Re: American flags

[Robert Scott Gassler <rsgassle@xxxxxxxxx>]

I walk around Brussels every day and see the American flag on sweatshirts 
worn by Bulgarians and other items of clothing worn by people who could be 
Arabs for all I know.

Someone once told me that the French all cry when they sing their national 
anthem, whether they are leftists or rightists.

How about we defuse the whole issue by all wearing American flags on our 
lapel? I have one I'll wear on my trip to the States in a couple of weeks.

If anyone asks about it, I'll mention the struggle for freedom and 
democracy for all peoples, the proud leftist tradition in the US, the 
history of the moverments for peace and justice, etc.

Who could mess with that?

At 10:57 24/03/04 -0500, you wrote:
> Last night as I watched coverage of the Bipartisan Commission on terrorism 
> chaired by Bob Kerrey, the war criminal ex-Senator who currently runs the 
> New School University with an iron fist, I was bowled over by the garish, 
> rhinestone-studded American flag on Madeleine Albright's jacket. This was 
> not a postage-stamp sized pin, but something about the size of a bar of soap.
>
> Meanwhile, John Kerry cannot be spotted without the obligatory flag on his 
> lapel. After September 11, liberal newsman Dan Rather began wearing an 
> American flag pin in his lapel. So does sportscaster Werner Wolf.
>
> The flag is ubiquitous in NYC storefront windows in my neighborhood. The 
> Chinese restaurant, the CVS pharmacy, the Russian barber shop, where I get 
> my buzzcuts, all have them.
>
> People in my building wear them, either on their lapel or as a pin on a 
> pocketbook. There is an American flag on the doorman's desk as there is at 
> nearly all the security guard stations at Columbia University.
>
> All of these flags are sported for one and one reason only--to tell the 
> onlooker that they support the war against terrorism and that they support 
> the president.
>
> The use of the flag to intimidate dissent began with Richard Nixon who 
> wore the pin himself, as did all of his top aides. Ever since then, there 
> have been repeated attempts to use the flag as an ideological weapon.
>
> On September 25, 1988 The Boston Globe reported on how the first George 
> Bush waved the flag against his opponent from Massachussetts Governor 
> Michael Dukakis, a contest whose themes will likely be played out this 
> year between his son and John Kerry:
>
> >>There are numerous parallels between the Bush and Nixon presidential 
> campaigns, as well as Nixon and Agnew's "law and order" assault on 
> Democratic congressional candidates in 1970.
>
> Joe McGinniss, the author of "The Selling of the President," an account of 
> Nixon's media campaign in 1968, recalled that "the flag was a consistent 
> motif" in Nixon commercials that year. Bush's carefully staged events, 
> which protect him from reporters' questions, are also similar to 
> Republican activities in 1968, when Nixon's handlers shielded him from the 
> press, McGinniss said.
>
> Republican candidates proudly wore American flag lapel pins like war 
> decorations that year.
>
> After Agnew was criticized for his approach, he worked a new line into his 
> speeches. He said he did not question anyone's "patriotism," only the 
> "judgment of the radical liberals."
>
> Bush uses the same language this year. When he assails Dukakis on the 
> Pledge of Allegiance, Bush adds, "I don't question his patriotism, I 
> question his judgment."<<
>
> So Kerry's campaign, in seeking to avoid Dukakis's mistake, is playing up 
> both the flag and his patriotism, as demonstrated by his military record. 
> Whatever value this has in electing Kerry is secondary to the effect it 
> has in reinforcing the "patriotic" mood that has gripped the nation.
>
> After September 11th, the insufferable Todd Gitlin put a positive spin on 
> the proliferation of American flags:
>
> >>The attack stirs, in other words, patriotism ­ love of one?s people and 
> desire to keep them from being hurt anymore. And then, too, the wound is 
> inverted, transformed into a badge of honor. It is translated into 
> protestation (?we didn?t deserve this?), and pride (?they can?t do this 
> to us?). Pride can go toward the quest for justice, the rage for 
> punishment, the pleasures of smugness. The dangers are obvious. But it 
> should not be hard to understand that the American flag sprouted first, 
> for many of us, as a badge of belonging, not a call to shed innocent blood.<<
>
> full: http://www.opendemocracy.net/debates/article-2-47-105.jsp
>
> I would challenge this interpretation on two grounds. First, we do not 
> need a "badge of belonging". The iconography of the flag is not meant to 
> draw people together. It is to *exclude* people who are not members of the 
> homeland. The post-September 11th period has been marked by a growing 
> xenophobia directed against the French, the Germans and any nation that 
> refuses to toe the line on the US wars of expansion. Also, it certainly is 
> a call to shed innocent blood. 10,000 Iraqis have been killed since the 
> war began. Until the American people can begin to understand their 
> suffering in the same terms as the WTC tragedy, no progress will be made 
> toward peace and reconciliation. To begin that process, it will be 
> necessary to reduce the role of the flag to what it once was, an official 
> symbol that belongs on Post Offices and other federal buildings.
>
> --
>
> The Marxism list: www.marxmail.org

Robert Scott Gassler
Professor of Economics
Vesalius College of the Vrije Universiteit Brussel
Pleinlaan 2
B-1050 Brussels
Belgium

32.2.629.27.15