How Patriotic is the average American?

[BuckSparkles]

so a self perpetuating circle jerk of this:

Actually I might have several conservative friends, but I have far more liberal friends. Liberalism seems common among naive youth who believe everything they see on TV or everything a college professor might say instead of being skeptical.

I drive them up the wall, but I admire them being able to remain friends despite political differences.

I do admit I have lost one or two of former friends who were a bit more passionate about their beliefs, but oh well.

[De Lupe]

"Patriotism is loyalty to real estate. Real estate that's been conquered 800 times by 800 different countries and 800 different regimes and each time it was just the greatest country ever." - House

In other words; I'm moving to Canada if we ever have a draft because I ain't dying for this place.

[Feel The Power]

From my experience, most people aren't very "patriotic" here unless a topic of conversation comes up that calls for it, or something bad like 9/11 happens.

[De Lupe]

Love me some Hugh Laurie. His new Hulu show has 2 episodes up, I may go watch them thanks to this quote... right after I watch the episode of House where he says this so I can scratch the itch of actually hearing it in his voice as opposed to hearing it in my head's version of his voice.

Hugh Laurie really was a great choice. He did such an amazing job. I see a lot of myself in House; like 7/10 of the way. All I'm missing is the medical degree, the crippling leg pain, and the Vicodin addiction.

[Auxora]

Americans are certainly patriotic, but I definitely think it's more a case of other people from other countries underestimating and downplaying how patriotic they are than just people from the US being extra patriotic. Look at the UK in olympics, the World Cup, UEFA, anything to do with the royalty, and shirts with the union jack were everywhere in the 80s. Even UK supporting English athletes at Wimbledon. I could say similar things about Germany (I work with folks from Germany, and I rarely see them without a shirt, hat, coat, etc. that has the German flag logo on it) or France as well, or even India or China, and certainly any of the Eastern European countries or Russia. In most developed countries their citizens are fairly to strongly patriotic.

So I'm not sure where the stigma started that somehow people from those countries are less patriotic than the US. It seems like such a silly thing to complain about, when every country has flags everywhere, tradition around leadership, pride in those that served in the military, celebrates some sort of national/independence holiday, nearly every country has sacrificed many thousands or millions of people in wars for their country, and they show strong support for athletes representing their country. But yet the same people see an American waving a flag and somehow they forget that they do all of these patriotic things themselves and act like it's strange.

[kail]

Few would not want to improve the country that they are a resident of.

[Deleted]

Because they are uninformed.

They live in a country that let's people die because they can't afford meds. A country where you can legally shoot each other under the right circumstances and where 80% is obese. A country constantly under attack from dry heats hurricanes and floods.

1% of the entire population is in jail. Alcohol is allowed softdrugs ain't. But only when your 21. Instead they let children drive 2000 pound vehicles and carry lethal arms when they are 16 but they can't handle the responsibility of drinking a beer.

Only an uninformed person would consider that the best country on earth.

[Tulune]

It depends on where in the USA you are referring to, we are a pretty big and diverse nation. My family in the south (Virginia) is pretty patriotic, but where i live in New England, not so much.

[Evil Midnight Bomber]

http://nyti.ms/2elaGZ6

The people who cheer at around the 30 second mark..not patriots.

[Independent voter]

In Europe the patriotic compare their country to other countries. The US doesn't do that, nobody in the US thinks "yeah, we better than Spain"

[Wyrt]

In Europe the patriotic compare their country to other countries. The US doesn't do that, nobody in the US thinks "yeah, we better than Spain"

No, they compare the US to Canada, Mexico, the UK, France, and Australia. Probably because those are the only countries they know about.

[Independent voter]

No, they compare the US to Canada, Mexico, the UK, France, and Australia. Probably because those are the only countries they know about.

No we don't, we don't think about other countries.

[dextersmith]

Not sure if Patriotic is the word I need to be using, if not feel free to correct me. Basically, on tv and in movies (I know this generally is not accurate but hang in there), Americans seem to be super Patriotic, can name all the presidents, know their history to a tee etc. I'm from the UK and sure, I can tell you who has been Prime minister in my lifetime and I can name a couple from recent history who were before my time but were famous for what they achieved. The sad fact is, I can probably name more American presidents than I can my own countries leaders. This is all from films and tv as I have never studied american history so I assume that the average American would know more than me based on that alone.

That's not patriotism.

[Kuntantee]

In Europe the patriotic compare their country to other countries. The US doesn't do that, nobody in the US thinks "yeah, we better than Spain"

That's quite a big claim and is pure horse shit. You don't need to go far to see American supremacist "patriots" in this very forum. American nationalism is presented to the world as "patriotism" when in fact it has all the characteristics of good ol' nationalism barring obsession with ethnicity for certain people. Tho, some "patriots" are also obsessed with that as well.

If you want to observe healthy patriotism, you need to look at Europe and West Asia.

[Independent voter]

That's quite a big claim and is pure horse shit. You don't need to go far to see American supremacist "patriots" in this very forum. American nationalism is presented to the world as "patriotism" when in fact it has all the characteristics of good ol' nationalism barring obsession with ethnicity for certain people. Tho, some "patriots" are also obsessed with that as well.

If you want to observe healthy patriotism, you need to look at Europe and West Asia.

That's because foreigners are here. How can you be isolationist on a forum filled with foreigners?

We have to speak in generalizations with 330 million people. Generally, the family of four you see waving the US flag at a parade never think of foreigners at all, maybe once or twice a year.

[Wyrt]

That's because foreigners are here. How can you be isolationist on a forum filled with foreigners?

We have to speak in generalizations with 330 million people. Generally, the family of four you see waving the US flag at a parade never think of foreigners at all, maybe once or twice a year.

Funny, because foreigners have been a very large topic for the presidential election.

[Gaaz]

The average American is pretty patriotic. Yeah, you get a few people, a disproportionate number of them online who hate America and like to bash it cause they're edgelords, but most of us love our country. It's weird when you think this is normal and then you talk to the average European, ask them about their country and the usual response is, "eh, it's a country!"

Also another reason we love our country is because in terms of the land and diversity it's absolutely beautiful and resource rich. You could not ask for a better place to live, in my opinion. We have it all in terms of climate choice, types of terrain and environment, etc. If you like a particular type of environment or climate or anything really, there is a state you can find it in.

Despite how fiercely we disagree about how to govern it, I think it's safe to say that we virtually all love our home.

Probably the reason why most europeans seem less patriotic compared to the US is because in Europe we care more about culture, not physical borders. For example parts of France at one time or the other belonged to Germany, Spain, England, Italy, as well as being completely separate and independent. Untill relatively recently, Germany was a collection of a couple of dozen kingdoms, later turned into Prussia, Saxony and Bavaria. It became one country only in 1871.
The same goes for most of Europe. So being obsessed about a "country" you live in has a much shallower meaning for most europeans, as opposed to "what culture do you belong to".
To put it into context, US patriotism is more about land and your home. European patriotism is about how you live and what you do.
IMO

[Spectral]

If it were possible to quantify patriotism as a single number, you'd wind up seeing some interesting clustering. Rural Americans, by and large, really love the United States, are very comfortable expressing this in no uncertain terms, and frequently fly flags and engage in other conspicuously patriotic signaling behaviors. Urban Americans, by and large, fancy themselves highly cosmopolitan and think in international terms; they're often uncomfortable with conspicuous patriotism and are quick to point out that the United States is no better than a number of other countries.

There's probably a significant middle-ground in the suburbs, but the two groups above will cluster towards maximum and minimum.

[Coombs]

I was in the infantry, but I'm barely patriotic. The only time that changes is when Tennisace makes a post and all I can think of is grabbing an american flag and invading that shit stain of a country and putting an end to that smug nature exuding from the tundra.

[Shadowferal]

Remembering all that makes one's country great, and taking pride in the fact that you are a citizen of that country...there's nothing wrong in that. Just the opposite.

However when that pride becomes hubris, and denies the reasons why/how other countries are great then it becomes nationalism.