[Feral]

When I started to come aware of myself, I started having problems with it.
First was the 'under god' part. I was never comfortable with that.
Then the whole thing started getting to me. Why the hell were my teachers forcing me to affirm my devotion to a country, that at that point I had hardly learned about, simply because I live there? Because I was born there? When people started thrusting religion at me, I became more aware of indoctrination. And I do not like it.

[hannahintj]

When I said it during school, I would omit "under God." It is discriminatory against atheists and any theological belief that isn't monotheism.

[GeologyRocks]

Hmm same here. In my thread "told off a teacher" today it was over the pledge.

It's unconstitutional...period. If anyone looks up the history of it and why it was changed and when our government started making kids say it you would see it was nothing but a brain washing campaign.

And to anyone who is atheist it's a HUGE slap in the face. Not just for the "under god" part but the fact that when the USA started making kids say the pledge it was during the cold war. They were afraid of the "atheistic communists" as all of us atheists are considered "commies" by the ultra right. So they were uniting children to support their government without question AND to strengthen their belief in god, to fight "atheistic communism".

The people who get into the pledge are some god and country tea bagging morons in the USA. And they want to talk about flag burning, fashioning the American flag into every conceivable piece of clothing and wearing it is pretty offensive. I mean...fly the flag. Don't wear it. The only ones who "wear" it are dead service members as a shroud and over the casket.

[Betamax]

Not sure if someone posted this, sorry if it was. Just a clip from one of my favorite comedians, Doug Stanhope, on the pledge of allegiance.


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[anticlimatic]

	Originally Posted by titi monkey To view links or images in this forum your post count must be 2 or greater. You currently have 0 posts.
	Kind of stupid to force children to recite things they don't understand.

The point of the pledge isn't really to understand it, particularly for preschoolers and kindergarteners (the only years I ever recall saying the pledge in school).

The point is to establish a sense of community and social tradition. Why NTs would be largely against this (or fail to even see it, or it's merits) isn't much of a surprise. It's good for kids to be submerged in things they don't understand; such is the life ahead of them. It taps into the harmony of group submission, which is a pretty deep principal...and although the modern era seems to think that only ego-boosting/stroking/inflating indoctrination is healthy, I'm a bit more old testament in my life philosophy.

[titi monkey]

Originally Posted by anticlimatic To view links or images in this forum your post count must be 2 or greater. You currently have 0 posts.

The point of the pledge isn't really to understand it, particularly for preschoolers and kindergarteners (the only years I ever recall saying the pledge in school). The point is to establish a sense of community and social tradition. Why NTs would be largely against this (or fail to even see it, or it's merits) isn't much of a surprise. It's good for kids to be submerged in things they don't understand; such is the life ahead of them. It taps into the harmony of group submission, which is a pretty deep principal...and although the modern era seems to think that only ego-boosting/stroking/inflating indoctrination is healthy, I'm a bit more old testament in my life philosophy.

Oh? And what else would you have them recite?

[solivagant]

Jingoistic bullshit.
I hear they do something similar in North Korea... and nowhere else in the world.

[painfulltruf]

Just part of the Industrialized educational system attempting to create a compliant tax paying work force and military cannon fodder.