3 suspended for not standing for Pledge of Allegiance Quote:
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Three small-town eighth-graders in Minnesota were suspended by their principal for not standing Thursday morning for the Pledge of Allegiance, violating a district policy that the principal now says may soon be reworded to protect free speech rights.
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What do you think about this? The Pledge was not something I seriously thought about until after I graduated high school. It was just something we said every morning. Their were a few people in my classes who refused to stand as well. I thought they were silly at the time, but I also thought the Pledge of Allegiance was somewhat silly.
But recently I've wondered whether it is proper to pledge allegiance to A FLAG. What inherent properties does our flag have that make something like that necessary?
Of course there has been debate in recent years about whether it is proper to include the words "under God" in the pledge. But maybe we should consider whether The Pledge itself is proper.
When I did some research, I discovered some intriguing facts about our pledge of allegiance:
It was written in 1892, and was not officially recognized by the United States until 1945.
The Pledge was originally written to help promote a flag selling campaign by a magazine looking to boost subscriptions.
It was written by Francis Bellamy, a military socialist.
The original salute for The Pledge was very similar to the Nazi salute:
http://members.arstechnica.com/x/xai...llegiance2.jpg
The words "under God" were not added until 1952.
Sources:
Pledge of Allegiance - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia Francis Bellamy - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia Chapter Three: American Socialists and Reformers
Back to the article, what do you think? Should students be compelled to stand and recite the pledge with their hand over their hearts? Is it good and necessary? Silly but harmless? Or even dangerous?
The pledge seems like a form of idolatry to me, and it seems ironic that the concept was created and promoted by a Baptist minister.
I think any form of blind patriotism is dangerous, whether it is allegiance to a state, or a flag.
What say you?