I’m not proud to be an American, but at least I'd like to be
My relationship with patriotism is complicated. I was, quite literally, born on the fourth of July, so the day has always held personal significance to me. For an appropriately brief time, my parents allowed me to maintain the delusion that all the pomp and circumstance was for me. My sense of patriotism was reinforced by the seven years that I served in the US Navy. But as I have become more aware of my nation’s complex and deeply problematic history, and of the societal problems that plague it today—and as I’ve observed it from the outside after moving to Canada—my attitude towards patriotic displays has changed. Especially since 2016, the emotions evoked by the American flag have morphed from pride into some combination of embarrassment, sadness, anger, and despair.
This year was particularly difficult. My partner and I flew from our home in Manitoba to visit my parents at their small farm in South Carolina. It had been several months since I had been back to the US, and going home felt like…well, home. It wasn’t just that I was with my family, but also that I was in the place where I was born and where I lived nearly four decades of my life. The trees, the climate, and the terrain were the same as the ones I had grown up with. When we drove down to the coast, the sights, smells, and sounds of the ocean and tidal creeks were those I spent a decade with later in my life. And my parents’ farm was a place where I have found unconditional love, comfort, and support during some of the most difficult times of my life.
While we were there, we attended an Independence Day celebration at Unity Park in Greenville, SC. This gorgeous 60-acre park opened in 2022, bringing together land once occupied by an all-white park and that of a separate-and-definitely-not-equal park for Black children (that was also the site of a police shooting range). It was a step towards acknowledging the city’s history of racism and moving towards racial reconciliation. And looking around the park at the thousands of people gathered for this event, it seems to be working.
There were people from an enormous variety of racial, ethnic, religious, cultural, and economic backgrounds. There were queer people, immigrants, people with disabilities, people receiving various forms of social assistance, and kids who attend public schools. There were people who share my political views, some who definitely don’t, and others who don’t really care. But everyone there, whether they spend time thinking about it or not, is affected by the politics and policies of the nation we were there to celebrate.
The evening’s soundtrack included several songs that are staples at Fourth of July celebrations and military events I’ve attended but have always struck me as somewhat unpatriotic.
The “ain’t that America” lines from the chorus of John Mellencamp’s “Pink Houses” aren’t a celebration, but rather a critique of a country where people are forced to settle for lives that don’t even resemble “those old crazy dreams [that] kinda came and went.” When Tom Petty sings about “an American girl, raised on promises,” he does so to highlight how those promises often go unfulfilled. CCR’s “Fortunate Son” is about people of lower social or economic classes being sent off to war while the more fortunate benefit from their sacrifice. And “Born In the USA” isn’t The Boss’s ode to birthright citizenship, but the story of a young man being sent halfway around the world to shoot holes in strangers, losing a friend in combat, and returning home to a country that can’t be bothered to create a place for him.
But this year, as I listened to these songs, sprinkled in among Christian nationalist hymns and Toby Keith’s rabidly militaristic post-9/11 anthems, I realized that—for me, at least—these are actually the most patriotic songs of all. True patriotism isn’t pretending that a nation is without flaws, but rather acknowledging them and working to correct them.
When I received my commission as a naval officer, I took an oath to defend the Constitution “against all enemies, foreign and domestic.” While I left the military 15 years ago, I remain true to that oath, and the enemies I’m most concerned about are decidedly domestic. Over the past two years, I’ve looked on in despair as the Supreme Court justices appointed by our treasonous, felonious, abusive, narcissistic, twice-impeached would-be dictator of an ex-president have steadily worked to undo decades of progress and undermine the very foundation of our republic.
That foundation, to be clear, was fundamentally flawed. The United States was founded by white supremacists and built by enslaved people on land violently stolen from people who had cared for it for thousands of years. Despite their assertions, the founders clearly didn’t believe that all men are created equal; they didn’t consider Black and Indigenous people to be fully human or worthy of citizenship, and they didn’t even bother mentioning women. Liberty and justice were not intended to be, and never have been, for all.
But they built into the Constitution measures to ensure that no one is above the law, to avoid government entanglement with religion, to ensure that the government represents the will of the governed, and to make necessary changes to even the most fundamental aspects of that government in the future. Those mechanisms have allowed us to make so much progress. Slavery was abolished. Women and non-white, non-property holding Americans were granted citizenship and the right to vote. Racist immigration and internment laws (some of them, at least) were repealed. The privileges associated with marriage were extended to LGBTQ+ people. The right to safe and legal abortions was guaranteed.
This isn’t to deny that we still have major problems—gun violence, white supremacy, imperialist interventions, access to healthcare, wealth inequality, policing and prisons, gerrymandering and disenfranchisement, just to name a few. There’s so much more to be done, but—critically—there’s a way to do it.
This election isn’t about who is president for the next four years or which party controls Congress. It’s about whether the mechanisms of democracy will be completely demolished. It’s about the lives, liberties, and livelihoods of LGBTQ+ people, immigrants, racialized minorities, women, children, people with disabilities or chronic medical conditions, those who rely on social programs, educators, scientists, and anyone who doesn’t subscribe to a very specific version of Christianity.
If this sounds apocalyptic, that’s because it is.
Project 2025 is a policy agenda by the Heritage Foundation, a Christian nationalist think tank whose “goal is to assemble an army of aligned, vetted, trained, and prepared conservatives to go to work on Day One to deconstruct the Administrative State.” The group seeks to decrease or eliminate checks and balances, concentrating power in the presidency. Kevin Roberts, the president of the Heritage Foundation, has stated that the intent is to bring about a “second American revolution, which will remain bloodless if the left allows it to be.”
Among other things, Project 2025 aims to end no-fault divorce (keeping people trapped in abusive marriages), make deep cuts to Medicare and Social Security, eliminate the Department of Education and divert public funds to Christian schools, prevent children from learning about (and working to overcome) racism, eliminate civil rights protections, end marriage equality, and deport or incarcerate immigrants. And there’s so much more.
Trump has denied knowing anything about Project 2025, but he’s not exactly proven himself to be trustworthy, and all evidence points to this being the GOP’s intended policy agenda. Their 922-page playbook is a long and horrifying, but vital, read.
Donald Trump has already tried to take the highest position in this nation by fraud, election interference, and mob violence. He refused to say that he would accept the results of the 2024 election if he lost. He threatened a “bloodbath” if he is not elected. He has talked about acting as a dictator and hinted at an interest in abolishing term limits. And the Supreme Court he created just ruled that presidents are immune to criminal prosecution when acting in their official capacity (whatever that even means). As Justice Sotomayor wrote in her dissent, the Court has now made the president “a king above the law.”
Donald Trump, the Republican party more broadly, and the Christian nationalism that has empowered them are an existential threat to American democracy. And given the command that a president holds over the world’s most powerful military, that is an existential threat to the entire world. There is every reason to believe that if Trump wins this presidential election, there may never be another one for him to lose. Congress failed—twice—to hold him accountable. The Supreme Court and lower courts have failed to hold him accountable. We, the voters, are the only line of defence that remains, and keeping this man out of office is the most important thing we can do.
So as I sat there with thousands of other Americans (and at least a handful of Canadians) watching the smoke clear after the best Fourth of July fireworks display I’ve ever seen, all I could think was that I hope there’s still something to celebrate next July.