Flags and colors
Now everybody knows I'm not an expert on patriotism and I don't claim to be. So I admit I just don't understand.
I was listening to a country station the other day (BIG mistake) - just for informative reasons, I don't like country music. So I get hit by a dozen songs about the "red white and blue".
Flashback. A few years ago Croatia was in post-war national fervor and all you could hear was the national anthem... and "our colors: red white and blue".
How ironic.
I can see people reminding me of my lack of patriotic conscience of whatever kind. But they don't have my experience either. What would you think? You live in one country and then years and thousands of miles later you think you are in another world and you're not. I know Americans and Croatians refer to two different flags but when it comes to raising the national emotional temperature those two countries did exactly the same thing. And each one of them thinks they will emphasize the best of what they have, their uniqueness by advocating just this one thing, that they are all to be identified by these colors.
Both countries had and have to overcome a violent invasion from a hateful enemy... who on his part, I am certain, waved his flag in pride - probably believing that this flag gave him a superiority and justification to go and destroy. A flag (not just the national-representing kind) emphasizes the collective and not the individual and so responsibility is shifted. It's easier to do things in the name of XYZ than out of one's own conviction.
Identity is not a flag. It can be a symbol of where you come from or where you grew up or where you chose to live but it is not you. You can wave it in gratitude I believe, but not in pride.
But now to a more important patriotic question: Does wearing a bikini with the Stars and Stripes on your butt fall under patriotic or idiotic ?
: )
Posted at 02:18 PM on July 25, 2002