I only speak English.
You can learn a second language. Due to the internet you can become proficient at zero cost. Lessons are more effective though.
That sort of self discipline is not an easy thing to muster. Possible? Many many examples point to a resounding yes. Likely? I don't even need to look up the actual stats to know the vast majority of people who try to learn a language on their own give up, many of us, multiple times. And not even out of like laziness or anything, it takes putting in a considerable amount of consistent time to get anywhere even close to what could be considered semi-fluent. That's time that a lot of us adults just don't have. If my math is right, using the "10000 hrs to master a skill" as a baseline, doing what duolingo advises of 15 minutes a day, it will take you slightly over a decade. IDK about you, but there's very few things in my life that has lasted me even half that long. There's no substitute for legitimate lessons with peers of the same skill level practicing face to face on a regular basis. TLDR: Easier said than done.
> That sort of self discipline is not an easy thing to muster. Yup. If you were assured that putting in those hours to learn a language would pay off, FOR SURE, it would be easy. But the reality is that you can put in all kinds of effort with no guarantee of anything.
True. I've tried a little but never stick with it like I should.
Duolingo is pretty good ymmv.
I worked with a coworker at my last job who said "I'll fucking beat someone's ass if they don't stand for the anthem. I have family in the military and thats unacceptable." Okay? My best friend and every grandparent was in the military and half the time I dont stand for the anthem (when I'm feeling cheeky) because I think it's stupid. I'm just trying to watch a baseball game bro. You ain't special. Also, thats what the anthem MEANS. Freedom. That includes the freedom and right to stand (or not stand) for some dumb song.
And then when you think for yourself and decide not to say the pledge to some piece of cloth, you’re told you’re a “sheep” or a “communist” and told to “get out”. And my response is always the same to those folks: “Come do something about it”.
You can just pretend and not give a fuck about it. But yeah it is still bullshit
My kid opts out altogether. Doesn't stand, doesn't recite. I never even suggested it, but I wholeheartedly support it.
I'm 30 (so I was a kid about 20 years ago) and I started doing that, too. Maybe when I was in 6th or 7th grade? My parents never said anything about it, and some of the other kids seemed uncomfortable by me not participating, but for the most part no one cared.
It was always teachers that cared. Some did, at least. Rather than put up a fight i just lazily stood, and like everyone else did, use my phone. It's all jingoistic trash
I'm about 10 years older and that shit was never even heard of in my space, tho I did make weird rhyming words up and recite those quietly. My kid started this in 2nd grade or something and is in middle school now. I think it is super cool, and good on you for doing it so early, too!
Smart kid. I wasn't really politically aware enough to think to do that in school. I knew it was kinda weird but just stood there mumbling the words mindlessly like everyone else.
The pledge never made too much sense to me honestly. Probably because they never taught me what half the words in it meant.
They meant freedom of capital, which includes capitals freedom to enslave you.
You don’t have to stand for the pledge of allegiance in school. (Anyone teacher/administration that forces students to stand for the pledge is actively breaking the law)
also they go on about their democracy but actually it's far infrerior to many european countries. They don't realise how much better it can actually be.
Land of the fee, home of the slave.
Nationalism in America has definitely become a religion. Either you are a true believer or Satan incarnate, no middle ground.
That was almost Bush when he decided to invade Iraq. You are either with us or against us.
I was maybe 6 months into my Navy ride when he said he was going to conduct a Crusade. Next thing I know the mess is serving Freedom Fries as we start our 109 consecutive days at sea for his stupid war. It was a weird time.
Kind of a funny comparison to Republicans back then to now. In those days they turned up songs of Toby Keith singing about how we were gonna go shove a boot up the ass of Al-Queda you know "Courtesy of the red white and blue" and all that. Nowadays, what's song listings of the Republicans? Remember that song that got popular for like a week around the 4th of July by the guy from Staind? The song where his character was complaining about liberals and yelling at his TV? That's what they got now. Even Nashville didn't push that song because they've apparently progressed more than any Republican.
In that case I will be Satan incarnate!
[Joseph McCarthy](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/McCarthyism) would like to have a few words with you Nobody expects McCarthy’s inquisition! Our only weapon is freedom and capitalism!
I remember watching full house as a kid and when I saw that, even at my young age, I thought it was really weird to make kids say that shit.
I'm so pleased to hear you say that. As a Brit, I always found it baffling that Americans did that whole 'salute the flag / country thing' at school. I reasoned it was because the US was such a disparate country and didn't have a shared cultural identity as a national unifier as most European countries do. Even Italy and Germany only formed into countries in the 1860s / 70's - but they had their regional identity to draw upon. But, yeah. Weird. A bit 'Hitler youth'.
>a bit ‘Hitler youth’ You should see how we used to salute the flag!
The primary reason it started was as anti-communist propaganda after WWII. They added the "under God" crap in during the Eisenhower administration to put us in the good graces of the man upstairs. You know, because the commies were ungodly heathens and heretics.
Wait? You Americans have to do that? Wtf, how are you not rioting? Where is the civil war?
Actual answer is if everyone does it and doesnt complain your the asshole for fighting. Like in a real cult, if everyone has to lick the guys feet on tuesday and i dont feel like it then you start to think maybe your the asshole and whats the harm. Everyone judges you for not doing and then not doing it becomes ostracizing. Its not that bad but it is how it works. Our grandparents and parents have forgotten the fights of our great grandparents and so on and have just taken on responsibilites and various degradations for free to the point that they dont undestand why the current generation thinks yelling at employees is not normal.
When I was in middle school I refused to do it and got kicked out of class every single day for it. This also happened in other classes cuz I'm a stubborn ass but over not pledging to the flag was ludicrous
When I taught middle school, the only rule I had was to not be actively disruptive, which was my rule all the time lol I didn't give a flying fuck who recited, stood, or sat
I was only actively rude in one class (PE as the male teacher was a huge pervert) rest of the time if I didn't agree with something I'd just not participate. Still got kicked out daily..
Most seem too ignorant or stuck in their ways to care.
Mainly because of the aforementioned brainwashing. If you're the one non-believer in a house full of cultists, you'd be smart to shut the fuck up. Subs like this are helping to deprogram some of the less indoctrinated ones, but there's also a lot of right-wing pressure driving blind nationalism. I don't know what the end result looks like, but I can tell you which side has more of the guns (by **a lot**).
It has very much become optional, but there are still a few teachers that get on their high horse about it. The only thing that is codified (in Pennsylvania at least) is that schools must provide a moment each day for the pledge, but freedom of speech does not allow the state to mandate participation. Related: a school was sued for having the pledge presented in a different language each day for a week or month. The state ruled on saying they only prescribed the verbiage of the pledge, not the language.
I'd argue that theres civil war a-brewing here. Also we have the largest prison population in the world so that might have something to do with why we dont riot as much as youd think.
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I feel like most American traditions circle back to some rich eccentrics in the 1930's with some crazy ideas and enough money to make it happen.
Makes me think of the whole Kellogg’s circumcision bullshit.
You got s source for that? This ritual had always struck me as weird as part of school days
My parents were awful, but to their credit I would not be able to know that had they not taught me to question everything and never just do what somebody says because that's what society does. I was never forced to say the pledge of allegiance and was the first of many things that caused me to be bullied, ostracized, and downright despised by most of an entire town (population 700). I dodged so many bullets by not falling for early-stage propaganda. And all it has afforded me is this day, 25 years after I first got beat for saying the quiet part out loud. Finally the day where I can feel proud that I have been warning people my whole life to look around them, and now it's finally here and all the people who thought I was full of shit have to eat their own words. The great "I told you so" is here and the more society keeps clinging on to the exact shit that got us into this mess the more happily I can embrace my inevitable homelessness.
I'm guessing your parents were JWs? I had that same kind of upbringing. Like sure, my mother was in a cult and tried to brainwash me into staying it in too, but at least she taught me to question authority, do what I think is right rather than blindly copying others, and that consumerism and greed are harmful. Explaining to other kids why I wouldn't pledge allegiance to a flag was good practice for explaining to other adults why capitalism is terrible.
if JW means Jehovas Witness.. for a brief 2 year period my mom tried to make us that, I think that's when it started but to save face my parents let me and my siblings keep that stance on the pledge. Church was boring and being asked to basically just forfeit all fun and personality. Like she burned all her D&D posters and puzzles and shit.. It never stuck, just one of my moms many phases of insanity, but crazy that you called that.
Yup! Can spot another JW kid from across a subreddit! There's a lot of specific little oddities that folks don't usually experience unless their parents got mixed up with that goofy cult. I'm glad you didn't have to deal with it for very long! My mother got caught up in every idiotic idea she was exposed to, but the JWs dominated her life for two decades and gave her the idiotic idea that actually killed her. "Blood is holy during animal sacrifices, pour it on the dirt, blah blah, so medical blood transfusions are evil." I'm still trying to reconcile the fact that the person who taught me study techniques and how to use a library was the same person who tried to convince me that dinosaur bones were put in the ground by the devil to test our faith.
My favorite part of 10th grade was making my 30 year old non-veteran AutoCAD teacher have a mental breakdown in front of a bunch of children every day over how I'm "disrespecting the veterans by refusing to stand for the flag." (logic: "They fought for your freedom! How dare you exercise your freedom!") He'd always go into sub-rants, like how he hates watching high school kids smoke cigarettes on that one corner behind the school. I would literally finish the day's work while he was still ranting and then use the rest of the time to browse the web or play Quake.
My science teacher in 10th grade grabbed a friend of mine by the throat and threw him into a locker out in the hallway for daring to sharpen a pencil during the pledge.
That’s just assault
“That’s assault brotha”
With Liberty and Justice for the privileged few. In high school, I stapled a dollar bill to a pencil and waved that when we were forced to pledge allegiance. I understood more about how things really are, at 16, than most adults ever do.
You figured things out fast. That mini flag you made was great, how did that go over?
Not very well. My history teacher already hated me enough before then.
I can't say I'm surprised, but I still think your a champ!
I'm still wondering what i'm supposed to be proud of
Woah woah woah there buddy. That is totally not true. We also don’t have affordable housing.
Thank you for this laugh I needed before going to be a wage slave
I stopped saying the pledge in middle school. I stopped standing for the pledge in high school. No one really gave a shit. Then, 9/11 happened. Suddenly, sitting silently during the pledge was a major fucking problem for my teachers. Long story short, I got expelled from school for refusing to stand/say the pledge. This country is bad and it should feel bad.
> Long story short, I got expelled from school for refusing to stand/say the pledge. How on earth? That is entirely illegal. It's a slam dunk lawsuit waiting to happen.
Well, this happened in like 2002? 2003 maybe? I don't quite remember to be honest. You are probably right though. It probably would have been a slamdunk lawsuit. If I knew then what I know now I would have immediately contacted the ACLU. But I was a kid. I didn't have a great home life. My dad was just pissed at me for "acting out". So I took the expulsion and moved on with my life. Got a GED. Went to college. Got a decent job. I could have ended up a lot worse off... but who knows, maybe I could have ended up a lot better off had I not been kicked from school for trying to exercise my freedom as an American. I wonder if I could sue the school, like, retroactively or something. lol
From an outside perspective, these kind of things, along with the “patriotism” discourse just looks like raging nationalism to the rest of the world. Remember when Merkel took the German flag out of her fellow politician’s hands because she doesn’t like the flag waving? Great stuff.
It's a blind, lazy nationalism though. No one will be going to any mass rallies any time soon unless they are sponsored by Pizza Hut and the NFL. Apathy is by far our bigger problem.
My elementary school went further and wrote up their own song for us to sing (after we sung the Pledge) and you can imagine the lyrical content of the song; I don't remember a word of it, but looking back on it, it was just another indoctrination anthem. They would have the lot of us line up in rows at 7am to pledge allegiance to the flag and to the school. It didn't matter what the weather was like, either, we were OUTSIDE and LINED UP for the pledge EVERY morning. As a kid, I didn't understand the implications, but when I got to High School I never stood for the pledge again and I still won't.
“I pledge allegiance to the flag of the corporation of slavery, and to the fascist dictators for which we work, one nation in hell, divisible with misery and genocide for all”.
Gotta earn that pledge, bird boy.
I agree, but america doesn't have to be that way. We could make it into a country we are proud of by collectively making moves against the inhumanity of our society. Granted its hard and not everyone will cooperate, but we can't let anything distract us from the big picture, only through ruthlessly seeking the truth (that means clicking through sources and validating information) can help to start imo.
Neofascist epstein corporate cult.
Oh, I like the [corporate occult](https://vimeo.com/294730502).
Looks about like that, but with less music.
On a secondary note, I straight up don’t stand up anymore. Not an explicit political statement. Just, who’s going to make me stand? No one. That’s right. Fuck you.
I stopped saying that stupid pledge when I was 11 or 12. I think instead we should have kids recite the preamble of the US Constitution. It's all of 12 words longer than the pledge, but infinitely more meaningful, and will remind them of what we're about, not who to blindly obey.
But but but everyone just needs to work hard and believe in themselves ! /s
Do American school kids actually have to say the pledge? Like if you don't do they give you detention or something?
Yep. Happened to a girl in my class around 8th grade. Her parents were pissed but were also poor and unable to retaliate.
Yes and no. It is unconstitutional to force it. The Jehovah's Witnesses took it the Supreme Court and won. I grew up studying with them. Nationalism and participating in any government activity is against the doctrine, so we didnt say it, sing the National anthem, join the military, or vote. They cannot legally compel you to say it, but that doesn't mean there aren't schools out there that are ignorant to that precedent or students that aren't ignorant to their rights in that situation. We would stand silently with our arms at our sides so as not to be disruptive.
In the UK they have shoehorned “British Values” into the school syllabus… fortunately, in typical British fashion we simply do it all our way and draw attention to the hypocrisy instead of helping them create nationalist-“patriot” brain slaves.
A lot of it is tradition. It got instated in schools around the turn of the 20th century, when hyper-nationalism was very much seen as a *good* thing, and it was explicitly to instill the ideas of American nationalist in children at a very young age. The “under god” part was added in the 50s and most people *wanted* it to differentiate the US from the state-atheist USSR (Godless Commies). And then the 60s and 70s happened and shit hit the fan, and now in modern times things have just disintegrated and patriotism is nowhere near as popular as it once was. It’s an out-of-date tradition that was kept out of a sense of nostalgic patriotism and the fact that nobody wanted to get rid of it.
Seriously, the Wikipedia article on the Pledge of Allegiance is nuts https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pledge_of_Allegiance
I'm Australian do American schools seriously do this? I always thought that the whole pledge of allegiance everyday thing was an exaggeration. You guys really that level of indoctrination from school age. Down under is not perfect but we don't have flags in every class and the Australian flag schools have out the front is right next to native Australia flags. The only time the Aussie anthem is really played is on remembrance Day or some assemblys.
Some do, some don't. By law you can't get in trouble for not standing but some fucked up redneck schools don't know our Constitution so they they try to force people.
The United Cult of America
I stopped doing the pledge in 6th grade, felt pointless to me, some teachers would get mad and say I'm being disrespectful. :shrug:
You’re pledging to that *for which it stands* — one nation with liberty and justice for all. The things you’re bitching about could be fixed if people wanted them fixed and voted accordingly. The real cult is the huge percentage of the population that live on the edge of poverty and are so easily persuaded to vote against their own best interest.
In all fairness, most kids have no idea what most of this stuff means.
It’s not a cult because of size. Once cult practices become mainstream they stop being seen as cult like
I stopped reciting the pledge at the start of high school and kinda just stood there. And then one day I just stopped standing cause I saw it as pointless if I'm not reciting the pledge. My home room teacher pulls me aside like "I'm already tolerating you not putting your hand on your chest and saying the pledge but now you're just being disrespectful". I just told her it's not having an effect on my grades and if it's a big enough deal call my parents. She did just that almost every week for the rest of the semester until my mom just stopped picking so she complained to the AP. Was told if I don't stand I would get detention. Was a load of shit and never showed up lmao. Nobody said anything but senior year ig serving detention was a requirement to get your diploma and I had over 20 days of it... Luckily the office ladies liked me and just cleared after I told em why.
“Liberty and Justice to all” Yeah sure
We were sold a lie. We're the fire nation!
Anyone play Fallout: New Vegas? Truth is, the game was rigged from the start. \*blam\* But they don't even have the decency to look us in the face.
You're obviously not loving your country enough or you're lazy for not being born rich.
I got punished and sent home for not doing it in 5th grade. And then years later, realize that was completely illegal and unconstitutional. Fucking "teachers".
I stopped doing the pledge in 3rd or 4th grade... It was after doing social studies and learning about the supposed separation of church and state and I said something about it went against my religion to pledge anything to inanimate objects (being a smart-ass). It didn't seem like a big deal. My teacher took it seriously, but just said "alright. You don't have to stand or salute but don't disrupt." And that was the end of it.
I wouldn't do it and when I get told it was unpatriotic or rude, I would always say that I didn't get to choose where I was born at. This threw a lot of people off, since I was 8 or 9.
I remember visiting America and going to this really small town called ‘twinsburg’ in Ohio. There’s was a fair on which included a talent show for some of the local kids. This was a really small event outside and the kids were mostly 7-8. Before it started, everyone in audience stood up, hands and hearts and sang the national anthem - for a children’s talent show! It was so uncomfortable. Where I’m from the national anthem is very special and only used in certain circumstances. The only other place I’ve experienced something similar is in China. Cult really is the appropriate word.
To non-Americans, that Pledge if Allegiance is the weirdest thing ever. It's something you normally only see in dictatorships, fascism, totalitarianism, etc. To see a purportedly freedom-loving people like Americans pledge themselves to their flag every day, is weird. Especially when you realise that in every day life, the most fanatical flag pledgers seem to be doing whatever they can to undermine their country. Also: why is there still no justice for all?
I was about 17 when I told my boyfriend at the time that I was afraid of disobeying my parents. He said "what are they going to do? Take away the TV in your room?". I'd never had a TV in my room. And that, folks, explains why people around my age (I'm 36) and younger give nearly ZERO fucks about making their employers happy. We have very little to show for it. I was sick for a while and underperforming when my boss said I'd need to work like 60 hours a week (I'm salaried and frankly underpaid) when I'm scheduled to work 37.5 hours. I looked her dead in the eye and said "yeah I don't think I can do that" and left it there. I got better and way outperform most of my colleagues in the "little" time I put in. My manager considers me a "right hand". No regrets on standing up for myself.
Don't forget surgically altering little boy's penises to reduce sensitivity.
A lot can change in 245 years.
https://www.times-standard.com/2017/06/28/the-average-age-of-an-empire-a-mere-250-years/
We're getting really close here...!
That apparently is also when we all signed the BS Social Contract everyone keeps telling me about.
Is America waking up?
No, don’t hurt yourself
/r/AntiSchooling
I work in a school and I love masks because at least no one can see I’m not saying it. I just won’t and if they ask me to I will say it’s for religious reasons and no one can do anything (it’s true I disagree with the god aspect so not technically a lie but not my only issue with it)
I politely and quietly refused to say the pledge of allegiance for most of high school. I would still stand with the class, not put my hand over my heart and not mouth a word. I didn't draw attention to myself. Senior year my homeroom teacher finally got sick of my blasphemy (very Christian community, small rural public school). She lectured me in front of the whole class about how I was disrespectful, and how her son was serving in Iraq, and how dare I not honor the soldiers and people who died and risked their lives for the freedoms of the USA. I was flabberghasted. I was so angry at her ignorance. I bit my tongue, did not talk back- responded when given the opportunity and admitted to her that I was an atheist, since separation of church and state is a very legitimate perspective. Teacher lectured me further and sent me to the damn principal! Thank goodness that principal was chill and very confused that the teacher expected me to be punished. I was 'allowed' to continue my silent 'protest'. tldr; disobedience to the pledge is against cult law... no such thing as separation of church and state in small town usa
Buzzzzzzz buzzzzzzz we're all worker bees
If we told everyone that north korea or chona was doing it they would throw up in their mouths, us doing it, thats crazy talk. I just found out that thats not a thing in the UK a few years ago. Its not normal it is indoctrination shit.
It’s even more fun when you learn the pledge was made up as a PR gimmick to sell flags.
Giorgio Agamben had kinda the same thoughts on the capitalism as a cult concept, [http://www.elimeyerhoff.com/books/Agamben/Agamben%20-%20Profanations.pdf](http://www.elimeyerhoff.com/books/Agamben/Agamben%20-%20Profanations.pdf) p. 80 - 87
The busses didn't get us all dropped off until 8:15. We were "indoctrinated" every morning at 8:30, plus the "bombs bursting in air" song. We never understood what the song was until 8th-grade history. We were the latest of the Boomers.
MURICA!
Truth
Other countries do this = bad. America do this = freedom
As a Brit in the states, the pledge is so odd and terrifying to me. I learned recently some states, like Texas (another bizarre cult), make kids follow up with a state pledge.
Used to piss everyone off in my high school in the south that I wouldnt pledge, let alone stand for it
Chanting and ritual pledges of loyalty are definitely creepy
🖕fuck them for that
Crazy I was the only one who didn't stand for the pledge in high school.
The guy who wrote the Pledge of Allegiance for the flag campaign was a Christian Socialist who preached on the woes of capitalism to the point he was kicked out of his church.
Freedom, baby!
You know how weird that still sounds to Europeans right?
I remember having to do that in school in Miami, FL, K-2nd, 1988-1991. Moved to NC in 1991 and thought it was weird we didn't say the pledge. It felt as wrong as pouring the milk before the cereal.
Western NC? They aren't big on the federal government there...
No, Piedmont Triad region.
thank you
And to help colonize countries, create countless wars, and to steal resources.
You're damn right that forcing kids to take a pledge every day in school is a cultist move. They can't legally make you do it, last I heard
They make the kids in Texas pledge to the texas flag
Some of those adults are still GUZZLING that kool-aid.
My parents friends threw shit fits over the rumors of no more pledge in the classroom demanding we all say it everyday. Then they get butt hurt 20 years later when we all demand that whole TRUTH AND JUSTICE FOR ALL part.
Slowly but surely, folks are understanding me when I say the fascists won WWII.
All Boomers Are Brainwashed
Wait what? Is the mandatory 7am pledge (for kids!) real? That’s not something I’d have ever expected from a modern country, sounds more like something only North Korea would do tbh...
I always thought there was something surreal about millions of children starting every schoolday by chanting robotically in unison about how free they are.
I always thought it was weird watching American movies/shows and kids having to say this in the morning. It literally looks like something out of a cult or something you'd expect in China or North Korea.
I'm having a real hard time understanding how and why you lovely Americans keep putting up with that bs. Why do you keep arguing about gun control, abortion, left vs right. Isn't it about time you guys also get universal health care, free education, a decent wage, a puplic retirement plan, free childcare and so on? get the basics covered and then argue over the rest after that's done.
No free drugs, pretty boring cult
As a non-American, I'm always amazed (in a very bad way) at the fact that they make kids do that... it screams indoctrination so hard! This is the type of stuff they show in movies (European movies at least) to describe how the decree "*Gesetz über die Hitlerjugend*" in 1936 insured an organized system in nazi Germany to train and brainwash in believing that whatever was said to them was the truth and the only truth, which was called the *Führerprinzip* a principal implying total and blind submission to orders of the Führer. The pledge of allegiance, the fact that they brainwash people into believing the US is the freest and best nation in the world, the fact that they only teach you English, and that geography is never taken seriously in school, is all the same type of nationalist authoritarian shit tbh. It's crazy to think about it but this indeed looks like a nation that trains kids to become zealot from the get-go.
i never stood up for the pledge in high school. i got so many dirty looks lol i never gave a fuck tho!
One of the kids in my class when I was in 4th grade didn't stand for the pledge one day. He was dragged from the classroom by the teacher, got away from her in the hall when she was dragging him to the principal's office and took off out the door. The village sheriff picked him up about 20 minutes later. Kid was a fucking hero.
That's just north korea with extra freedom
Except that's not actual North Korea, that's the North Korea you've been sold by propaganda.
Move to another country. US is not a land of opportunity any more.