# Hang your heads in shame, you pseudopatriotic flibbertigibbets! **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [October 17, 2000, 9:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hang-your-heads-in-shame-you-pseudopatriotic-flibbertigibbets/37318 "2000-10-17T21:12:50Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 11\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Punoqllads](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/d2c977/32.png) [@Punoqllads](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Punoqllads)\ **Post date:** [October 17, 2000, 9:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hang-your-heads-in-shame-you-pseudopatriotic-flibbertigibbets/37318/1 "2000-10-17T21:12:50Z")
If you care enough to try to impress passers-by with your alleged patriotism, maybe you should show some **respect** for the oversized flag you so proudly hang for all to see. [ol] [li]Flags are flown during the **daytime**. Take down the flag at night.[/li][li]Take down the damn flag when it’s raining! How about I fly **you** up 100 feet in the middle of a thunderstorm?[/li][li]If your flag is torn, **don’t fly it**! Repair it before flying it again, you schmucks! This is a symbol of the United States. Are you truly trying to insult this country? Or do you only value our currency?[/li][/ol] Oh, and since you show no understanding of the knowledge present in a 2nd grade civics class, when the flag becomes so worn out it is no longer repairable, you should respectfully burn it and dispose of the ashes appropriately. Y’know, since commercial speech has fewer rights than political speech, would legislating fines for disrespect for the flag on commercial property be constitutional? ---
**Author:** ![oldscratch](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/ed655f/32.png) [@oldscratch](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/oldscratch)\ **Post date:** [October 17, 2000, 9:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hang-your-heads-in-shame-you-pseudopatriotic-flibbertigibbets/37318/2 "2000-10-17T21:25:32Z")
Of course many of those who show such disrespect for the flag would of course support an amendment banning it’s burning. :rolleyes: ---
**Author:** ![ElwoodCuse](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/edb3f5/32.png) [@ElwoodCuse](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ElwoodCuse)\ **Post date:** [October 17, 2000, 9:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hang-your-heads-in-shame-you-pseudopatriotic-flibbertigibbets/37318/3 "2000-10-17T21:33:55Z")
I think our country has better things to do with its time than worry about (gasp) flag burning. ---
**Author:** ![Enos\_Strate](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/aca169/32.png) [@Enos\_Strate](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Enos_Strate)\ **Post date:** [October 17, 2000, 9:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hang-your-heads-in-shame-you-pseudopatriotic-flibbertigibbets/37318/4 "2000-10-17T21:49:18Z")
I agree with your position of respecting the flag. However, I believe that it is okay to fly the flag at night as long as it is appropriately lit (with spotlights, not on fire). This is something that I think I learned in ROTC many, many years ago, so please correct me if I am wrong. ---
**Author:** ![andros](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/e480ec/32.png) [@andros](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/andros)\ **Post date:** [October 17, 2000, 9:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hang-your-heads-in-shame-you-pseudopatriotic-flibbertigibbets/37318/5 "2000-10-17T21:55:27Z")
No, you’re correct, **Enos**. The flag is not to be flown in the dark, but lots are flown at night. > [@](#): > > Y’know, since commercial speech has fewer rights than political speech, would legislating fines for disrespect for the flag on commercial property be constitutional? Nope. Unconstitutional and IMHO abhorrent. ---
**Author:** ![racinchikki](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/eada6e/32.png) [@racinchikki](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/racinchikki)\ **Post date:** [October 17, 2000, 10:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hang-your-heads-in-shame-you-pseudopatriotic-flibbertigibbets/37318/6 "2000-10-17T22:54:59Z")
Once I was at a friend’s house to spend the night. They had a rather short flagpole in their front yard with (from the top down) the American flag, the Canadian flag, and a NASCAR flag on it. While I was at their house the flagpole got knocked over by a truck and the US flag ended up ripped in half. Rather than repair the ragged, muddy flag, they opted to burn it in their bonfire pit. They’d an extra one which they ran back up the flagpole (the Canucky and racing flag were in the wash) and we went out back and folded the flag and burnt it. Some neighbors came over and yelled at us for flag-burning. Dumbasses. ---
**Author:** ![Guinastasia](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/guinastasia/32/5751_2.png) [@Guinastasia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Guinastasia)\ **Post date:** [October 17, 2000, 11:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hang-your-heads-in-shame-you-pseudopatriotic-flibbertigibbets/37318/7 "2000-10-17T23:02:05Z")
Is it true that if a flag touches the ground, you HAVE to burn it? I remember in Girl Scout Camp, we were putting up the flag and one of us dropped it on the ground. We all started giggling about how we were going to jail. ---
**Author:** ![Ike\_Witt](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ike_witt/32/283_2.png) [@Ike\_Witt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ike_Witt)\ **Post date:** [October 17, 2000, 11:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hang-your-heads-in-shame-you-pseudopatriotic-flibbertigibbets/37318/8 "2000-10-17T23:25:32Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Guinastasia \* > \*\*Is it true that if a flag touches the ground, you HAVE to burn it? > \*\* No, that is not true. However, burning a flag is a (the?) correct method for its disposal. ---
**Author:** ![andros](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/e480ec/32.png) [@andros](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/andros)\ **Post date:** [October 17, 2000, 11:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hang-your-heads-in-shame-you-pseudopatriotic-flibbertigibbets/37318/9 "2000-10-17T23:34:44Z")
HAVE to? No. Not according to federal law at any rate, but your state may require it, depending on how deeply it bought into the the flag-worship craze of the 1970’s. (And andros shows his biases again.) Flag observance is spelled out in [US Code Title 36, chapter 10](http://www4.law.cornell.edu/uscode/36/ch10.html), sections 173-8. It is **not** national law, but again, many states have their own laws regarding the US flag. As for whether a flag should be burned upon touching the ground, section 176, paragraph b reads: > [@](#): > > The flag should never touch anything beneath it, such as the ground, the floor, water, or merchandise. and paragraph k reads: > [@](#): > > The flag, when it is in such condition that it is no longer a fitting emblem for display, should be destroyed in a dignified way, preferably by burning. If one chooses to interpret those two paragraphs in such a way that touching the ground makes a flag “no longer a fitting emblem for display,” then yes, it should be disposed of. I don’t personally agree with that interpretation, but to each his own. ---
**Author:** ![Revedge](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/ecae2f/32.png) [@Revedge](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Revedge)\ **Post date:** [October 18, 2000, 4:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hang-your-heads-in-shame-you-pseudopatriotic-flibbertigibbets/37318/10 "2000-10-18T04:11:56Z")
> [@](#): > > _Originally posted by Punoqllads \* > \*\* [li]Flags are flown during the **daytime**. Take down the flag at night.[/li]_\* The flag can be flown at night. “Oh say can you see? By the dawns early light. What proudly we hailed, at twilights last gleaming?” ---
**Author:** ![Johnny\_Angel](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/d26b3c/32.png) [@Johnny\_Angel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Johnny_Angel)\ **Post date:** [October 18, 2000, 4:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hang-your-heads-in-shame-you-pseudopatriotic-flibbertigibbets/37318/11 "2000-10-18T04:37:00Z")
**Revedge** wrote: > [@](#): > > The flag can be flown at night. > > ``` > "Oh say can you see? > By the dawns early light. > What proudly we hailed, > at twilights last gleaming?" > > ``` Right, the rule should appended, “In case of minor symbolic victory, the flag should be left flying.”