MY COUNTRY TIS OF THEE

Lately I have been on Facebook, and I’m wondering what I am doing on it. What I’m finding disturbing is a lot of people are putting stuff up at times that just gets silly in the least.

For instance there are little slogans they pick up for gun control, abortion and gay rights. Issues about which a social network I suppose should concern itself with. But the troubling thing for me is that most of the things posted, are not thought out. There are people that profess their faith, get preachy and try to sell it to others. Then they go ahead and glorify the military, the flag and the attitude that this country is holy, beyond God’s reach even. They assume the position of God and determine that some of us will die and go to hell, regardless what we are really saying.

If you are for peace: why not for gay marriage and gay rights? If you are for abortion, how is it you don’t want the death penalty? If you are for the death penalty, are you for abortion? Must I raise the flag every day and shout out God bless America, or will my paying my taxes and voting be enough? If I wrap myself in the flag, am I condemning everyone else in the world other than Americans? Why are we so preoccupied with proving our religion, our patriotism and our point of view?

Is it not enough that this country has such a great system that we don’t need fear, or hype, or convincing, just our use of law and order, and our own set of values to live without fanfare, without self-righteousness, go to our own church quietly and vote for who we want privately?

I see things on the net that bend the truth, to prove a point that can’t seem to be proven with real fact because they don’t investigate it. I have been a victim myself of taking things for face value and realized I should have taken a closer look. A Viet Nam or Korean war veteran hides from a fireworks display because he is shell-shocked, and we post pictures of Marine Corps or air force or naval ships under a US flag. That jingoism is what made a lot of men dead, a lot of men or should I say young boys go out in harm’s way and come back in body bags, or psychologically crippled or physically ruined for the rest of their lives. And let’s not forget the widows, mothers and children who are part of their lives, are they not harmed for life too?

We need a standing army, we also need trucks to haul freight, neither should be glorified during a peace time, we should be celebrating peace, spending our energies finding lost children and starving families, and let go of the jingoism, it is never any good, and just fuels false pride.