They didn't go after the Jehovah's Witnesses or Amish - but ----

[packman]

[Crutchez_CuiBono]

1. That's so good.

That's epic. Ty. i don't tweet (just the word alone makes me ill anymore) but it'd seem that this would be a good one to make the rounds.

[Stuart G]

2. Yep..!!!!!!

[c-rational]

3. Great post. I was not aware of this. Thank you. K&R.

[Bernardo de La Paz]

4. And ... Citizen Vain still doesn't know the words. Or how to color the flag. Or respect POWs. . . nt

[geardaddy]

8. Citizen Vain! I love it!

I'm stealing that!

[Bernardo de La Paz]

18. Please do! I stole it too! . . . nt

[niyad]

5. thank you

[dchill]

6. Now you know. Everyone should know by now.

[iluvtennis]

7. Thank you for this new thing I learned today. nt

[BobTheSubgenius]

9. A great point being made here!

Very sad it needs to be made.

[handmade34]

10. well

we have always really known, some just don't want to admit it

[LakeArenal]

11. I have an Amish girlfriend

During the election I asked if she follows politics, Prez particularly.

She said not really but she had heard good things about the “man” running. (Dump)

I said that I don’t know what you heard but he is the worst human being that ever walked the earth.

I will see her soon. I’ll see what she hears now.

Also, somewhere along the line, I heard the Amish don’t know American history. Or of George Washington.

I can only speak of one Amish family, but they know a lot about US history and George Washington.

[JohnnyRingo]

21. They learn what they're taught in school.

I believe most have their own schools, so it's up to the teachers. Every sect is different, depending on their elders in the church. Some here in NE Ohio even have cell phones, so some are more connected to the outside world than others.

[leftofcool]

38. That is the difference between the "old Amish" and the "new Amish"

There have been a couple of splits in the last 100 years but when one of the ladies from the Amish sect near us tried to explain it, it was way over my head/pay grade.

[JohnnyRingo]

39. This is where the Order went cutting beards a year or so ago.

It was in the news when the Mullet family went about shaming others into compliance. They're still in prison.

Since every church is at a different level of adherence, some get angry and exact coercion on the more lax families.

At least they all have red lights on their buggies around here. It's still frightening to drive around there on a weekend night. My son owns a taxi van service for them

[olegramps]

28. I was on a train when we got word that Kennedy had been shot. We were halted near a Amish community

I will remember it till my dying day. Their buggies when lined up for blocks with their lanterns eerily gleams in the night as they made their way to the train station to hear the latest news. They were grouped on the platform many crying and holding each other. They may have some strange ways, but they are loyal Americans and love this country for the freedom it provides them to practice their religion. They have many admirable qualities. I was recently discharged and on my way to interview for a State Department position. It was mind shattering for me and I will forever remember the sound of drums coming up Penn on their way to Arlington.

[uponit7771]

33. +1, do you write books? tia

[olegramps]

51. No. But I sure enjoy reading them. Wonderful companions. Never a murmur of rejection or censure.

Last edited Wed Aug 29, 2018, 02:09 PM - Edit history (1)

[pangaia]

35. Good story to hear.

I was having lunch before an orchestra rehearsal.. maybe 1:30 EST. I even remember we were about to rehearse the Beethoven 3rd Symphony, WHICH has one of the funeral marches that was often played on TV. If you heard at night, it must have been quite a while after he was shot.

[olegramps]

52. Yes, it was the early evening when we arrived at station and it was begining to snowing heavily.

[SunSeeker]

12. K & R

[cp]

13. Excellent!

[Uncle Joe]

14. Kicked and recommended.

Thanks for the thread packman.

[QED]

15. I posted this today on fb

In response to my cousin's post of one of those antiNFL things floating around. I resist doing this on the family page but damn, I'm so fed up with racist crap. If I don't speak up do they take it as agreement? Time to push back.

[leftynyc]

16. Did you post on twitter?

I would love to retweet and if you didn't, I would be honored to do it for you.

[progressoid]

17. Uh. Maybe need to re-work that meme.

"One black man kneels..." but the picture shows three.

Should say "A few black men"

[JohnnyRingo]

20. Good point

...but the vitriol all started with one man, Colin Kapernick.

[ck4829]

50. It's fine

[JohnnyRingo]

19. Good one. K&R

Too many on the right (AKA racists) think they're protesting against the flag or the anthem, but that's what Fox News tells them.

[Ferrets are Cool]

22. Fantastic post!!

[KY_EnviroGuy]

23. "Now you know why...". Very profound.

Excellent talking points when right-wingers throw this flag and anthem shit in our faces......

[Ms. Toad]

24. You might want to do some legal research.

They actually do go after Amish, Jehovah's Witnesses, Menonites, etc. for
following their faith when faith conflicts with nationalism.

Just a few examples:

Minersville_School_District_v._Gobitis - Supreme court ruling that Jehovah's Witnesses could be compelled to recite the pledge of allegiance in school, overuled by West Virginia State Board of Education v. Barnette.

Thousands of Jehovah's witnesses were arrested during World War II for seeking conscientious objector status. https://books.google.com/books?id=MG2KMqrlMOUC&pg=PA186#v=onepage&q&f=false

About half of the 70,000 men who applied for CO status got it, many of them Quakers, Brethren and Mennonites. Because Jehovah's Witnesses opposed WW2 but not all wars, draft boards routinely denied their requests. Of 16,000 men convicted of draft resistance during the war (and sentenced to a maximum of five years), 6,000 were rejected CO's, and 3/4 of those were Jehovah's Witnesses.

25,000 CO's were assigned to non-combat military duty, of which the most famous were medics. At first, frequently reviled in boot camp as cowards and shirkers, "Conchie" medics' status rose rapidly on the battlefield, when GIs realized their lives often depended on the unarmed medic, and his bravery under fire.

Nearly 12,000 CO's were assigned to "alternative service," especially Public Service Camps that had been funded with $7,000,000 from Pacifist churches and organizations. Working fifty unpaid hours a week on conservation, forestry and public health projects, some CO's found these camps to be virtual prisons, where military discipline prevailed. (The last of the CO's was released from the camps in 1947.) About 500 CO's volunteered for medical experiments, testing, among other things, cures for typhus and malaria.

https://www.pbs.org/perilousfight/social/objectors/

Tinker v. Des Moines Independent Community School District - white Quakers suspended from school for wearing black armbands.

The response is not the same, but it is disingenuous to suggest that members of the historial peace churches(and others who hold similar views on nationalism) have not been persecuted for exercising their first amendment rights.

[njhoneybadger]

26. Your examples are 80 years old

[Ms. Toad]

27. I'm not 80,

and the kids in the Tinker case are my peers.

Those wishing to make a point about patriotism (generally) aren't going after individuals in those religions now because state requiremens fo recite the pledge, or sing the anthem, or participate in prayer, are settled law (settled by the cases you are dismissing as "80 years old.&quot

That does not mean there are no challenges - especially in the wake of 9-11, and the wave of nationalism that followed, there have been more disputes. This is a decent summary of more recent cases. https://www.freedomforuminstitute.org/first-amendment-center/topics/freedom-of-speech-2/k-12-public-school-student-expression/pledge-of-allegiance/

And - I can tell you that I, personally, have been challenged numerous times for not participating in the pledge or the national anthem. I'm an older white female.

Largely, Jehovah's Witnesses, Amish, Quakers, Mennonites are not multi-millionaires participating in a multi-million dollar weekly nationalistic event with a nationwide audience. (I.e.responding to the small, quiet regular and continuing stands of faith and do not provide Trump and the right wing jerks the same kind of platform to rile up jingoistic nationalism that the football industry does.)

[hunter]

31. My childhood as a Jehovah's Witness wasn't smooth sailing.

I was a weird autistic spectrum kid anyways so ignoring the flag salute did nothing to improve my social standing. I was usually reading or drawing spaceships during the flag salute. Hear no evil.

One of my grade school teachers made an example of me in social studies as an example of religious freedom in the U.S.A.. That was almost as bad as the red white and blue asshole teachers who thought my mom was crazy and I was a little shit and treated us as such.

My faith and my power was that I'd rather not irritate God. Certain people, including teachers, school administrators, and classmates were going to hate me whatever, whether I saluted the flag or not.

My mom couldn't stay out of politics so she was booted out of the Jehovah's Witnesses and then we were Quakers. Quakers similarly are not keen on oaths to the State.

I later taught in a school where the flag salute was problematic because maybe 40% of the kids had parents who were not U.S. citizens. Many teachers were not doing the Pledge of Allegiance in their home rooms. Holy Roller white U.S.A. Christian parents were upset about that, so the principal decided to do the Pledge over the PA system in the morning, holy roller white U.S.A. Christian kids presiding.

Our school was pretty battered and worn and unmaintained since all the white people moved away in the 'sixties so the intercom/public address system didn't work in many classrooms, mine included. I didn't complain. In that twenty minutes I took roll, we read the school bulletins, and discussed news of the world.

[Ms. Toad]

37. I believe the difference is largely the audience and money involved in football

Race, in this instance, is just a happy coincidence (for folks like Trump).

I was a Quaker in a very red state during the Vietnam war, and a newspaper reporter in the relatively low-level nationalistic that preceded 9/11 (when schools in the state I live in now required schools affirmatively choose to say the pledge or not. No school board member who wanted to remain in office would have voted NOT to have a daily recitation of the pledge).

I've been singled out more times than I can count for unobtrusively not participating. But there's no political payoff, or audience, for persecuting a middle-school quaker - or a reporter at a local school board meeting - for not participating in the pledge.

I responded similarly to how you did to the the blatantly unconstitutional "moment of silence" at the public school I taught at for years. We just went on with our lessons - I didn't demand anyone stop praying, but I didn't facilitate it in any way. And we discussed the various ways of praying that are not consistent with a moment of silence - to make the point that I wasn't anti-religion, but pro choice in the matter and not elevating any one religion (or religion at all) over another.

But people who insist response is unusual, or different in form have a very different experience than you and I did.

[HockeyMom]

48. Florida Public School Jehovah Witnesses

We had many Haitian Jehovah Witness students, and staff. The students sat and read a book. The classroom assistant would go to the back of the room closet and get supplies out, or sit and do paperwork. She told me saying the pledge was considered Idolatry, worshiping a false god. The aide just went about doing her job. This was only about 10 years ago, so times have changed?

When I worked in NY in early 2000's, the school had a student go down to the office and recite the pledge over the PA system. In one 8th grade class there was a boy who was a Wiccan. "It is against my religion to worship a piece of cloth", he would say. He went to the Restroom when the pledge came on over the PA.

Add Wiccans to the list of religions who won't say the pledge? I did meet his parents. Yes, they were Wiccan.

[malaise]

25. Great post

Rec

[Scurrilous]

29. K&R

[keithbvadu2]

30. This is how you honor the National Anthem? Wander about while it is playing?

This is how you honor the National Anthem? Wander about while it is playing?

The example shown by republicans.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=0&v=ycpGzWcLZjI

[justgamma]

34. He thinks they are saluting him.

No wonder he hates people kneeling. He doesn't give a damn about the flag.

[ck4829]

47. Wow

[zentrum]

32. Excellent point. Thank you.

[workinclasszero]

36. This explains the white rage perfectly

Lead by the Grand Dragon-in-chief of course.

[Angry Dragon]

40. good one

[appalachiablue]

41. Good post, thanx.

[aqua29]

42. This Post is Out of Context

[fleabiscuit]

43. Perhaps English is a second language? nt

[Old Vet]

44. Wrong aqua29, I live surrounded by Amish.............

What you don't understand is both groups take full advantage of living free thumbing there nose at our flag. For everyone of these assholes who didn't serve someone else put there lives on the line and died in there place, Fuck Them...….

[Stargazer99]

49. I don't do the Pledge to a country that is perfectly willing to let my children

die due to lack of medical care and I experienced radiation at 5 yrs of age ( I lived near Hanford WA). I lost 3/4 of my thyroid to 3 different types of cancer due to this and you want me to honor this country? !wake up! I am not your human sacrifice

[ck4829]

46. OK

[ck4829]

45. K&R

[tymorial]

53. Oooh. I love this!

So brilliant. I am sharing this with everyone. Thank you!