Rational BAC

I don't find anybody particulary rude on this forum. There are a lot worse forums you know that way. And, of course, I am very thick skinned anyway.

All I can relate is personal experience. It is possible times have changed and "big brother" is actually watching you and listening to what you say at some god forsaken time of the morning.

I still say you can get away with leaving out "Under God" and changing "indivisible" to "divisible" and -----unless you are speaking very loudly,-------- it would seem that even today, no one would notice at all. Or if noticed something different would be so unsure about what they heard as to not mention it.

Of course I could be wrong about times today. Maybe "THEY" are watching us very carefully. Paranoia rules.
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PS----I never thought of this until now but ------instead of "Under God" I think you could mumble something like "without God" and that would work quite well for an atheist. Someone would have to have excellent hearing to catch that, expecially with a bit of a mumble.

And you can say the Pledge and be true to your beliefs (or non-beliefs)

How about that one guys? I think it would work quite well.


The important part when making a Pledge is--------------------------------------------- "To thine own self be true"

livius drusus

I seriously doubt Rhea's town council meetings are held at the crack of dawn. You are belittling Rhea's experience by making it sound outlandishly improbable. I find your cheery experience of Pledge recital outlandish to a Brady Bunch degree, but I won't call you delusional or accuse you of paranoia.

The national mood of hyper-patriotism is palable and real not just to those outside the mainstream (peace activists, atheists, Tim Robbins), but to the spokespeople of the status quo as well. There hasn't been a news program that hasn't mentioned the tidal wave of my country right or wrong style jingoism and religiosity sweeping the nation. They usually attach it to some noxious pablum about dimpled girl scouts giving new flags to homeless nuns or some such inanity, so it can be presented as a cute thing instead of a chillling one. But nonetheless the mood is here, it's queer, and I will not get used to it.

Rational BAC

I will agree with you that times are a little scary today that way-----but paranoia over stupid things does not help at all.

There is always the election of 2004. I think Bush baby is toast myself. Going to go the way of Big Daddy.

Fight the big stuff. Let the little stuff go. The Pledge is "little stuff". Easy to get around, and not worth fooling with.

Congress can "mandate" any damned thing they please. And a free American populace can mandate what they say as a pledge. And, again, honestly ---------I seriously doubt anybody is going to notice minor phonetic changes in a mumbled pledge.

Muffinstuffer

Heh....no offense intended, but that's sort of like when Leslie Nielsen said, in Naked Gun 2 1/2, "I'm sure that we can handle this responsibly, just like the mature adults that we are. Isn't that right, Mr. Poopy Pants?" Calling his experience of Pledge recital outlandish to a Brady Bunch degree IS sort of questioning his experience, isn't it?

Again, no offense intended. I just thought that the entire point was that the two experiences were BOTH different and valid..not that one was valid, and one was not.

livius drusus

Why do you persist in doubting Rhea's perceptions or honesty? Unless she's lying, tripping, painfully over-sensitive or in some other way insane, her experiences are just as accurate a depiction of reality as yours. Is it really so hard to imagine that the Pledge that was first modified to include god as a test of anti-communist patrotism could again be deployed in such a manner?

Rational BAC

livius-----

Brady Bunch?-------------Now we are getting seriously nasty.---

Try it sometime for yourself. The next time you are supposed to recite the pledge. Substitute "divisible" for "indivisible" (maybe you are one of those dam Yankees who cannot do that, but try it anyway). Mumble some nonsense syllables at the "under God" part.

Try it ---------I think you will find, as I have for the last 50 years that no-one will notice at all.

I could be wrong though. Maybe there are theist spies among us just there to check on things like that, but I doubt it.

livius drusus

I will do no such thing. And even if I did, it would of course have exactly no pertinence whatsoever to the veracity of Rhea's experience.

Again you mock Rhea and anyone else who has experienced the peer pressure and ostracization weapons of the mainstream with your snide references to spies and big brother. You are wrong. Not because freemasons are recording our every bedfart, but because many people in this country view anything less than full-volume flag-humping declamations as suspiciously lacking in patriotism.

Rhea

RBAC - I'm trying to figure out if you're actually accusing me of LYING or being DELUDED or what. Not sure exactly. Maybe you'd care to spell it out. Am I lying? Or am I deluded?

Although again, I thank you for presenting EXHIBIT A to explain to our friend MuffinStuffer just exactly where my civility is coming from if he approaches me the day after someone like you has. Perhaps MuffinStuffer will have a newfound compassion for the history which can lie behind a curmudgeonly response to his witness.

You'd think after 60 or so years of life you might actually learn an appreciation for things being different in different places. And times. Perhaps you want to stroll over to SL&S and read the story about the boy who just stayed silent during the "under God" part and was harrassed by his classmate over it. You dismissed without comment my relating of an experience. You completely ignore the impact of a member of the town board standing in front of a crowd to say the pledge at some point prior to running for office, and you don't even discuss whether mouthing "under Dog" or some such inanity actually addresses the problem of showing support for something that you do NOT, in fact, support.

If you can dismiss what is printed right in front of your face, it does not surprise me at all that you perceive no one noticing anyone during the pledge.

So which is it, anyway? Am I lying or deluded? How about the student who was harassed? Lying or deluded?

Rational BAC

Maybe I should explain more fully my problem with adding "under God" to the pledge---at least from a practical standpoint.

I am a Christian so I have no real problem with God. As a very firm believer in the STRICT separation of church and state-----I have to admit I do have a problem with it as a "mandated" by Congress addition to the Pledge in the McCarthyiest mid 50's.

But back to the practical aspect of it. I know many on this forum are too young to remember when "under God" was NOT in the pledge----and so atheists and agnostics have had to struggle with this problem a lot more than I have.

My problem, and the problem of EVERYONE from my (soon to enter dotage) generation is that--------------THAT IS NOT THE WAY WE LEARNED IT. I think, if I recall well, that I was in the 5th grade ----------I mean we are talking every morning saying the Pledge of Allegiance. -----for like 5 years --without "under God" in the damned thing. I could do the math on that, but believe me, I bet it was in the 1000's of times I recited the Pledge without "under God". I mean by that time, by God, it has been seriously ingrained in you.

OK----------Now comes in Teach and says Congress has mandated that you recite differently what you have recited for the past 5 years.

First of all------It sure sounds funny that way and seriously messes up the rhythm.

Second of all------you have learned it the old way so intensively that you cannot make the change. ------------All people from my age group when saying the Pledge----were thinking ahead of time "I gotta stick 'under God' in there somewhere---------where does it go anyway?--my mind is a complete blank.

And so it was somewhat hilarious in the late 50's for all of us of our generation. ------------"Under God" got stuck in there some damned place or other, come hell or high water.

So the whole thing for my generation was a bunch of incoherent mumbling. And most, like I did, just gave up on the whole project and went back to the old way----which actually did, and still does, sound better.

The only thing for sure about "Under God" in the pledge ----is that it sounds "stuck in there" ------which is what it was.

I hope this helps you young whipper snappers out a little bit. ----------------------Hell -----that didn't sound very good---------Going to leave it in anyway.

Rhea

So how does that relate to you telling me that I have not experienced what I said I experienced?

And I expect that many of the posters are not as young as you seem to think. For the record. What makes someone a whipper-snapper? 50? 40? 15? You'd better leave off the assumptions. You're batting about .010 here.