[QUOTE=Mangetout]
I don’t get patriotism. A good working knowledge of geography is great, a general knowledge of the politics of your home country and the way it fits in the world is good, an appreciation for the culture and tradition of your homeland is wonderful, a sense of ethics regarding your place in society is useful. But I don’t think any or all of those things add up to patriotism, which, as I say, I just don’t get.
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Good post. Couldn’t have said it better.
[QUOTE=Mr. Moto]
Respect for the flag is pretty utilitarian as well.
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I don’t want to turn this into a debate over one detail, but I can’s see how it’s utilitarian - Please could you describe what you had in mind?
[QUOTE=dangermom]
That’s kind of a weird article. Was some of it a joke? Paying your kids money to memorize things they ought to know anyway? Maybe I just don’t believe in paying for learning. But it came off kind of weird.
We will be memorizing famous American speeches and documents (and, in general, a bunch of other things; we’re currently working on a poem and the first 20 Roman emperors, yes we are strange, but at least we can recite “Jabberwocky”), studying the history and ideals of our country, and eventually looking at the Constitution very carefully. Also we have the flag out at our house quite a lot–I like flags, especially in summer, so cheerful and summery.
I hope to teach our kids a love for their country and a conviction of civic duty; that is, they should always be working for the betterment of their country. Patriotism IMO is not the same thing as nationalism or jingoism, nor is it “my country is better than yours.”
But I’m not going to pay them for it.
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I like these ideals you are teaching your kids. I like your methods.
Let’s not forget we do pay for learning. It’s called going to college/university.
I’ve never really gotten “patriotism.” It’s an emotion I’ve never felt and seems indistinuishable from mindless nationalism to me.
I’m all for educating kids on American civics, government, geography, history – all that jazz – but they need to make the value judgements for themselves, not have them instilled. The one value I think should be impressed upon kids is the importance of (and the relative rarity of) the right to dissent. Teaching kids that they must, or even should show any “deference” to elected officials or a rag on a stick is contrary to how I understand American values. Being an American means you don’t have to defer to jack shit. I’m teaching my kids that they have a duty to look cross-eyed at their leaders and that they should defer to such drivel as flags or anthems only as much as they feel like.
[QUOTE=Diogenes the Cynic]
The one value I think should be impressed upon kids is the importance of (and the relative rarity of) the right to dissent. Teaching kids that they must, or even should show any “deference” to elected officials or a rag on a stick is contrary to how I understand American values. Being an American means you don’t have to defer to jack shit. I’m teaching my kids that they have a duty to look cross-eyed at their leaders and that they should defer to such drivel as flags or anthems only as much as they feel like.
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Oh come now, Diogenes. I know how you raise your kids from the childrearing discussions here, and you aren’t a particularly freewheeling parent. You have definite ideas on how kids ought to be raised, and back them up with discipline. Good for you, BTW. That’s how it ought to be.
I said deference, not obedience. There is a difference between the two, and you recognize it as well as I do. You wouldn’t ever tolerate one of your kids acting rudely to their teacher, right? At least not without really strong provocation?
Besides, don’t you think impressing on your kids the importance of dissent is itself instilling in them one of your value judgments?
I have a feeling that all the patriotism/nationalism/regionalism stuff worms its way into my kids brains without any help from me. Texas delivers it with the force of a sledgehammer.
My attitude is that no person or institution deserves a free ride. People with political authority create myths around themselves and make it so that everyone follows along. I’m not buying.
So I guess I’m not exactly a go-to guy when it comes to teaching patriotism.
[QUOTE=Mangetout]
I don’t get patriotism. A good working knowledge of geography is great, a general knowledge of the politics of your home country and the way it fits in the world is good, an appreciation for the culture and tradition of your homeland is wonderful, a sense of ethics regarding your place in society is useful. But I don’t think any or all of those things add up to patriotism, which, as I say, I just don’t get.
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The short answer is that it’s an American thing. Trouble is, no one can figure out what “patriotism” actually means. It often seems like it’s nothing more than a cudgel to bang the other guy over the head with.
The article referenced by the OP is advocating what might be called a “soft” patriotism, which most of us can get behind. But is it really patriotism? There’s the rub.
And FWIW, most of this stuff my kids did learn in school. I certainly wasn’t the one drilling them in the state capitals.
[QUOTE=Diogenes the Cynic]
I’ve never really gotten “patriotism.” It’s an emotion I’ve never felt and seems indistinuishable from mindless nationalism to me.
I’m all for educating kids on American civics, government, geography, history – all that jazz – but they need to make the value judgements for themselves, not have them instilled. The one value I think should be impressed upon kids is the importance of (and the relative rarity of) the right to dissent. Teaching kids that they must, or even should show any “deference” to elected officials or a rag on a stick is contrary to how I understand American values. Being an American means you don’t have to defer to jack shit. I’m teaching my kids that they have a duty to look cross-eyed at their leaders and that they should defer to such drivel as flags or anthems only as much as they feel like.
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So you do realize the ideals what children grow up with do go through a grinder/mixing machine called teenage years and they decide that what their parents said is bollocks, and that they are going to believe whatever they want to believe.
What the teenagers don’t know [hee hee hee] is that it’s what you learned in your formative years that sneaks up on you and galvanizes into who you truely become inside, and what you believe to be true.
[QUOTE=Mr. Moto]
Oh come now, Diogenes. I know how you raise your kids from the childrearing discussions here, and you aren’t a particularly freewheeling parent. You have definite ideas on how kids ought to be raised, and back them up with discipline. Good for you, BTW. That’s how it ought to be.
I said deference, not obedience. There is a difference between the two, and you recognize it as well as I do. You wouldn’t ever tolerate one of your kids acting rudely to their teacher, right? At least not without really strong provocation?
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Rude, no. I’m not saying I would teach them do be gratuitously disrespectful or rude to other people as individuals, I want them to be wary of undue deference to or uncritical acceptance of symbolism and the superficial trappings of authority.
For instance, I teach them to be respectful to people in uniforms (be it police, military or other) but I also want them to know that a uniform does not necessarily make a person trustworthy. I want them to keep their eyes on authority at all times and teach them that they should never subsume their own moral sensibilities to (what I feel is) the idolotry of nationalism.
In short, I’m saying love your country – know the history, know how it works, know what makes it special – but don’t confuse the country with its symbols or its leaders and never let those things override your own conscience.
Mark Twain said that patriotism means being loyal to your country at all times and your government when it deserves it. That’s about the way I feel.
Yes, but i didn’t say I don’t want to impress any value judgements on them, I just want to make those impressions as minimalistic and useful as possible. I’m trying to stay very hands off about such amorphous things as religious and political thought and let them develop their own minds. I tell them that there are some questions that nobody knows the answer to, and that I’m no more of an oracle than anybody else. Some questions don’t have a right or wrong answer.
Incidentally, just to be a little more clear, when I talk about impressing the importance of the right to dissent, I’m talking about an appreciation for the fact that they CAN, not telling them they should do it for no reason, but to not be AFRAID to do it and to appreciate that others have the right to disagree with them too.
[QUOTE=Phlosphr]
So you do realize the ideals what children grow up with do go through a grinder/mixing machine called teenage years and they decide that what their parents said is bollocks, and that they are going to believe whatever they want to believe.
What the teenagers don’t know [hee hee hee] is that it’s what you learned in your formative years that sneaks up on you and galvanizes into who you truely become inside, and what you believe to be true.
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This is true. I turn more into my dad every day.
[QUOTE=Diogenes the Cynic]
This is true. I turn more into my dad every day.
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Me too!
I think that what he’s doing is reasonable. I like what he said about his son reading the bit about Tyranny at the Jefferson Memorial. This last bit of overwhelming stupid Patriotism we just went through seemed to have forgotten Jefferson altogether.
As for whether Nazism was Patriotic, I think it was very much about love for the Pater land. No true Scotsman is a lame argument here. It’s about the way you express your Patriotism, not rewriting the newspeak dictionary so it can make you feel better about being a Patriot.
When things went nuts here I felt all the more like a Patriot when I retorted against a lot of ‘Sand into Glass’ arguments.
America is a great country, I love it here, and I love the ideals it was founded on. I think this guy is doing a good thing, and that as far as American Patriotism goes he’s doing it right, because he is teaching them about the right to dissent and the genocide and slavery.
I agree with his notion of teaching them the state capitals. Knowing something about a state makes it less nebulous. I agree that if you don’t love Nevada you can’t love America. Nevada is one of those places where you can palpably feel the freedom. IMO it’s arguably the freest state in the country. I love it there. You don’t however have to love Connecticut to love America. ;p
[QUOTE=Mr. Moto]
Do you really define that as patriotism? I sure don’t. What that was was a perversion of patriotism, IMHO.
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Of course it’s patriotism; it’s simply patriotism for a country that went crazy-evil. That’s one reason why I don’t like patriotism; it tends to be uncritical.
[QUOTE=Mr. Moto]
The sort of general patriotism seen in the U.S. (respect for the Constitution, respect for the flag, deference toward public officials, public servants and military members, and knowledge of American history and culture) isn’t a frenzy at all, and is exactly the sort if thing I’m trying to teach my kids.
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That’s not the patriotism I see in America; I see millions of people who accuse anyone who regards America as imperfect, as anything other than the Greatest Country In The World as a traitor and terrorist. American patriotism is all about making speeches about freedom and then telling people to obey authority and conform, to be a Christian capitalist and to revere the rich and powerful. To always agree with the government and to regard all non-Americans as subhuman.
And since the flag and Nazis have come up, I find the American near-worship of the flag disturbingly similar to the way the Nazi’s plastered their flag on everything.
As for teaching my hypothetical kids patriotism, not a chance. They would already get far more of that than is healthy, and I don’t think a country is something worthy of loyalty or admiration anyway.
You those classes that tell teenage girls what it is like to have an irresponsible pregancy? Maybe they should save a few slots these days for 50 - 70 year old women.
[QUOTE=Shagnasty]
You those classes that tell teenage girls what it is like to have an irresponsible pregancy? Maybe they should save a few slots these days for 50 - 70 year old women.
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Traitor!
The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse must be riding and Doomsday is on its way. I actually agree with something the Diogenes said?
I have made sure my son knows the history of the US, warts and all. My son’s social studies teachers over the years have all told us that he is the most politically aware and knowledgeable student they have ever seen. He pays attention to what is happening not only here but around the world. If he is unsure of what the roots are to an issue, he reads up on it from various sources so he is not being fed a single line of thought. I tell him what I know and attempt to impart fair and balanced facts (not Fox News “fair and balanced” but info that is as objective as possible). If I don’t know something, I will help him find answers.
Our country was founded with certain ideals and it’s important to remember that we should always be striving to meet those ideals. Our successes and failures are not always the fault of our leaders but of ourselves because we chose them. It is our right and responsibility as citizens of this country to step forward and tell the Emperor that he is naked.
My son has seen me tilt at windmills at town council and school board meetings. He knows that I write letters to my local, state and federal representatives and knows that I never miss an election, no matter how minor it might seem. I want my voice to be heard, even if I am the only one dissenting. I will not sit back and grumble to myself if I disagree with what I see. I stand up and shout it out.
To me patriotism isn’t about wrapping yourself in the flag, parroting a pledge and blindly following what Uncle Sam says. It is about working to make your home a better place and to keep it from falling into disrepair. It’s taking pride in what you have and striving to not just preserve it but to improve upon the foundation. I love my country for what it can do right and ashamed of it for when it let’s us down. I served in the Army because I respect the idea of America and what it can be.
If the Dixie Chicks, Sean Penn, Susan Sarandon, Michael Moore, Cindy Sheehan and Al Frankin want to bad mouth America and insult it, then that is their right. I would never, never want them to lose the right to say what they want about America. I may not agree with them and they will never receive my financial support but that is because I find them and what they say offensive. But more offensive, still, would be censoring their right and ability to have their say. And that is what makes America great.
The stuff in the linked article isn’t patriotism, it’s basic education. A rudimentary knowledge of geography? The preamble to one of the most important documents ever written? That’s second grade, not patriotism.
I don’t know exactly what American patriotism is in this context or any other, but I’m fairly certain it’s got a lot to do with believing in the principles outlined in the Declaration and Constitution, and doing your best to live by those principles. Be nice to people, study history, relentlessly question authority, vote, keep yourself informed, pursue happiness. If you really want to raise patriotic kids, set a good example by doing the above. Paying them to memorize lists of states is, IMO, idiotic.
I read that article and remembered that I had a wooden USA jigsaw thing when I was a kid, and it was an awesome childhood flashback.
The state capitals were something I had to memorize in grade school. That alone was sort of pointless; paying my kids to do would be stupid. I’d rather pay them to do chores.
I’d prefer to just raise them to be educated in many things historical, geographical and political and let them decide on their own how they feel about the country they live in.
I’m not inclined to believe someone who constantly makes remarks like,
It was probably his attitude, not his teachings, that were the problem. This is the kind of person you hate to have on your side.