American school kids having to recite the Pledge of Allegiance is incredibly weird

American identity, the historian Philip Gleason put it this way:

To be or to become an American, a person did not have to be any particular national, linguistic, religious, or ethnic background. All he had to do was to commit himself to the political ideology centered on the abstract ideals of liberty, equality, and republicanism. Thus the universalist ideological character of American nationality meant that it was open to anyone who willed to become an American.

When you whole national identity is something abstract then loyalty to the government and it's institutions ends up playing a much more central role than in nations where national identity is far more concrete. Hence things like daily loyalty oaths by children to a government symbol can even seem logical to some.

/r/unpopularopinion Thread