BS: Buy a flag, fly a flag, or go to jail!

Subject: BS: Buy a flag, fly a flag, or go to jail!
From: Bee-dubya-ell
Date: 09 Aug 04 - 12:06 AM

The legislature of the state of Florida, in its infinite wisdom, has decreed that all classrooms in all public schools and publicly supported colleges and universities within the state shall have a US flag on display. Furthermore, said flag shall be no smaller or larger than exactly two-feet by three-feet. (Related news article here.)

Now, I have no problem with US flags being displayed in classrooms. There was one in every classroom I was in for twelve years. I pledged allegiance to it every morning and still grew up to be a pinko hippie radical. The problem is the two-foot by three-foot size thing. Most classrooms currently have flags of about half that size. That means everyone's gotta buy new flags or face a penalty. And, in its never-ending quest to have Florida proclaimed the home of the unfunded mandate, the legislature provided absolutely no funding for purchasing these new flags. "We can say you've gotta do it, but we don't have to give you the money to do it with!" It's up to the individual schools or school districts to find the money. Of course, no school system has a dime to spare so the school principals will probably go begging to the PTA.

But here's my real beef: Who says a larger flag is more patriotic than a small one? Don't they all have the same number of stars and stripes? Don't they symbolize the same thing regardless of size? Don't my elected representatives have anything better to do with their time?

Subject: RE: BS: Buy a flag, fly a flag, or go to jail!
From: CarolC
Date: 09 Aug 04 - 12:12 AM

GET OUTTA THERE WHILE YOU STILL CAN BEE-DUBYA-ELL!!!!!!

Subject: RE: BS: Buy a flag, fly a flag, or go to jail!
From: GUEST,John O'Lennaine
Date: 09 Aug 04 - 12:26 AM

Exactly the same thing has recently happened in New South Wales (Australia).

All schools are required by law to fly an Australian flag, at their own expense.
Every school I know of always did, but now its THE LAW.

When there are so many schools in need of staff and basic teaching equipment, I think this burst of patriotism is a little unseemly.

John

Subject: RE: BS: Buy a flag, fly a flag, or go to jail!
From: Peace
Date: 09 Aug 04 - 12:26 AM

"An executive order issued by President William Howard Taft on Oct. 29,1912, fixed the overall width and length of the U.S. flag, known technically as the hoist and fly, respectively, in a ratio of 1: 1.9."

from    www.outlawslegal.com/organic/flag.htm

Seems they may have the dimensions wrong.

Subject: RE: BS: Buy a flag, fly a flag, or go to jail!
From: Little Hawk
Date: 09 Aug 04 - 12:37 AM

Sounds kind of like the atmosphere in Imperial Japan in 1944. Be patriotic or else!

Subject: RE: BS: Buy a flag, fly a flag, or go to jail!
From: Peace
Date: 09 Aug 04 - 12:37 AM

Were I a school principal, I would have the flags hand made by students in art class. Make sure that the stars and stripes are proportionally correct and that the dimensions meet Taft's executive order--or the latest ececutive order. Pin it to the wall. Cheap, good to develop math skills, measuring, drafting, planning, teamwork, painting, etc. No one said it had to be bought or made from cloth. It would be a chance for teachers to do cooperative teaching--history of the flag, the colonies, etc. There is lots to learn. First thing to learn is that the law is the law. Second thing is to interpret the law.

Subject: RE: BS: Buy a flag, fly a flag, or go to jail!
From: katlaughing
Date: 09 Aug 04 - 12:40 AM

Personally, I think they should all be flown upside in the distress sign! (The legislators were probably thinking with their teeny-tiny dicks which they hoped would grow at the sight of all those *larger* flags!)

Subject: RE: BS: Buy a flag, fly a flag, or go to jail!
From: Peace
Date: 09 Aug 04 - 12:43 AM

Wallets--but rub 'em and they turn into suitcases. No doubt!

Subject: RE: BS: Buy a flag, fly a flag, or go to jail!
From: Bert
Date: 09 Aug 04 - 01:06 AM

LOL katmeluv.

Subject: RE: BS: Buy a flag, fly a flag, or go to jail!
From: Rapparee
Date: 09 Aug 04 - 09:36 AM

We're flying a 5 x 8 foot US flag instead of the 3 x 5 one we started with. It's more proportional to the height of the flag pole.

State law in both Kentucky and Idaho requires public buildings to display both the US and state flags. I'll hoist the state flaq (3 x 5) when we get one.

Subject: RE: BS: Buy a flag, fly a flag, or go to jail!
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 09 Aug 04 - 10:38 AM

Doesn't flag worship count as some kind of religion? Sticking a flag on the wall and paying homage to it is a kind of idolatry. Thank God we never have that kind of stuff in schools here.

Subject: RE: BS: Buy a flag, fly a flag, or go to jail!
From: curmudgeon
Date: 09 Aug 04 - 11:33 AM

Not much difference than bowing down to the Emperor's hat.

Subject: RE: BS: Buy a flag, fly a flag, or go to jail!
From: Bill D
Date: 09 Aug 04 - 11:34 AM

it's a bad sign when we are ORDERED to display a flag.

Subject: RE: BS: Buy a flag, fly a flag, or go to jail!
From: Blackcatter
Date: 09 Aug 04 - 12:13 PM

Here's what we've had to do in Central Florida to help our kids and teachers stock there book bags and classrooms with "required" supplies.

A Gift For Teaching

♥ Almost half of the students can't afford lunch, much less school supplies.

♥ Some kids go to school without socks, underwear or showers.

♥ Teachers spend an average of $500 a year to help care for their students' needs.

♥ School supply budgets only allocate five cents a day for each student.

♥ Our Mission

The mission of A Gift For Teaching is to ensure that children in Central Florida have the basic tools for learning by transferring, at no cost, the community's surplus supplies and merchandise into the hands of teachers and school children in need. The schools participating are from the most impoverished areas, based on the percentage of students enrolled in the free and reduced lunch program.

Subject: RE: BS: Buy a flag, fly a flag, or go to jail!
From: Little Hawk
Date: 09 Aug 04 - 12:14 PM

Dang right. I think that the public in Florida should be ordered by law to purchase flags that are so absolutely HUGE...imagine flags that are at least 20 by 35 feet, for example...that everyone would finally realize just how silly the whole damn thing is and get over it. I have never seen any place more obsessed with its flag than the good old USA. It is idolatry.

Subject: RE: BS: Buy a flag, fly a flag, or go to jail!
From: Jim Dixon
Date: 09 Aug 04 - 12:31 PM

Find out what organizations lobbied for the bill and ask THEM for the money.

Subject: RE: BS: Buy a flag, fly a flag, or go to jail!
From: Jim Dixon
Date: 09 Aug 04 - 12:39 PM

Furthermore, if they don't give it to you, use this information to embarrass them as much as possible. Write letters to your local newspapers denouncing the VFW (or whoever) for being "patriotic" enough to lobby for the bill, but not patriotic enough to put their money where their mouth is. If those organizatons, whoever they are, have given money to politicians, publicize that, too.

Subject: RE: BS: Buy a flag, fly a flag, or go to jail!
From: wysiwyg
Date: 09 Aug 04 - 12:43 PM

VFW's also GIVE flags. Let's be sure who we're attacking eh?

~S~

Subject: RE: BS: Buy a flag, fly a flag, or go to jail!
From: Peace
Date: 09 Aug 04 - 12:44 PM

"Patriots shout promises and fools salute a flag,
While the country which it represents is torn apart like rags,
It's not just done in fact, it's done in deed;
I count the blessing daily that the air I breathe is free,
But between assault and battery you'll be brought to your knees,
It hurts me deep inside to see you bleed,
My country 'tis of thee,
Country 'tis of thee."

From a song I wrote for Canada many years back.

Bruce M

Subject: RE: BS: Buy a flag, fly a flag, or go to jail!
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 09 Aug 04 - 12:45 PM

There are many tendrils to this pledge and/or loyalty question.

A boss at a Corps of Engineers office in Central Texas went further than having new employees read and sign the loyalty oath--he administered it in person and had you read it out loud. You have the option to "so help me" to someone's god or to "so affirm." I chose "so affirm" and his eyebrows went way up on that one.

I can't help but think that the folks who want this flags firmly in place are the same ones who want school prayer to be part of the curriculum. When I can I sit out the pledge, or if pushed to rise, I just stand with my hands at my side, and when they get to the prayer (which they invariably do at public meetings down here in Texas) I just sit, or I stand looking forward with no gesture or indication that I'm participating. And I usually see several others practicing a similar form of non-participation.

The pledge doesn't make the U.S. any stronger or smarter or make kids and more likely to grow to be loyal subjects or patriotic citizens. It just makes a few people feel good to see everyone else have to go through their little routine.

SRS

Subject: RE: BS: Buy a flag, fly a flag, or go to jail!
From: Peace
Date: 09 Aug 04 - 12:57 PM

Alberta has returned to that also. Our school division has mandated that each classroom have a flag which students must face as the National Anthem is played over the intercom. We also have a daily reading of the Lord's Prayer--but I AM in a Catholic school.

The only part of SRS's post with which I disagree, and it's not major, is this: The study of Wing Chun (a martial art) has taught me that to make a 'move' my own I have to repeat it about 5,000 times. Then, in a combined defense/offense strike, it is 'automatic', and therefore faster. I think the same can be said of facing flags and hearing anthems and repeating prayers. Indoctrination does work for most, and then when countries or religions call for the unquestioning support of their adherents, they get it like right now. "Though this be madness, there is method in it."

I would give my life for this country and its people, but before I have to do that I will fight every stupid, ill-considered policy with all the might I can muster. Because, to me, that is what a patriot SHOULD do.

Bruce M

Subject: RE: BS: Buy a flag, fly a flag, or go to jail!
From: Nigel Parsons
Date: 09 Aug 04 - 01:33 PM

Further to Brucie's comment above:
FDR update it Here

But still 1:1.9

Is the Florida legislature contravening US executive order 10834?

Nigel (My flag is red white & green!)

Subject: RE: BS: Buy a flag, fly a flag, or go to jail!
From: Bobert
Date: 09 Aug 04 - 01:45 PM

Down in Leesburg, Va. (where I used to have my business) they have a three flag rule. Put up a forth and you *will* get a letter...

Also on the serious side, back 'round 1980 after retirib from my job as a social worker, I went to work at Dominion Chevrolet in Richmond, Va. in their service deperatment. Well, the owner got this idea that he would sell more cars if he had a bigger flag so he purchased the largest flag that he could find. It was like 30 feet long and 18 or so feet high... Well, it wasn't up more than an hour before someone complained about the size of it. Go figure? Wouldn'
t happen these days, that's fir sure...

BTW, when ever the wind came up they'd have to draft the tow rucker driver, who happened to weigh in at about 250 pounds, to get the danged think down. I remember one afternoon that he was out on call and by the time he got back that flag was carryin' on something fierce and he somehow got hold of one corner of it, held on fir dear life and had himself a fine ol' ride as that flag picked him up like he was nuthin' but a hot air baloon... Now that was sight to see... Sho nuff was...

Opps... Sorry about the drift...

BTW, I ain't go no flags on my ol' Toyota and no "God Bless America" bumper stickers either. I do have a variety of Green Party stickers. Do they count fir anything? Ya' reckon I might get arrested?

And, BTW, part 2... No wise crack comments about the Green Party stickers being responsible for the current administration being in power. Heck, if they had had to steal a few more million votes, they would have...

Bobert

Subject: RE: BS: Buy a flag, fly a flag, or go to jail!
From: Blackcatter
Date: 09 Aug 04 - 01:47 PM

One of the other problems this causes is that because of new fire safety regulations, only 20% of walls can be covered with anything. So another 3X5 foot section means that even less childern art or information posters can go up on the walls.

Of course, something like 30% of our students are going to classes in trailers. Talk about real "trailer trash."


Of course, an ignorant population doesn't vote and them that do usually vote Republican.

Subject: RE: BS: Buy a flag, fly a flag, or go to jail!
From: Peace
Date: 09 Aug 04 - 01:54 PM

Vote GREEN: Give peas a chance!

Subject: RE: BS: Buy a flag, fly a flag, or go to jail!
From: CarolC
Date: 09 Aug 04 - 01:59 PM

Is this your flag, Nigel Parsons?

Subject: RE: BS: Buy a flag, fly a flag, or go to jail!
From: Nigel Parsons
Date: 09 Aug 04 - 02:12 PM

CarolC:

Did you have to do that?

It's a pain having to stand while I'm keying

Nigel

Subject: RE: BS: Buy a flag, fly a flag, or go to jail!
From: CarolC
Date: 09 Aug 04 - 02:15 PM

hahahaha...

It's a very nice flag, Nigel.

Subject: RE: BS: Buy a flag, fly a flag, or go to jail!
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 09 Aug 04 - 04:22 PM

"I can't help but think that the folks who want this flags firmly in place are the same ones who want school prayer to be part of the curriculum."

That's what puzzles me. You'd think those would be the very people who'd recognise flag-worship as a kind of idolatry, and who'd be determined to fight it to the death. More especially so long as reverencing "the flag" isn't even accompanied by any kind of prayer.

What I'd have expected woudl have been that they'd be saying that, so long as there is no place in schools for prayers and religious symbols, there should be no place for any lesser symbols such as flags.

Subject: RE: BS: Buy a flag, fly a flag, or go to jail!
From: Blackcatter
Date: 09 Aug 04 - 04:29 PM

But they don't see it as flag-worship. They see it as honoring the country. I really don't have a problem with that. I have a problem with the pledge, because of the "under god", but as for having the flag, that's ok.

Subject: RE: BS: Buy a flag, fly a flag, or go to jail!
From: CarolC
Date: 09 Aug 04 - 04:40 PM

I'd have a problem pledging alegiance to a flag whether or not the pledge contained the word "God" in it. I don't agree with the idea of pledging allegiance to a flag. Now the Constitution would be another thing altogether. I would not have any problem pledging allegiance to or, perhaps more appropriately, support for the Constitution of the US.

Subject: RE: BS: Buy a flag, fly a flag, or go to jail!
From: Peace
Date: 09 Aug 04 - 04:50 PM

Symbols are very powerful. They provoke feelings that cannot be rationalized right off. I feel angry when I see a swastika, and I smile when I see the nuclear disarmament sign. Jung spoke to this, and countries have picked up on it.

Subject: RE: BS: Buy a flag, fly a flag, or go to jail!
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 09 Aug 04 - 05:06 PM

CarolC--we are in agreement there. The constitution is the thing that makes or breaks the U.S., not the flag. The "under god" bit was put in with a shoehorn 50 years ago in a bit of a rush (we've covered that before on Mudcat). Here's a link (from a group called "Religious Tolerance.org")

Symbols like the swastika were appropriated from earlier cultures and had far different meanings, but those are probably forever lost, at least in the West, due to the heavy baggage that went with the most modern usage by Hitler.

Brucie, do you have any links to the nuclear disarmament symbol you're speaking of?

SRS

Subject: RE: BS: Buy a flag, fly a flag, or go to jail!
From: PoppaGator
Date: 09 Aug 04 - 05:11 PM

I'm sure that the VFW did *not* lobby for this regulation. I'm equally sure that some profit-seeking flag manufacturer had something to do with it. Why else "require" that perfectly good flags -- which already exist in most if not all American classrooms -- be replaced with flags conforming to an arbitrary measurement?

Subject: RE: BS: Buy a flag, fly a flag, or go to jail!
From: Rapparee
Date: 09 Aug 04 - 05:14 PM

Actually, flying the flag or flags in front of the Library or City Hall or the Federal Courthouse, etc. isn't a bad idea -- it marks them as public buildings.

I might even put a US and Idaho flag set in my office. As a PR flack down in Kentucky told me, if you ever have the media interviewing you on something that might be bad or embarassing, put the flags behind you and, if possible, a picture of Washington, Lincoln, or both.

Subject: RE: BS: Buy a flag, fly a flag, or go to jail!
From: GUEST,Clint Keller
Date: 09 Aug 04 - 05:17 PM

Far as I know, the Jehovah's Witnesses are the only religious group that refuse to salute the flag because it's idolatry. And far as I know it's the only part of their religion I agree with.

CarolC (09 Aug 04 - 04:40 PM ) got it right.

clint

Subject: RE: BS: Buy a flag, fly a flag, or go to jail!
From: CarolC
Date: 09 Aug 04 - 05:19 PM

SRS, I think it's what we here in the US call the "peace sign" or the "ban the bomb" sign. Circle with an upside-down Y with three tines instead of two.

Subject: RE: BS: Buy a flag, fly a flag, or go to jail!
From: jeffp
Date: 09 Aug 04 - 05:22 PM

Stilly, the nuclear disarmament symbol that Brucie was talking about is the one we know as the peace sign, you know, the one that looks sort of like the Mercedes logo with an extra bit pointing straight down. It was born in the UK and formed by the semaphore for N and D, meaning nuclear disarmament. (Anybody that was there please feel invited to correct anything that needs it.)

Subject: RE: BS: Buy a flag, fly a flag, or go to jail!
From: Peace
Date: 09 Aug 04 - 05:32 PM

SRS: What CarolC said.

www.cnduk.org/INFORM~1/symbol.htm

Subject: RE: BS: Buy a flag, fly a flag, or go to jail!
From: Metchosin
Date: 09 Aug 04 - 07:28 PM

Still makes me laugh, but years ago, when I became a federal civil servant, I had to swear allegiance to the Queen on a Bible. The government had not supplied the lab where I worked with a Bible and superiors hadn't thought to bring a personal copy, so I was sworn in on a dictionary, reversed so that the title was not obvious.

As a Canadian, pledging allegiance to a flag seems so very foreign, but then again, so did pledging allegiance to the Queen. In fact, come to think of it, the only thing that did seem quite right about the whole thing was the use of the dictionary .

Subject: RE: BS: Buy a flag, fly a flag, or go to jail!
From: Amos
Date: 09 Aug 04 - 07:33 PM

I think pledging Allegiance on a dictionary would be much more binding than doing so on a Bible.


A

Subject: RE: BS: Buy a flag, fly a flag, or go to jail!
From: Metchosin
Date: 09 Aug 04 - 07:45 PM

It could have been more binding Amos, but it was an abridged copy. LOL

Subject: RE: BS: Buy a flag, fly a flag, or go to jail!
From: Jim Dixon
Date: 09 Aug 04 - 08:08 PM

Many Quakers also refuse to pledge allegiance to the flag. I can't say this is an official doctrine of the Quakers, because Quakers don't have any official doctrines or creeds. There probably are some Quaker kids who DO say the Pledge, or go through the motions, just because they don't want to make a fuss or stand out from the crowd, and I don't think Quakers would condemn them for doing it, but I think they would support anyone who refused to say the Pledge.

See Friends Statements on the Pledge of Allegiance

Subject: RE: BS: Buy a flag, fly a flag, or go to jail!
From: GUEST
Date: 09 Aug 04 - 08:34 PM

Bobert, that stupid gigantic flag still flies over Midlothian Tpk.

Subject: RE: BS: Buy a flag, fly a flag, or go to jail!
From: HuwG
Date: 09 Aug 04 - 10:10 PM

From the Two Ronnies (BBC comedy show, some years ago):

"The longest trial in recent British history has just ended at the Old Bailey. Apparently, when the chief prosecution witness took the oath, he held the card in his right hand, and read aloud what was in the Bible."

Subject: RE: BS: Buy a flag, fly a flag, or go to jail!
From: Blackcatter
Date: 09 Aug 04 - 11:30 PM

"I Pledge Allegiance to the flag of the United States of America
and to the Republic for which it stands, one Nation under God,
indivisible, with liberty and justice for all."

You're not just doing to the flag and the flag is just a physical symbol. Call it idolatry, if you wish, but no one is worshipping the flag in this case.

Subject: RE: BS: Buy a flag, fly a flag, or go to jail!
From: darkriver
Date: 10 Aug 04 - 02:40 AM

Here is the largest US flag ever. It was plastered to the outside of the building where I work, a few days after 9/11/01, by my boss.

doug

Subject: RE: BS: Buy a flag, fly a flag, or go to jail!
From: GUEST,Boab
Date: 10 Aug 04 - 03:52 AM

Congratulations Bee-dubya-ell, on your possession of what seems to be one of the few unwashed brains between Seattle and New Orleans!

Subject: RE: BS: Buy a flag, fly a flag, or go to jail!
From: The Fooles Troupe
Date: 10 Aug 04 - 06:37 AM

Johnnie Howard has apparently been faithfully taking the Bush tablets.

Australian Schools now have to fly the Aussie flag to get Federal Funding.

The Govt has decreed that $1500 will be made available to put up a flagpole for each school - but the funding seems to be a little short on one for every school...

But:

First you have to raise the money yourself to get the flagpole installed.
Then you have to submit a form requesting reimbursement.
Then you have to pay for and affix an approved plaque that says that the flagpole was donated by the Howard Federal Govt.
Then it has to be "approved".
Then just wait for the cheque...

Insert here all the previous stuff about schools not having sufficient funding in the first place...

Robin

I'm not making this up!

Subject: RE: BS: Buy a flag, fly a flag, or go to jail!
From: Sandra in Sydney
Date: 10 Aug 04 - 09:34 AM

& while waiting for the chq. the school does without essentials, if they are a poor state school or a small private religious school.

However if they are one of the large rich private religious (or secular) school with enormous government funding, they don't even notice the cost.

sandra