I try to figure out some way to squirm out of it, so as not to distract the gathering with a discussion of why I didn’t stand and recite. A few years ago, I was the guest speaker at a big suburban Rotary Club or something like that when I suddenly realized what was coming in a few seconds. I feigned a cell phone call that required me to quickly slip out of the room.
At Toastmasters, they always do this at meetings. One time, though, I was chairing the meeting, and would have had to lead the pledge.
I deftly asked if our President would do the honor of leading the pledge. He deftly took on that responsibility. It was all smooth enough, I don’t know if anyone took particular notice.
If they did, to eff with 'em…
Our district had a case of a student being shamed by a teacher for not standing for the pledge last year that got into the media and caused an embarrassment, so this year before school started we all had to sit through a training about how we are not allowed to coerce students into participating in patriotic exercises, the kinds of things we are allowed to say (e.g. general direction to stand up or be quiet is fine, singling out a student or asking for a reason they aren’t participating is not), etc.
I found this peculiar because I was a student in this same district many moons ago, stopped standing for the pledge in high school, and not one adult ever said a thing to me about it and clearly had directions not to make an issue of it. Guess something got forgotten in the training manuals in the interim.
Those that degrade this country but refuse to leave? What hypocrisy…
The national anthem is a joke to you? Only stand out of cowardice? And are proud of it. Post it online? ::: sheesh ::::
Freedom comes with responsibility. Folks miss that part a lot.
To help insure that freedom you were in which part of the military or have done what? Besides take? And abuse.
If we really took the Pledge seriously, you’d think we would say it just once: upon becoming a citizen, or reaching age of majority.
Ha! I love it when The Pledge is recited in my presence. I get to just sit there and no one even bats an eye. :). And since I’m so much lower than everyone else, I don’t even bother mouthing the words, 'cause I’m basically invisible anyway.
Ah, silver-linings. Gotta love 'em.
Tell it to Donald Trump.
Yep. That’s our stance, and we are happy to live in a country where we are free to exercise it.
What specific responsibility is being fulfilled by reciting the Pledge of Allegiance? Does it pay a tax? Does it report a crime? Does it keep trash out of the river or save a child from drowning?
What responsibility comes from, say, reading a book, seeing a movie, writing a poem, or posting on the SDMB?
What about irresponsible freedoms, like getting drunk, watching porn, cussing the umpire at a ball-game, throwing an unwanted book into the trash, or voting for Mickey Mouse?
We’re free to do shit like that. And we’re free – and I thank the generations past who fought, and bled, and died to protect that freedom – to blow raspberries at the fucking Pledge of Allegiance.
If freedom only includes “responsible” activities, then that’s no freedom at all.
I will stand out of respect. But I am a Christian. I do not pledge allegiance to the principalities and powers of this world.
I’m living here because I was born here, and don’t feel particularly called to leave, even if some random person on a message board feels I should.
Besides, wherever I went, I’d still be in a country in this world. And it’s not the U.S. in particular that I’m not pledging my allegiance to. If I had been born and raised in Norway, I wouldn’t be pledging allegiance to Norway.
Just because those words are the motto of the U.S. Military Academy, why should they be mine? I’m not finding “Duty, Honor, Country” anywhere in the Bible. So on this point, I have to reject your world view.
I suppose that if the U.S. were organized around your principles, it would expel those who believe as I do. But fortunately it’s not.
I reject this. Sorry.
I do not make oaths or pledges of loyalty. I neither stand nor salute nor recite, or participate in any other ritualistic behavior. I affirm that I am not an opponent of the United States, and will endeavor to be a lawful and peaceful citizen. My loyalty is to fairness and justice, and I will not participate in the idea that the nation or its government is inherently superior to others. Nationalism is as archaic as caste systems and feudalism, in my opinion, and only respect for a nation’s borders and laws should be maintained. Other loyalties should be reserved for the brotherhood between civilized people and a respect for human life, rights, and dignities, and no such respect should be afforded to governments over people.
Time was, in the UK it was the custom to play the national anthem at the beginning or end of concerts and plays, or at the end of the evening’s performance in the cinema. But of course, people were keen to get to the last bus home or to the pub before “Last orders”, which could lead to an unseemly steeplechase to get round the odd stalwart patriot standing to attention - as in this scene from the sitcom about the WW2 Home Guard, Dad’s Army:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OV_gQ461_yw&feature=youtu.be&t=130
It is rare in my adult life for me to encounter the pledge but I have no problem reciting it. I certainly have no problem standing for it.
[quote=“Flyer, post:37, topic:735165”]
I truly, honestly, cannot understand why anybody who likes living in this country would have any objection whatsoever to saying it. That includes religious objections, too. If you don’t like the Pledge, then why are you living here?
It is the duty of every person living in this country, citizen or not, to defend and protect it by any means necessary. The Pledge is merely a small token of that. I have never been in the military, but the Motto at West Point explains very clearly and succinctly what every single person should strive to live for.
"DUTY – HONOR – COUNTRY"
Those words should resonate like a solemn drumbeat in every American’s mind, for all time. They are inextricably linked, both to each other, and to the American Ideal.
If you have never seen Red Skelton explicate the Pledge of Allegiance, you should. He dropped the humor for a few minutes, and in those few minutes, he gave this country a great gift.
[/QUOTE]The Constitution that conservatives pretend to love gives me the freedom not to stand and recite whatever words the masters demand that we parrot. It isn’t up to anyone to tell me what I must stand and recite or face expulsion. Repeating these trite phrases does not in any way defend the country. I will stand but not with hand over heart and I will never recite one word of that silly pledge. If the nation is invaded, I will make the gun shape with my fingers, point to the enemy, and say “bang”. The rest I’ll leave up to the professionals for whose service I pay taxes.
If you have any Facebook friends, you’ve undoubtedly gotten posts from people for whom the POA is a big fucking deal, whining about how it’s never said anymore (but it is) because someone doesn’t want to offend anyone ( a reason that has never been given by anybody for anything). They’ll whine about how people are trying to take “under God” out, although nobody is.
I will say the pledge as many times as Washington and Lincoln did- zero.
[quote=“Flyer, post:37, topic:735165”]
I truly, honestly, cannot understand why anybody who likes living in this country would have any objection whatsoever to saying it. That includes religious objections, too. If you don’t like the Pledge, then why are you living here?
It is the duty of every person living in this country, citizen or not, to defend and protect it by any means necessary. The Pledge is merely a small token of that. I have never been in the military, but the Motto at West Point explains very clearly and succinctly what every single person should strive to live for.
"DUTY – HONOR – COUNTRY"
Those words should resonate like a solemn drumbeat in every American’s mind, for all time. They are inextricably linked, both to each other, and to the American Ideal.
If you have never seen Red Skelton explicate the Pledge of Allegiance, you should. He dropped the humor for a few minutes, and in those few minutes, he gave this country a great gift.
[/QUOTE]I refuse to perform loyalty tests. I contribute to society, follow its laws and pay my taxes as required of me. Public displays of loyalty have no bearing on whether I’m a good or happy citizen.
I believe it is polite to stand quietly while the people around you recite the pledge. Similar to when someone else’s national anthem is played.
I stand for the pledge when it comes up (“at boy scout meetings” is all that’s coming to mind.) I probably mumble along. I don’t feel strongly about it either way. I often leave out the “under God” part.
At synagogue, when the congregation prays for the nation, and for its leaders to be guided by God, I do join in.
I stand for national anthems, ours and others. That comes up a lot more often than the pledge of allegiance.
Whatever. My family came 7,000 miles to be in this country. We took oaths to renounce our old citizenship and be loyal to our adopted country. We changed our citizenship. We give everything we have to our new country and nothing to our old country.
The Pledge means nothing. It’s just words. So are the words “duty - honor - country”. What matters is how we live every single day.
I don’t like or dislike the Pledge, but I don’t think liking it should be a litmus test for living here.
And who the hell are you to decide what words we should stand and recite in order to retain our citizenship? Maybe I want you to stand up and recite the First Amendment whenever I want to hear it. Isn’t that just as silly?
I haven’t pledged since middle school, when it occurred to me that it’s just weirdly indoctrinating.
In school I would stand but not recite the pledge. No one cared.
My mom was a teacher, and would say the pledge even though she doesn’t agree with it either. Because she taught in a very small southern town, it would’ve been a HUGE problem if a teacher didn’t say the pledge. Even if the teacher is a longtime resident and leader in a local church.
Because we can, and because it’s legal to do so. *** And if you don’t get that, you are missing the point of “freedom”.
Anaamika – your story about the cops pledging to a flag on a laptop is hilarious.
**Flyer **-- your notions of patriotism notwithstanding, the Supreme Court ruled in 1943 in West Virginia State Board of Education vs. Barnette (319 U.S. 624), that requiring a person to say the pledge is violating the first and fourteenth amendments.
mic drop
It’s funny that so many people here have an issue with the Under God part. I am not terribly religious, but that is the only part that seems like it could be worth of pledging allegiance to.
To a country? I agree with another poster that that seems a bit fascist. To a flag? That’s just silly.
Actually the whole thing comes across as a granfalloon.