Brian M Downing
Many in the movement see themselves as true patriots – descendants of homesteaders and workers and soldiers. Their love of America is deep and gut-level. They see others speak the appropriate words and stand for the Anthem but judge their affection as shallow and less forceful. They’re often deemed unpatriotic and perhaps unAmerican.
The country has undergone jarring, rapid changes in the last half century and patriotism has been greatly affected. The Vietnam war and its aftermath opened a chasm. It appears unbridgeable.
Vietnam
The victory of World War Two brought decades of celebration. Unified by proven institutions and beliefs, Americans looked ahead confidently. A smaller, but controversial war ended differently. Faith in America had been sent to Southeast Asia as surely as ground battalions and air squadrons.
Opponents of the war and those embittered by defeat became distant from and critical of patriotism. It had been exploited by politicians, who’d lied about the war’s origins and prospects. Moreover, it brought tens of thousands of deaths and many more casualties. America’s prestige and honor fell. The celebration quieted.
Unifying myths weakened, two countries came into being side by side, conflict loomed. Many saw patriotism as based on tall tales and dubious legends and as obscuring militarism and prejudice. Better to look around, learn more cosmopolitan ways, and appreciate other cultures. Leave the old ways to the elderly and rustics.
The prevalence, insistence, and purported superiority of this view irked the faithful and bred resentment and hope for renewal.
The American idea
The US became great because of hardworking people, religious values, and democratic principles. One rose according to talent and earnestness. The nation comprised and accepted many religions. Elections were fair and the rule of law prevailed. America prospered, rose to greatness, and became a beacon to the world.
History books have lost the romantic spirit of older texts that were written for, and sought to build, a unified nation. But the idea is still believed in, despite years of marginalization and ridicule. Devotion has become stronger to America’s ideals than to its institutions.
Military service
Honoring soldiers and veterans is part of local life: JROTC, drum and bugle corps, flags at hallowed ground for the fallen, blood and soil. Gun ownership goes hand in hand. Stories of the unity and purposefulness of the Second World War are incandescent reminders of who we should be today.
Veterans of all wars are respected, though more so World War Two vets, whose numbers are dwindling, and Vietnam vets, whose homecomings were shameful. Young men and women look forward to military service, as did their forbears. Wars are thought necessary and they must be seen through.
In much of the US, military service is sparse, usually limited to family lore from the long-gone days of conscription. War is to be avoided if not rejected out of hand. Memorial Day and Veterans Day are days off. Support for troops is displayed by bumper stickers and thanks of varying sincerity.
National consensus
Textbooks once spoke glowingly and nearly unanimously about the Republic. Consensus saw to that. History was filled with accounts of the westward spread of civilization, prosperity for all, farsighted leaders, and just wars that made for a better world.
Most of this has been qualified, balanced out, or turned on its head – so much so that any underlying general truth in the old histories is hard to recognize and defending it brings recrimination.
Assimilation was part of the American story. That’s what Irish, Jewish, Polish, and other people did. Civil rights leaders of the post-WW2 era dreamed of assimilation as an end point in their struggle. It’s now seen as betrayal of an identity. Minority groups seek to maintain their customs and languages. As James Baldwin said, why go into a burning building?
Traditionalists find this divisive and unpatriotic – all the more so because un-assimilating groups are joining hands with the other side.
©2024 Brian M Downing
Brian M Downing is a national security analyst who’s written for outlets across the political spectrum. He studied at Georgetown University and the University of Chicago, and did post-graduate work at Harvard’s Center for International Affairs. Thanks as ever to fellow Hoya Susan Ganosellis.