They use to always play the national anthem before the opera in Tulsa so that folks would get it out of their system and not sing along. Not really, that was the joke, but people in the audience loved the opportunity to show off. They don’t do it at all in Austin.
Playing the anthem isn’t an old one, but it’s a tradition and I don’t have a problem with that. Go ahead and play it. But trying to force the players to participate in the ritual in order to demonstrate approval of the Trump agenda is another issue entirely. I find it deliciously ironic that players now, instead of kneeling quietly, are reenacting one of the most pointed and controversial moments from the 1968 Olympics.
When we are in a world war playing the national anthem before public events makes a lot of sense. We are not in a world war now, or even in a declared war. We are, instead, using the public’s reverence for the national anthem for commercial reasons, only. Of course we should stop doing this, but we won’t, because we, the owners, believe this helps our bank accounts.
We have also weaponized our national anthem. We are using it to try to force people who want to improve our nation to shut up and obey our government. The simple fact that little Donnie, the faux president, wants to force us to shut up, is proof that we shouldn’t do so.
The part you don’t see in the picture and that people don’t remember is that the two athletes took off their shoes to protest black poverty and wore beads around their necks to protest lynchings. One unzipped his jacket (major protocol breach) to symbolize blue collar workers, and he wore a black shirt over the ‘USA’ on his jersey.
Most importantly, they still bowed their heads to the flag and the anthem. There was nothing anti-American about it - just anti-racist policy and anti-racist social norms. It’s as if they looked at all the solemn symbolism the Olympics loves to indulge itself in, and said, You want symbolism? Here’s some symbolism for you.
Boy, you are literal minded! I meant moral obligation, sort of like standing for the pledge of allegiance, which it is perfectly okay not to participate in! I am very much living in the right country, thank you! Please don’t law-splain your point to me or oh-so-rigorously point out the legal and constitutional flaws in my own point of view, especially when rendered on a forum where, one, not everyone is a lawyer, and two, snark is not discouraged, and three, shut up!
Just to be clear, in my original comment/snark/miserable failure of a post, I did not mean to imply that YOU were like a vet with ptsd, but that the Trump Complainers were, demanding that football players not kneel and instead stand with their hands over their heart while the national anthem is sung and cynically conflate protest with being anti-military. Boy, I hope I have made myself clear now!
Snark, explained in such great detail, is not snark – it’s garbage. Back to the writing board.
No, it’s not, and no, it doesn’t. There’s no obligation to play the anthem. It’s something that got started during the Cold War as a bit of jingoistic nonsense. And it doesn’t strengthen the Union at all. It makes us weaker. It contributes to the lip-service patriotism that says ‘you must make a fetish of the trappings of the nation and its military’. At the same time, it gives those who do so a free pass to ignore the principles on which the nation’s foundations are laid.
Worshiping the military and the flag, playing The Star-Spangled Banner, God Bless America, doing color guards and military flyovers… these are a sign of rot, of spackling over the holes and termite-infested beams. They excuse those who embrace them, let them make cheering into ‘proof’ of patriotism, while ensuring they will sink deeper and more firmly into the intolerance and insularity that pits them against those of us who say that the principles of freedom and democracy are more important to the long-term well-being of the nation than the trappings of its pride and glory.
I don’t watch much football, and have never been to an NFL game. But I do watch a lot of baseball on the computer via MLB app, and have been to about 250 MLB games in person. The anthem–Fine, if you have to do that. But the rest of it–Meh. Soldiers throwing out the first pitch, etc.–I can do without it. I am here to watch a baseball game, not acknowledge flags and patriotism. If I wanted to that, I would go to a Veterans Day parade.
