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Minnesota City Council Stops Reciting Pledge of Allegiance
Is it really a big deal that a small Midwestern city stops reciting the Pledge of Allegiance? My answer is, “yes,” and I’ll tell you why. The city council of St. Louis Park voted unanimously to stop reciting the Pledge. Here were some of their remarks regarding this decision:
Ellen Hertz, a business owner in the city, says she has no problem with the change, but doesn’t think it was necessary.
‘In terms of what would offend people and what offends me, that’s not at the top of the list,’ Hertz said.
Mayor Jake Spano wasn’t at the meeting when this change was approved. He says getting rid of the pledge wasn’t a big priority for him.
Spano told CBS Minnesota via email: ‘I think there are more substantive things we should be working on to make our city more open and welcoming.’
Welcoming to whom? I checked the demographics of the city: The population is just under 50,000; the city is 81% white; 96% have attended high school, 4% have attended college; the median household income is $71,346. In other words, it’s a pretty prosperous, blue-collar, Midwestern community. So who is pushing this agenda?
Even though the vote was unanimous, they are going to revote on the issue July 8.
One Council Member had this to say:
‘I hope it’s not too controversial,’ [Tim] Brausen said. ‘Our community tends to be a very welcoming and increasingly diverse community, and we believe our citizens will understand … Unfortunately, some of us feel like patriotism has been so politicized that it’s almost used as a weapon against people.’
His comment makes me wonder about a few things: Who originally proposed this change? Why would his citizens “understand?” What makes him think their community is “increasingly diverse” when it’s not? And why does he think that’s important?
Why do so many council members seem indifferent to this decision?
(I couldn’t find a tally of other city councils that don’t recite the pledge.)
It’s too bad when patriotism is seen as a highly politicized issue.
Published in Politics
Because the “under God” stipulation has always been a problem for them.
You may be right, but I don’t think they like to be under anything at all, Yehoshua, especially when it comes to supporting the United States.
Prager University just put up this video of Niall Ferguson, who talks about it’s being a fine time to become an American–it’s great!
unless it’s Big Brother
So are Zen Buddists class liberals, or visa versa?
Minnesota is nuts and has been for a long time. Al Franken. Jesse Ventura. Ilhan Omar. Jumping into cold lakes after getting out of the sauna. Good walleye and canoeing, though.
You left out that corrupt guy who just became their AG, I think.
Take your pick. I think that Zen Buddhists gravitate to the Left, and the Left gravitates to Buddhism. Jews gravitate to Buddhism, too, so it’s a double whammy.
Thanks for the reminder, @bobthompson. Keith Ellison? Who is also Muslim.
I cannot like this statement at all.
I love America. I am a patriot and a nationalist. America make my heart sing. She is the greatest nation in the history of Mankind. No other nation has ever been her equal, in power, glory, or liberty.
We may feel the Republic’s best days are in the past, that liberty has retreated, but I say her best days are ahead. Freedoms and Liberties wax and wane. There are area for grave concern. Yet, we live in an America where people cannot be rounded up based on being from Japan. Experiments cannot be conducted on people against their will. Blacks are not forced to live apart from whites in the South. Slavery is thing to be hated.
I want America to be better, she is far from perfect. Today, conservatives, or libertarians, or classical liberals or whatever fancy name people want to use to prove that they are not part of the great mass of sheeple, too often look at America as not being perfect as they see it should be and turn from it. Just like the left does.
America, always. God Bless her, and Guide her through the night, with His light from above.
Thank you for saying it. It’s way more credible coming from you.
I think we established earlier that the Pledge was created before Fascism. We should try not to throw the word Fascism around just because we don’t like the Pledge–that’s the kind of thing the Left does.
Susan, what do you think “increasingly diverse” means? In Minnesota, a city of 50,000 people that is only 81% white is on the high end of racial diversity. In 2000 it was 89% white, in 2010 it was 83% white, and now it’s 81%. The proportions of black, Hispanic/Latino, Asian, Pacific Islander, Native American, other races, and mixed race all increased during that time period.
Like MWM and Arahant I have a mildly negative view of the Pledge ever since I learned about its origins. I don’t like a group of free citizens feeling social or political pressure to take an oath. However, when it comes to officers of the government or members of the military, I think some kind of pledge is warranted.
I taught 5th grade for 37 years. The Social Studies curriculum was U.S. History. These were 10 and 11 year old students for the most part. The first week of class we did not say the pledge instead we discussed what each part meant, what they were saying, what a pledge (promise) was so that during the second week and following when we did say the pledge they had some idea about what they were saying. Sometimes I would have a Jehovah Witness in class and he or she would say they wouldn’t repeat it. Sometimes some of the other kids would make some remark about this. This gave me a chance to talk about pledges, promises and who or what you are promising and that these people believed the only one they could properly pledge allegiance to was God. The students understood this and respected the Jehovah Witness for their belief. A very few times someone would came to me and say the could or could no longer say the pledge after reading about the slavery of the early years. I would talk to them about this and then ask them to stand quietly and respectfully while we said the pledge. The students learned a little about disagreements and respect, no one had to repeat anything they didn’t want to and I had no problems with either administrators, parents of students.
That’s how I dealt with these questions with 10 year old students.
Forgive me for posting and running, and for not thoroughly reading the material I’m referring to, but Fascism didn’t come into existence ex nihilo in the 20th century:
I think the website indicates that 57% have graduated from college with an additional 4% attending college right now. Otherwise, that would be some wacky demographics.
It has a fascist flavor to it. It’s on the spectrum. At the very least it pressures people to pledge unthinking difference to the state and implies an unsettling amount of conformity.
I’ve always thought the pledge of allegiance was childish. I also do not like loyalty tests. I think city councils should spend more time in their meetings taking care of trash collection and road repair and spend less time on childish loyalty tests.
As it should. Our nation is not united by religion.
Bryan, I don’t make the perfect the enemy of the good, which is what many libertarians do, but most especially the Progressives and SJWs. With them, if there’s one imperfection or perceived imperfection, it’s all bad and tainted.
I agree with you on the best days possibly being ahead of us, but we need to get out there and educate people on how and why we became the greatest ever in history, not just yell that we are the greatest. A lot went into creating and building this country, and we can’t throw those things away and replace them only with patriotism.
God’s many blessings have not come to us because we were “America,” but because our Founders created something very different intentionally. They had studied history and mankind and understood the liberty and freedoms, as well as the responsibilities it took, to create a free people, not based on nationality or patriotism, but upon a set of ideas and rules: Freedom, small government, free markets, addressing problems at the level closest to the problem by the people, the Rule of Law, and the guidance of Almighty Providence. These ideas, put into practice, created the greatest engine of prosperity and wealth creation ever seen. They lifted the world.
If your patriotism for America encapsulates these ideas, then I am fine with your patriotism. But if your patriotism is of the blood and soil variety, it’s not a good thing. There is a very big difference.
Their oath is to the Constitution and laws, not the flag and “republic.” As I said earlier in the thread, that is an oath I can take without qualms.
This is exactly how I have dealt with it for my quarter century of teaching. When children learn about something and begin to understand what it represents, then they can make a personal decision. I only asked that my non-sayers would stand and be respectful while the others said it. Some of my students had family members in the military. Some of my students have been Jehovah Witnesses. But, when they understood what the pledge was about–we’re not worshiping the flag–we’re pledging loyalty to our Republic–then they could make an informed decision. I never have had a problem reciting it. I love this Republic, and the flag, and the history (checkered as it is). I have ancestors who served in all the wars ever fought since 1775, and I have ancestors who hid in the Rocky Mountains in a tiny valley to get away from the law, so that they could continue to support their polygamist wives that they married according to their beliefs.
One Nation with Liberty and Justice for all.
Sounds like support of those ideals to me.
Where does that mention land, or race or birth. We spilled blood in 1812 to assert that America is open to new citizens.
I understand the history quite well.
I also feel it. My love of America is not about reason, nor should it be. If she falls to evil, I will always want to fight to free her.
Abandoning it for the wrong reasons is hardly productive. It is being abandoned because of a silly embracement of what we might call fascism not because of some new internationalism. The change is rooted in ignorance, spite and bitterness fostered by narrow small minded people not because it pledges to a symbol of a set of ideas instead of the ideas themselves. It’s the ideas they dislike.
So, Americans are the only people on earth who are allowed to be patriotic? Because “blood and soil” patriotism is not a good thing? The globalists will love that idea, but of course, they are against Americans being patriotic too.
You are over thinking this. What you are saying is tantamount to saying that it’s ok to love your family as long as your family was created by adoption, but if you are genetically related to your family, watch out! Not a good thing. I know: a country isn’t the same thing as a family, but if you are against nationalism and patriotism for most of the world, what do you plan on replacing those things with?
I believe that all people all over the world should love their country, regardless of whether their country happens to be the greatest country on earth or not; loving one’s country is not the same thing as loving the government of one’s country. It is totally possible to love one’s country and hate its’ government at the same time. It would seem that those of us who believe in small, local government that will be accountable to the people would be supporters of nationalism and patriotism, as opposed to entities like the EU. We all know what leftists want to replace nationalism with; what do you want to replace nationalism with?
I have come to the conclusion that I made a mistake in coming to America. I must live through this difficult period in our national history with the people of Germany. I will have no right to participate in the reconstruction of Christian life in Germany after the war if I do not share the trials of this time with my people … Christians in Germany will have to face the terrible alternative of either willing the defeat of their nation in order that Christian civilization may survive or willing the victory of their nation and thereby destroying civilization. I know which of these alternatives I must choose but I cannot make that choice from security.[30] -Dietrich Bonhoeffer
Considering that he referred to the German people as “his” people, it sounds like Dietrich Bonhoeffer was a blood and soil nationalist; he was a blood and soil nationalist who prayed for his own country to be defeated in a war because he knew that his country was wrong, but that did not cause him to reject the whole concept of countries entirely. Hitler was a nationalist; those who defeated Hitler, including Germans who opposed him, were also nationalists.
It is a big deal and this goes in line with the Colin Kaepernick line of protesting, and, indeed, hating of America. I suspect this will be a trend among Liberals. And apparently after reading some of the comments here among those on the right. I suspect they are more Libertarian than conservative. If you can’t have a communal moment of honor to the country, people, and traditions in which you live, then such a nation will surely weaken. If you can’t instill that love and honor for one’s country, people, and traditions in the youth, you are sowing the seeds of a nation’s decline. In effect, this has been going on since the late sixties, and yes the nation has declined.
By the way, trying to find time for Ricochet. It’s just tough with my schedule, but doubly so during baseball season.
Perfect. What is there to object to? Nothing. To my surprise I’m finding it more disgraceful that people on the right reject the pledge.
I’m very impressed, @dalegustafson. What a gift you were to your students! I can understand the wording is uncomfortable for some folks, but there are many things in life that I think are meaningful but don’t fit some idea of the way I would like them to be. But they serve a larger purpose. Thank you for being such a thoughtful teacher.
I think that we have to be fair toward the people who are not comfortable with the pledge, and those people who reject it. To me, there’s a big difference. I have little problem with people who are not comfortable with the wording or the process; I always believe people are entitled to their feelings. But I would hope that if they were in a situation where the pledge was recited, they would stand respectfully.
Let’s not be the thought police, folks. We get enough of that from the Left!
Edit: good to see you, @manny!