Here’s a fun fact I bet you didn’t know: The pledge of allegiance was written by a socialist. I’m not quite sure what Francis Bellamy was thinking; although he imagined all the people of the world pledging to their various flags, the result of the exercise is inevitably nationalistic.

But Bellamy was a socialist, and he wrote the pledge, and a treatise on the etiquette surrounding it. Much of that was slurped up by the flag code (although the text of the pledge has undergone two significant edits). The flag code includes language that states one should face the flag while speaking the pledge, and remove any non-religious headwear while one salutes the flag.

Uh, Whups, my original source contains the phrase “non-religious”, but the current code does not. I’m very curious when the change was made. If the flag code were on GitHub this would be much more transparent.

Most of this same etiquette has been transferred to the national anthem. So let’s get this straight. If sitting or kneeling or quietly protesting is bad, shouldn’t ignoring the whole pledge be worse? Not an act to raise awareness, just pure sloth. Sitting around, yapping to the people around you, absolutely ignoring the flag out of pure contempt should be far worse.

Right?

Tune in and watch your congress during the pledge tomorrow morning. Watch the senate. Glory in the patriotism. All those fuckers are far worse than a conscientious athlete hoping to deliver a message. Most of your elected representatives just don’t care. There is protest, and there is contempt.