As A Child... Did You Understand The "Pledge Of Allegiance"?

[arwalden]

Poll question: As A Child... Did You Understand The "Pledge Of Allegiance"?

It's sad to say, but I didn't understand the meaning of the Pledge of Allegiance until I was in high school.

Prior to that, I was merely parroting the syllables that I had been instructed to repeat. These meaningless fragments were recited in a slow rhythmic pace as written below:

I plejah leejunce.
To the flag.
Of the United States.
Of America.
And to the republic.
For which it stands.
One nation.
Indivisible.
With liberty.
And justice.
For all.

It's bad enough that children recite the pledge by repeating these meaningless sentence fragments. But it's REALLY embarrassing when I heard ADULTS---our own senators, even---who recite the pledge in the same rote, sing-song, childlike manner.

(By the way: These little 3 and 4-word sentences remind me a lot of how Bush reads his prepared statements. This is a BIG clue to his intellectual capacity.)

It's "I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America, and to the republic for which it stands. One nation, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all."

[disgruntella]

1. i said no - and by the way

Love that Agnes Moorehead photo!

[trof]

2. I think we said "Yew-nye-nah"

and "withlibertyandjusticeforall", like one word.

[demnan]

3. When you talk about concepts like alligence, pledging

the republic, indivisible (boy is that one not true), liberty and justice, what six year old, even the best student in the class, would really understand these abstract concepts?

By the time you are eleven or twelve you might start to understand some of these abstract concepts.

[lcordero]

4. "with liberty and justice for all"

It has become more meaningless as time goes by.

[LWolf]

5. I don't remember.

But young children don't understand it any more than they do the "Lord's prayer" that they learn to recite.

I've always taught it to my younger students word by word and phrase by phrase, since recitation is mandatory for my school unless there is a religious objection.

These days I'm teaching them to recite it in Spanish, since I'm supposed to be teaching them spanish. Even though I can't speak spanish.

[blondeatlast]

18. Is that an "immersion" thing? I believe in bilingual ed,

but is considered an evil thing in AZ.

[eyesroll]

6. I pledged to Egypt, because that's what I heard

And I also wondered what a widget stand was.

I wish I was making this up. I knew how to read before I learned the pledge, but my teacher just had us learn it from call-and-response. My mom finally wrote it out, and it made more sense, even if the bigger words were over my head.

[Maeve]

7. We had it explained most years

And you left out "udder guard".

I stopped pledging sometime back, altho I'll stand politely when it's being recited.

[trof]

8. Overheard at a club meeting

"Who's gonna do the plejaleegance?"

[thom1102]

17. Reminds me of an episode of Classic Trek

The one where Kirk Inc. land on the planet with the two primative cultures warring with each other. Kirk Inc. get captured by the yangyui's and they start reciting the "Holy words" and bring out the tattered Stars and Stripes. The "Holy words" are the Pledge of Allegience as if someone had played telephone with them over a period of a hundred years. Kirk scolds them for holding the words sacred without understanding their meaning. Kinda apropos, huh?

[JHB]

19. E Pleb Nista!

:silly:

[Maeve]

20. Actually, the preamble to the Constitution

"We, the people of the United States..." came out as "E pleb nista"

[Another Bill C.]

9. Francis Bellamy

I think that as long as the Pledge is required in schools, students might be inclined to read more of Francis Bellamy's writings. Francis was a Socialist and a devout WASP. I guess, as far as Conservatives go, those two points of view would balance out each other.

[Guaranteed]

10. We picked it apart in Boy Scouts...

...then they gave us a bunch of other rituals to memorize.

[Brucey]

11. I wrote my own that sounded the same:

I pledge my grievance to the flag of the United States of America, and to the republicans, which I can't stand, nauseation, under trod, with fake liberty and justice for all.

[unblock]

12. yes

i understood it to be a loyalty test and a means of religious indoctrination

thank you, arwalden, for leaving out the "under god" part added in the '50s, but unfortunately my PUBLIC school insisted on keeping it in. to try to get around the constitutional issues, they always had a student (usually a class president of some such) recite it over the school-wide p.a. system....

each year, i stood on the first day and recited the pledge, sitting down with my mouth shut during the "under god" part, standing to finish the pledge, then sat down.

the rest of the year, i stayed in my seat. when people nudged me to join in, i'd say, "i already pledged my allegience once. there was no expiration date, it's still valid. when you pledge your allegience, does that mean only for one day and you won't be loyal to your country tomorrow unless you pledge again?"

[trof]

13. great answer

"the rest of the year, i stayed in my seat. when people nudged me to join in, i'd say, "i already pledged my allegience once. there was no expiration date, it's still valid. when you pledge your allegience, does that mean only for one day and you won't be loyal to your country tomorrow unless you pledge again?"

Maybe I sould recite my marriage vows every morning, just so Mrs. t. knows they're still in effect.
;-)

[Redbear]

14. We always wondered

who Richard Stands was?

and to the Republic
for Richard Stands...

[trof]

15. I think he was Round John Virgin's cousin

Round John Virgin,
Mother and child.
;-)

[bleedingheart]

16. I liked the way my son used to say it...

"Invisible...with liberty and justice for all.."