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PATRIOTISM
It is a major event in a child’s psychological development to comprehend some sense of a nation, or, his country. He identifies first with objects closest to him, like the mother, then his own place to sleep, teething objects, toys, etc. Then he understands his own clothes, shoes, pants, etc. If the child is taught religious things, he may early identify with a building of worship, and a new set of people. But, eventually, he faces the matter of school, and the daily exposure to a group larger than any he’s encountered before. In the days before pre-school nurseries, kindergarten was a major social encounter.
My parents were quite interesting in their training methods. It was all very natural, it seems to me as I look back. I was baptized a Christian while in my mother’s womb, so I was literally born in religion. (She was nine months pregnant with me when she herself was baptized herself.) I can remember Sabbath School days, when I was two and three years old. I can remember the sense of reverence which I learned from first my mother, then the behavior of the people at church.
My mother was like a conduit of spiritual emotion, for better or for worse, like many ‘indigenous’ peoples. My father too had a great sense of the sacred, although it was expressed more in his seeming aversion to it, rather than by his overt avowals. Nevertheless, he still communicated a psychological message that there was such a thing as the sacred in the world. Between both my parents, I had a stark sense of the spiritual, from my earliest memories.
I went to kindergarten right at the age of five years. I then learned, for the first time, the pledge of allegiance. I had seen the American flag before, on the church platform, but did not have specific emotional associations with it. It was at school, with a group of other little kids, that I felt my first real consciousness of “America,” my country.
As we were taught the pledge, I was in absolute awe. It was a community experience, unlike anything I’d ever known. We all said it together. That was unique in itself to me. I didn’t know these other kids. They were just other human beings. Yet, in the process of learning that pledge, we were all one, somehow.
The teacher, Miss Shields, (an older woman), had us all standing in a big circle, but everyone turned to face flag at the front of the room. I remember looking at the other students. Group identity was exciting and new.
Then we all put our right hand over our heart. Now that was incredibly dramatic. I’d never done that before. That really meant something, something profoundly deep. And a whole group of us did it together. That made it even more significant. I can remember it to this day. I was in tears at five years old. It was just an overwhelming experience. I got goose bumps all over, too.
It was new and special, and to me felt very close to religion. Naturally, I was wired for that. The name of “God” did it for me. God was connected to this flag, and all of us little children. This was like a prayer, then. That was the emotional read in me. We all promised to be true and faithful to a flag, to the country it represented, and that somehow said we had a special relationship with one another. We were all Americans. We had a nation. It was “under God.” It was big, deep, and broad. It was us. All of us. Together.
It wasn’t until several decades later that I began to rediscover these precious feelings, and their role in being American. The first ‘return of the native’ came to me in 1990, just after I had finished an Artist Diploma degree from Hartt School of Music, in Hartford, Connecticut. I had moved to Andover, Massachusetts to take over a piano studio for a teacher who was traveling in Europe. It was a somewhat depressing for me, since I really had no official position, and no sure income but for that summer.
During that time, I realized that poverty did not mean personal failure, nor was it necessarily the result of personal failure. And I realized that greed and envy were as likely to be found in poor people as in wealthy people. Certainly, the poor had no moral basis for envy of the rich. It is natural, but not moral. I found words in the Bible to the clear effect that neither the condition of poverty or wealth necessarily signified anything moral. The only prohibition I could find was on covetousness.
Then I realized that it takes courage to endure want and privation. It takes even more courage to dismiss the natural resentment toward those who are more fortunate. I developed a social theory that the lack of courage lay at the root of all the social ills in America. People thought they had a right to a Cadillac. This was a terrible error. “I’ve been wronged” was the strongest sentiment in the country. To fight for one’s rights had become the meaning of being American. Equality had come to mean economic parity. It was all materialism now. This was not true Americanism at all, in my feeling.
I envisioned a national social reform campaign. I wanted people to be brave, and to endure their economic lot with courage. It was an Indian thing, in my mind, to take pain, and not to complain. I actually solicited sponsors, and even interviewed with some, like Phillip Morris, The Christian Science Monitor, and private tycoons. The 500 year anniversary of Columbus’ arrival in the Americas (1992) was approaching, and that added to my motives for campaigning. I thought America needed a revival of spiritual values, and an Indian would be the perfect leader.
As it turned out, I gave lecture at the Phillips Academy in Andover, and another at Quincy’s “Presidents Church” (Boston), and then the summer was over. I ended up returning to Hartford, CT. I had not succeeded in launching my social campaign, but I had established the ideas in my own thinking.
I later developed a bad case of cancer, and was truly put out of commission. 1991 was a most difficult year. In 1992, I found myself beginning a doctorate in music at the University of Arizona, in Tucson. I was actually still recovering from the effects of chemotherapy I’d had a year before, so, I was emotionally perhaps more sensitive than usual.
It was ’93. Clinton was just a year in office, and great troubles, personal and national, were already beclouding his presidential identity. The country seemed to suffer an overwhelming state of moral frustration, social confusion, and mistrust in general.
As an Indian, I’m naturally a spiritually inclined person. I take things very seriously, and I took myself to prayer to the Creator. I remember the morning I was so shaken by the affairs of the country. The woman I was dating, a medical student, herself quite religious, came out to my mountainside apartment one morning as I was about to give myself to prayer. I’m naturally a little dramatic in my style, maybe even heathenish, but I allowed her silent place. She was a very sincere person, and in fact I loved her for that.
I began to pray, simply, but then, as I appealed to God, “Remember our country,” I immediately broke up completely, as if to wail like an ancient Jew. It was such a sudden, gripping emotion that I cried openly. I was truly heartbroken over my country. I can’t say it any more simply or clearly. My soul was bleeding. I felt I was losing something I loved.
Some time after, my friend commented on my behavior. She was a little stunned by it, how someone could be that attached to a nation. She said, “I’ve never known anyone who felt it so intensely.”
Well, I love America, literally, or I should say, passionately. Maybe I’m psychologically askew, but that’s the way it is.
In 1998, after I’d taught Humanities and Psychology at Oklahoma State University-Oklahoma City for over two years (including summers), I realized that truth, love, and patriotism were quite absent from the American educational system, and in fact their absence was the underlying cause of the failure of the system.
I began opening each course with the open declaration of my agenda. “This class is about truth, love, and patriotism.” The ancient humanities courses were a perfect opportunity to explore the meaning of the word, “nation.” We needed the truth about ‘What is a nation?’ How does it come about? Why are there such entities? What makes a nation last? How does it become weak, and pass? I was determined that these were the questions needing answers. I would say, “One thing is certain: a nation cannot last if its people don’t love it.”
And that was the next matter, love. What is love, and especially, how do you love a nation? I pointed out that the introductory psychology text books, such as Davis and Paladino’s, or Morris and Maisto’s, do not even mention the concept of love, much less patriotism. Davis and Paladino mention truth only to justify the psychological method as a superior approach to attaining truth. I became quite convinced that the educational system was completely lacking in the most vital concepts on which a nation is built.
I held a mock trial the summer of 2000 at OSU-OKC. I had the students debate the teaching of patriotism in public schools. Interestingly, The Patriot (Mel Gibson) came out that July. It was the perfect climax of my whole effort that year.
I then presented a proposal to Oklahoma Governor Frank Keating that patriotism should be taught in public schools. He endorsed the idea immediately, yet we found no sponsor in the Oklahoma legislature at that time. In January, 2001, I became a columnist for David Horowitz’ Front Page Magazine, the internet news organ. I began using publicity to try and campaign for patriotism in public schools. I was listed among Young America’s Foundation speakers, and began speaking at colleges and universities.
By the end of that spring semester, I was dismissed from OSU-OKC due to my extracurricular activities. Institutions are liberal by nature, and especially educational institutions. There was no place for me as a college teacher, so it seemed.
The following fall, however, I was able to begin teaching for University of Oklahoma, in the College of Liberal Studies. By this time, I was blatantly patriotic in the classroom. Once again, the humanities course I taught was focused on truth, love and patriotism. Once again, I held another mock trial. This time, however, it was in an actual Oklahoma district court room, with an actual judge presiding. It was covered by OU’s Public Radio station as well. It was a wonderful experience, to hear intelligent people debate the pros and cons of teaching patriotism in public schools. The student jury decided, unanimously, that patriotism should be taught.
By the 2002 Oklahoma Legislature session, there was a House Bill which addressed some basic ideas of patriotism, and called for their minimal acknowledgment in public schools. The House approved it unanimously, but the Senate’s Education Committee chair killed it before it left her desk. It was never considered.
I began writing for OU’s conservative student newspaper, The Fountainhead, and exposing the story. I’ve been associating with the Oklahoma Conservative Political Action Committee since 2001, and through this agency I have been able to understand deeper meanings of patriotism as it applies to the political process. Elected officials must be held accountable to the people who elected them. This is critical.
Then I began to see the root problem of the legal system, and the liabilities in the courts. I was informed of the grotesque corruption in the Oklahoma Bar Association, and on July 15, 2002, I was appointed to a Citizens Task Force by Sen. Stratton Taylor, to investigate court reform in Oklahoma. This new development in my campaign for patriotism is encouraging. I believe that patriotism must be taught, but, clearly, the people who decide what is taught are those in power. Unless those in responsible positions are true to their duty, true to the people who elected them, there is no hope of reform, at least in a civilized manner.
So, my campaign for patriotism continues. I still believe that ‘love of country’ is the basic meaning of patriotism. The September 11 attacks on our country brought out a lot of emotional responses, and because this happened four years after I’d begun my public advocacy of patriotism, I was able to see some of the aspects of patriotism which were more important. The emotional base is natural and necessary, but it clearly must be educated.
This I have learned from OCPAC, right here in Oklahoma City. To love the country means to know what constitutes the country, and that means knowing and understanding the Constitution. Anyone can wave the flag. Socialists Democrats can wave the flag, but that doesn’t mean they aren’t enemies of the Republic.
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