Thread by @docMJP

I wrote this for the 4th 3yrs ago:

“…habitual patriotism is better than intentional value-signaling; and even thoughtless patriotism is better than witless cynicism, as cynicism is not a virtue, but the default mode of decadence.”

amgreatness.com/2018/07/04/god…

“The intelligentsia loves to think that the many are simple idiots who adopt a ‘my country right or wrong’ mentality even as the commoners generally understand political life in a much more realistic manner.”

But in this respect Jimi Hendrix’s “Star-Spangled Banner” at Woodstock, for instance, could be considered serious work of political philosophy, providing a better definition of politics and patriotism—for good and ill—than much modern political science.

Bruce Springsteen’s “Born in the USA” is another great case in point. Intelligentsia loves to point out that such works are pure protest, & misunderstood by poor, benighted, & common people who listen w/some kind of patriotic feeling. These rubes just don’t get it, they jeer.

But the idea that the people who actually had to fight in wars like Vietnam or who daily have interactions with worthless public schools and the bureaucrats who administer them believe in a simple “my country right or wrong” mentality is asinine on its face.

They know more of what is “wrong” in the country than the elites who welcome self-criticism only when they think they are above it. In fact, the common understanding/what people hear in both pieces of music is a bittersweet and nuanced one.

You hear the whole of politics—good and evil together—set within underlying realization that one can’t escape political life & ought not to try. It is a patriotism that understands we live in a painfully imperfect world & nation & yet it is ours, & we love it as we do our family:

and it is sometimes painful, sometimes noble, sometimes ugly, but always serious and our love remains.

amgreatness.com/2018/07/04/god…