Patriotism vs. Criticism

[kitty]

I went to a talk today where an author accused leftists (not liberals) of hating America. Do you think it's possible to be patriotic to the U.S. and still criticize it, or do you think the very definition of patriotism means that you must support your country undoubtedly?

[ChinaLama]

I think when you put it that way, there's no way to say "yes, the two are mutually exclusive." you'll have to define what sort of criticism seems to be unpatriotic, or what sort of criticism is ACCUSED of being unpatriotic. For instance, communism is by definition unpatriotic since patriotism = love of one's country and communism is a borderless doctrine. Anarchism would also by definition by unpatriotic, I suppose. But no one would agree any criticism is automatically unpatriotic, b/c then what would the pt of freedom of speech be?

[kitty]

I think when you put it that way, there's no way to say "yes, the two are mutually exclusive." you'll have to define what sort of criticism seems to be unpatriotic, or what sort of criticism is ACCUSED of being unpatriotic. For instance, communism is by definition unpatriotic since patriotism = love of one's country and communism is a borderless doctrine. Anarchism would also by definition by unpatriotic, I suppose. But no one would agree any criticism is automatically unpatriotic, b/c then what would the pt of freedom of speech be?

yeah... I think I worded that badly. I guess what I'm trying to say is "do you think political critics like Bill Maher can say 'America practices cowardly military practices by lobbing bombs at foreign countries' or college profs saying 'maybe America did something to provoke 9/11' can be said and still have the person claim to be patriotic?

[TB4000]

Since the 9/11 incident, people's opinions on what's deemed patriotic or not have been skewed to a real extreme. The rights we have in this country allow us to speak freely about critisizing our government, unlike other countries. Yet if someone does speak negatively about it they're seen as "traitors" by some people and not having respect for the country. I remember when somebody quoted Britney Spears as saying "we should support our president no matter what he does", which is idiotic in its own right, regardless of there being tensions between countries or not.

[nonamerasian]

yeah... I think I worded that badly. I guess what I'm trying to say is "do you think political critics like Bill Maher can say 'America practices cowardly military practices by lobbing bombs at foreign countries' or college profs saying 'maybe America did something to provoke 9/11' can be said and still have the person claim to be patriotic?

Bill Maher’s comments were taken out of context.

I used to watch that show a lot when it was on ABC and the guy was a supporter of the military and rah-rah America before everyone started putting flags on their cars.

What he meant was that he didn’t like spin people were doing, like, “They only hate is because we are free.” Another one was several people saying that you have to be a coward to smash a plane into a building.

His feeling was that wasn’t completely true. It is a lot more difficult to do a kamikaze than to push a button away from harm. I think he was saying if anyone were to be called a coward, they it would better apply to the latter than the first.

I think a person can still be patriotic and criticize.