It’s amazing how kids in suburban middle class schools assume that you have to say the pledge. Lots of the stupider members of the the teaching profession seem to think that too.
It is funny that right was won for us by Jehovah’s Witnesses, as much of a nasty piece of work Watchtower tends to be as an organization.
I sat starting in 6th grade. Was told I don’t have to participate but need to stand.
I got sent to the principal’s office for not standing for the pledge or saying it. The principal was basically like, “look kid, do you have to be disruptive like this?” But he couldn’t do anything. I guess we have one thing to thank the JWs for.
When I tried not to say the pledge in school the teachers told me I had to do it.
If they punished you, and there was a lawsuit, they would have lost. (Although who knows what would happen nowadays, the 1st current only protects freedom of speech when it’s money)
Tinker was a Supreme Court case (about kids wearing black brackets to protest Vietnam or something) and getting in trouble. The court established that freedom of speech does not end at the school door.
Funnily enough - the pledge in schools was basically a way to sell American flags to schools.
They didn’t punish me for that because at the time I did not know that the teachers were not allowed to force me to say the pledge and I complied when they told me.
What I ended up doing was just pretending to say the pledge so that they wouldn’t notice I wasn’t actually saying it.
That’s how freedom is supposed to work.
What’s obnoxious to one is holy writ to someone else.
I’m not a big fan of their “freedom” to let their kids bleed out, but you take some, you lose some.
I never heard about them stopping vaccinations.
They won’t do blood transfusions.
Are they stopping you from getting a transfusion?
No, but they have fought very hard for the right to prevent their children from getting one.
Just like the Christian Scientists have fought for the right to complete, outright medical neglect of their children and got that enshrined into law, as well as shoving up Ellen Whites made up word definitions into the dictionary.
Almost as if letting people have different opinions leads to conflict.
that’s the problem with KidS tHeSe dAyZ! they furget which country they’re livin in!
if they wore Official Donald J Trump Stars & Stripes Underwear every day like I do, they’d NEVER FORGET!
< salutes flag >
The sad truth is that it’s just too late to do anything about it. Our worship has turned the flag into a powerful egregore and it will SMITE ALL THOSE WHO OPPOSE IT. Can science and reason and ethics SMITE YOU WITHE THE FURY TO 10000 BOMBS? I thought not, and that makes them wrong (and stupid). We can’t do anything about it or the flag will DEVOUR OUR SOULS AND RAIN DEATH UPON OUR LANDS. Upside is that if we torture enough homeless people it might bless us with a mcdonalds
And science, and personal welfare, and philosophy, and budgetting, and cultures, and cooking…