I Don’t Pledge Allegiance To The Flag

Yesterday, we honored the lives that were lost 14 years ago during the attack on the Twin Towers. Since that tragic event, we have upped our national security in order to prevent another from happening. We look down upon the members of al-Qaeda who were responsible for the attacks, criticizing their nationalistic actions. So, why is it, then, that Americans insist on requiring children enrolled in school to perform nationalistic actions as well? The Pledge of Allegiance, written in its initial form in 1892 by Francis Bellamy, is recited every morning by millions of students around the country, a ritual that starts on the first day of kindergarten and lasts until the day we check out of high school. Rituals, like these, can seem like a non-issue, when in reality, requiring students to recite the Pledge is overly nationalistic.

I stopped standing for the Pledge of Allegiance in the eighth grade. What I didn’t understand then, that I still struggle with now, is why my patriotism has to be verified by these words. I am grateful for my rights and those who died for me to have them. I would rather live in this country than any other. However, I do not pledge my allegiance to the flag. I refuse to partake in an act of indoctrination disguised as patriotism.

The first thing we need to understand is the difference between nationalism and patriotism.  To be patriotic is to have a sense of love for where you are from. Nationalism is a more extreme version of that. It’s the belief that where you are from is not only the greatest place to live, but because you are from there, you are inherently better than people from elsewhere, which then results in acts of nationalism (ex. terrorist attacks by ISIS).

Our pledge guarantees “liberty and justice for all.” But in the past, and even in recent months, our nation has not upheld that statement. We have been struggling with police brutality and the refusal, by many, to accept the civil rights of others. Until Americans can say that every person is truly equal, that there is no discrimination, we cannot allow this untruthful statement to be recited by our children ad infinitum.

The very fact that only schoolchildren are required to recite the Pledge daily reveals its inherent corruption. Once students graduate and are employed, they are no longer expected to reel off the words in the Pledge. Doing this is just as wrongly nationalistic as it would be for schools in Iraq to force their students to pledge allegiance to the Islamic State. If we wish to teach the younger generations of Americans not to perform acts of terror, we should not indoctrinate them with words they may never understand. When I am at a sporting event and everyone stands up to recite the Pledge, I get uncomfortable. It feels robotic, to participate in saying the same words, at the same time, in the same way as thousands of other people. Why do we view this action as somehow better and more respectable than the people of Germany reciting The Fuehrer Oath when Hitler was in power?

I pledge that I will respect my rights and those of others. I pledge that I will vote in every election I am alive for and to partake in meaningful conversations about our political system. I pledge that I will stand up for my beliefs, that I will exercise my rights to speak, believe, write, and protest. I pledge that I will love living in this country and love the people who fight for me to continue living in it. I do not, however, pledge my allegiance to an inanimate object that symbolizes a nationalistic tone that we want our children to invest in. Instead of forcing their allegiance every day, let’s work together to make this country one that children want to pledge their hearts and lives to without being required to.