TRAIT 2: Visually Patriotic VS Silent Promotion

Before I moved to the US, I knew that I was embarking on a journey towards a proud nation that could be seen as bordering on obsessive in their patriotic duty. Whenever you watch a movie or television programme that is set in America, or even listen to American music, you can’t help but notice the patriotism that coats everything that you see or hear. In this entry I am going to consider why it is so noticeably important to be openly and obviously ‘American’, and why the need for promoting your home nation doesn’t seem to translate to us cousins across the water.

 

A righ’ Bri-ish housewarmin’ shin-dig!”

A few weeks ago, I organised a housewarming party in my lovely new apartment in Dover, Delaware. I decided that, as I am now residing much deeper into US territory, I would spin a British theme into the occasion as it seems to be almost exotic here. That made me think about all things British – the flag, the music, the food, and so on. The whole thing was such a classic ‘theme’, just like a beach theme or for the more adventurous type, anything beginning with the letter ‘z’ (how many of you said “Zee”?). It was at that moment that I realised … everything that we associate as being generally British, is just a cog in a theme’s wheel – a joke or a fun gimmick. On a general day to day basis, we don’t seem to openly celebrate our nation or the privilege of being British. Well, not unless there is some sort of Football game on or if a member of royalty is getting married – and of course we are not counting the Olympics! I mean a general feeling of patriotism, without the excuse of an event. I guess that we don’t really think about it much. When we go abroad, that is when we notice the not quite so obviously British things that we miss from home - like the NHS, the British accent or Tesco. But these are not the kind of things that you associate being patriotic with – can you imagine Americans going around and saying that they are being patriotic while talking about Walmart?
***As a side note, I cooked some amazing food at my house warming party (see image above) with great thanks to my Facebook friends for their advice and suggestions.***

 

Flagtastic!

When I first came to America, I flew into Boston through Philadelphia airport. My first experience of living in America was

in Philadelphia airport, walking to my next gate. I looked up to see a big picture of Obama in front of the United States flag. Then, the first time that I left Boston to explore the surrounding areas, every street that I drove down had the United States flag hanging proud from around 90% of the houses. When you are in Britain watching television programmes or movies and you see the excessive amounts of flags everywhere, you think that it must be for show and that they can’t possibly have that many people that are willing to hang up the flag outside of their house. Oh, how wrong you would be! The only thing that I can remotely relate it to, is how British people will religiously wear their football team shirts, and that it is a regular sight to see the football team scarf flying out of the window of a moving car when it is on its way to the game. So, in this way, American people seem to have the same dedication and patronage towards their country that a British person might show towards Leeds United (my Fiancé is a dedicated Leeds fan, so I apologise for any bias here). Of course, Americans are huge on sport as well, most Americans will follow at least one or two sports and show a great amount of dedication towards their teams. I may be clutching at straws here, but would it then be valid to suggest that for Americans, dedication to your homeland is like the lifelong dedication to your sports team? As we dive further into this post, we can see that the patriotism for America is really quite intense – but some would argue that a lifelong patronage to your team is also intense. Curiouser and curiouser…

 

 

 

 Flag down the reason for the flag obsession

 

The Union Jack flag that we know today was actually formed in 1801, to symbolise the uniting of the four nations – England, Ireland, Scotland and Wales (but since 1921 it has only been representing Northern Ireland, not the Republic of Ireland). The American flag, even though the nation itself is young, is one of the oldest flags in the world and as it was formed in 1777, it is indeed older than the Union Jack. The United States flag has changed since the original – there were originally 13 stars on it to represent the 13 states that had been formed from the 13 colonies that existed at the time. It came about as a symbol during the war of independence against Britain. It is said that George Washington once said that the stars represent heaven, the red stripes represent Britain and the white stripes represent the purity of the independence and liberty that they seek. The American national anthem, which I will get into a little later, was originally a poem that accounts the sight of the newly made flag, or the “Star Spangled Banner”, on the battleground and how it lifted the spirits of the Americans who were fighting for their freedom. The American people seem to know everything about the flag from an

early age, even the name of the lady who allegedly made the first flag, Betsy Ross, a seamstress from Philadelphia. In fact, my local pizza place is called Betsy Ross Pizza!

There is also such a thing as “flag etiquette” in the United States, and there is even a National Flag foundation (NFF) that sets out the regulations that must be followed when it comes to the flag. They even have a question and answer page which is definitely an interesting read: (Click here to read)
With this much meaning behind the flag stemming from such an influential time for the country – in essence, the birth of the country – it is understandable that they are so proud of it. It seems to me that the obsession with the flag as a visual tool for their patriotism comes down to the subject discussed in my last post – American people seem to value the expression and visualisation of their feelings, wants and needs much more than British people do. In my last post we discussed how Americans tend to ask for what they want more boldly than we British, and how our default answer to most questions is ‘no’, even though sometimes we actually want to say ‘yes’. Here it seems that Americans feel a need to express visually their patriotism in order for it to be true. Could this be because such a short time ago, their recent ancestors fought for and created the country, and so it is more a part of them than you could say the ancient Britain is to any of us? Why does the Union Jack flag feel more like a symbol of a party theme to me, rather than a symbol of patriotism?

O say, can you see God saving the Queen?

 

The American national anthem is a phenomenon that I honestly began to feel quite awkward about very quickly. It gives me a strange feeling when I hear it – there is so much passion in the singing of it as well as in the hearts of the people who are listening around me, so you can’t help but get goose bumps. You are made so aware of its meaning and authority that you find yourself giving it a certain amount of respect. I am not saying that we don’t have a national anthem in Britain, because obviously we do. But the

mumbling that you hear at a football game when even the players are pretending to remember the words is not in the same league. Does anyone actually know all of the words? (“God Save The Queen” doesn’t count…everyone knows that bit!) If you do, I apologise and kindly ask that you teach them to me because I fear that you may be the only one who does know it. And anyway, the wording doesn’t remind us of the sacrifices of our ancestors for our country, it talks about the queen as though she is still the head of the country which, bless her heart, she clearly isn’t.  
Whenever the national anthem plays here in America, I always get mixed feelings. As I said before, I feel a strange respect for it, but I also feel terribly awkward in not being a member of the culture that it creates within earshot. I hate to connect the two, but it is very much like that old British children’s show, the demon headmaster (for you Americans, the show really isn’t as bad as it

sounds!). Let me paint a picture for you. Everyone stops what they are doing. Everything goes silent. Everyone stands up. Hats come off. If there is a flag within the proximity, they will face it. Heads go up. Hands cover their hearts. Then they sing. They sing every word, and they have known every word since they were old enough to read - sometimes even earlier. I am describing the opening of a baseball game and every morning as they raise the flag in a US summer camp, but the same thing happens in bars, at concerts and even in some cases in the workplace. Before this, I had never seen anything like it in real life and it knocks me back every time. Luckily, I am usually with my British Fiancé when it happens, so we can look at each other and feel awkward together. Can you imagine being in that situation that I described but not knowing the words – and even worse, being of the nationality that refused them independence to lead them to create this song about war in the first place? Even more intense are the times that they don't sing along because they are listening intently to the singer - that happened at a baseball game and we were high up in a bar so we couldn't actually hear the singers voice, all we knew was that everyone had stopped everything in unison and had all faced the same way with hand on heart in silence. Very strange experience.

You have to wonder though, why do they hold such emotional importance in the song hundreds of years later? Is it because they want to visually show their gratitude to their ancestors? If it is, I am starting to see a pattern in our revelations!

Next time…

 

I hope that you have enjoyed my experiences of the differences in patriotism between the two countries! In my next post I will look at the American default optimism verses the British default pessimism. Thanks for reading and I hope to see you next time!

References:

 

• USA City Link
• Royal Gov
• Wiki - History of the United States Flag
• American Flags . ORG
• ... and in case you want to buy an American flag