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Most of us are familiar with these expressions of patriotism. However, for many young people, they don’t quite make sense. Because many of us only gained political awareness after the Obama administration, we don’t actually know what a convincing liberal patriotism looks like. In fact, when we listen to the current presidential candidates, we have no idea what a convincing liberal patriotism looks like. anything It sounds like it. On the debate stage last week, amid the botched statistics, outrageous lies and general incomprehension, patriotism was silent. We can’t help but wonder how anyone could feel that patriotic after that?
To many of us college students, the word itself reeks of antiquity, stuffiness, colonialism—even political incorrectness, like Gore Vidal. wrote exist nation 1991: “Patria-pater-father. So where’s Mom? Didn’t she help Dad turn the American wilderness into a concrete desert with gleaming golden arches?” Moreover, when many of the most daunting problems we face threaten not only national but global, it seems that our solutions should be expressed not in patriotic terms but in global ones. The word no longer seems to work for us. It rings hollow, a tool of politicians, a joke that Howard Zinn readers would enjoy. You can’t fool us with your grand gestures, we think. Paul Revere belongs to your nostalgia, not ours. America the Beautiful? Come on. We’d been to Europe while studying abroad, and the way of life there was pretty highbrow.
In the same article, Pollitt asks, “What has flag-waving finally done for us?” If flag-waving refers to the rebellious impulse, Kid Rock concerts, or a new wave of self-proclaimed Christian nationalists like Charlie Kirk, then Pollitt is certainly correct. But if flag-waving means calling upon the American creed to serve justice, peace, or equality—criticizing the country while appealing to its “better angels”—then the question seems to trivialize Frederick Douglass’s “What did the Fourth of July mean to slaves?Jimi Hendrix’s infamous Woodstock Extradition (For an example of patriotic protest by a Gen Z artist, see Olivia Rodrigo’s unapologetic reply overthrow Roe v. Wade) No reasonable person would equate all of the above examples, nor would they doubt the basic sincerity of Douglass when he spoke of the “great principles” of the Declaration of Independence, nor would they doubt the basic sincerity of Hendrix when he spoke of the “great principles” of the Declaration of Independence. explain He said his performance was “beautiful” in response to criticism that it was offensive.
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