Patriotism

If love is blind, patriotism has lost all five senses.
— William Blum

Mass shootings have become routine in the United States and speak to a society that relies on violence to feed the coffers of the merchants of death. Given the profits made by arms manufacturers, the defense industry, gun dealers and the lobbyists who represent them in Congress, it comes as no surprise that the culture of violence cannot be abstracted from either the culture of business or the corruption of politics.

All it takes for a society to express fear, paranoia, confusion, and a sort of mad country (riffing on mad cow disease, bovine spongiform encephalopathy) mental disease is a toxic brew of narcissism, propaganda, amnesia, planned and perceived obsolescence and a transnational economic barbarism against the collective masses, and we end up here:

American football quarterback Colin Kaepernick exploded across national headlines in 2016 for his evolving, bended-knee protest against systemic racism and police brutality. Kneeling during the national anthem became a rallying point for athletes not just in professional football but in other sports and at other levels, including among high school students.

Seems like in the past 15 years or so the idea of patriotism has changed some. More polarized, more tied to political or ideological views. I’ve never seen patriotism or the flag connected to either; I see the flag more as the symbol of a nation that allows the freedom to express those ideas. That alone deserves my respect.
— Macy Moore, U.S. Marine

I don’t live in the U.S. any longer. I did, for over forty years, but left for good almost twenty years ago. But I return, often, and I even returned and stayed for a year. I returned again this last week as an invitee of the Buffalo/Niagara Falls Film Festival (more on that below).

So I wish you well, Sarge, give ’em Hell!
Kill me a thousand or so
And if you ever get a war without blood and gore
I’ll be the first to go
— Phil Ochs, The Draft Dodger’s Rag
Guess that makes me a proud bitch.
— Teresa Kaepernick, Colin Kaepernick’s mother’s in response to Trump’s comment about her son

By all means, let’s talk about patriotism and President Trump’s call for “respect for our Country, Flag and National Anthem.”

The issue of kneeling has nothing to do with race. It is about respect for our Country, Flag and National Anthem. NFL must respect this!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) September 25, 2017

The spectacle is the nightmare of imprisoned modern society which ultimately expresses nothing more than its desire to sleep.  The spectacle is the guardian of sleep.
— Guy Debord, The Society of the Spectacle

As a tender of youth – 16 to 21 year olds, as my clients are in foster care, held by the state or some other guardian, or on their own, but still labeled as foster youth – I find the topics of our time more magnified by the presence of the ever-vaunting capitalist mindset about time, work, energy, technology, digital supremacy, patriotism, consumerism, punishment, surveillance, worthiness.