Once again, we find ourselves faced with a debate over the Pledge of Allegiance.
...
'Where they’re wrong is the words 'under God' are not a religious statement but they’re a statement of political philosophy,' Verm said. 'It was our Founding Father’s [sic] understanding that our rights don’t come from the state but they come from something higher than the state.
Rather a specious argument, I think. If they were talking about the Declaration of Independence, this would be valid:
We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.
The "under God" in the Pledge of Allegiance, however, has everything to do with religion, at least in the sense that it served to make us God-fearing Americans (and it was, of course, the Christian God, hence my distinction) "better than" them damn godless Commie bastards during the Cold War and the conflicts to come by directly associating ourselves with not just any god, but THE God, from whom all things that are good and right and true come. To the Government, and to the people of the time, it put us on the moral high ground. (The fact that many Communist nations had their own notions of religion and spirituality didn't matter one whit, and still doesn't because we're on to bigger and better religious wars, and that's a whole 'nother kettle of fish.)
I think that might still be part of the problem: the underlying mentality of the Cold War never truly faded from a lot of people's minds -- instead, it's expanded to include anyone who doesn't believe what the mythical "average white American" believes -- God, guns and country. And Honey Boo Boo. It's a statement that not only are we better than you, but that if you're against us you are not of God the way we are, and you goin' to hell. It's the statement that says that because you're not a Christian, you're bad and wrong; that because you're not of European descent, you're bad and wrong; because you might have a different political philosophy, you're bad and wrong; and so forth and so on.
Many people -- including a hell of a lot of Christians -- condemn that thinking in, say, contemporary jihadis. Those people are quick to point out that the Qur'an demands the killing of anyone who does not believe in Allah and the teachings of His prophet. Examining it at least semi-dispassionately, however, one cannot help but see a similarity in the way of thinking. Obviously, there's a divergence between the two (at least since the Middle Ages) -- I mean, I don't see Christians running around behaving like murderous beasts who've served notice on society that they're rabid and must be put down. And, lest anyone think otherwise, no, I'm neither an ISIS sympathizer nor a Communist.
Still in all, the debate over things like the Pledge demonstrates the absoluteness of belief that, well, we're better because we're "One nation under God." And, of course, that god is the -only- god that means a damn. Think that's not true? My stock response when someone points out to me that "WE ARE ONE NATION UNDER GOD" is "Which one?" That garners looks from the "what the hell are you talking about, 'which one?'" to "Ugh. You're one of those." Often, these come with comments such as "Well, there's only one god." At that point, I generally quit the conversation, because frankly, I don't have the patience to explain that there are a multitude of pantheons and attendant gods, goddesses and spirits who are actually still valid to a multitude of people throughout the world. I've gotten to the point where it would go something like this:
Mason: ::confused:: "Bacchus ... ?"
Rube: "The Greek god of whydontchareadafuckingbook."
-Callum Blue and Mandy Patinkin in Dead Like Me
So, "under God" has everything to do with religion and a nationalistic sense of moral superiority, but nothing whatsoever to do with true spirituality. As a person of deep faith, I believe that my inalienable rights as a human being come from That What's Greater Than Us, sure okay. As a person who was born and raised in America, I believe that the rights granted to me as a citizen of the United States come not from the God or the Bible (despite the fact that many of our Founding Fathers* were Deists**) but from the Constitution of the United States of America. Whether one wants to believe it or not, the Bible and the Constitution are two different documents, in the same way Yahweh and Thomas Jefferson are two different entities. That's kind of why the Bible isn't the Law of the Land.
That, and the fact that of the billions of people in this nation, only a fraction of them believe in the Christian God. HOLY CRAP I KNOW. The girl/family bringing the lawsuit believes her right to say "under God" in the Pledge should not be abridged (which really they're not) because some people don't want to say it because they don't believe in any sort of god. She believes they should just not say those words.
Here's a thought: how about you say those words in your heart, rather than trying to force other people to be subject to your belief? Because by doing what you're doing, you are putting it all up in our faces, whether you realize it or not. You're implicitly saying "my belief in God is sanctioned by the State, while your disbelief is not." That's really not a far cry from the establishment of a national religion as far as I'm concerned, and that's not particularly inclusive not only of atheists/humanists, but of anyone else, like those who follow the teachings of the Buddha, who base their beliefs in the Force, who follow Allah, or the Flying Spaghetti Monster, the Elder Gods, Zeus ... really do I need to go on? This is why the whole notion of "separation of Church and State" arose in the first place: so that anyone who wanted to be a part of this nation could be, without feeling separate or as though s/he was less of a human being. Of course, historically we've had a lot of trouble with that anyway, but I know we'd all like to think we've gotten beyond that and become more enlightened or something.
If that's the case, if we've learned from our missteps in this Great Experiment, why is the concept of inclusivity still such a difficult thing for us to grasp? Do so many of us still have this unconscious need to feel so superior to our fellowmen? That's what it comes down to. As a nation, we've gotten pretty big for our britches, and I don't think we can really wear them comfortably anymore. We have to check our collective head and get hold of the national ego that's gotten so completely out of control that we cannot stand the idea of others not doing what we are.
If we don't, I'm truly concerned for all of us. Otherwise, the little blooms of vitriol that we're seeing in these relatively minor debates that pop up are going to grow into giant mutated plants like that one in "Little Shop of Horrors" and devour us all.
If we lose our nation, will it really matter if we've got the power of the Lawd behind us or not? I don't really expect it will; rather, our religious and spiritual beliefs will revert back to residing where they belong: in our hearts, between Deity and ourselves. Why don't we forestall the coming self-destructive storm and allow that reversion to happen now?
*If you can't spell this without putting an apostrophe in it, I have issues with you anyway.
** Holy crap not necessarily Christians, I'm tired of hearing that too so STFU.
No comments:
Post a Comment