What's your take on the US Flag issue w/Toni?

I think in a month or so nobody will know who she is.

 

If this is in regards to the basketball player in New York, i have no problem with it. What she's doing is a form of protest. I happen to agree with her on her views on the war on Iraq. I believe that the Bush administration has ulterior motives.

 

Just imagine her in Iraq turning her back on Sadaam, or the Iraqui flag. If she wants to protest, stay in the locker room and not bringi ng down the team with her political views.

References to Bob Mathews article in the ROchester Democrat and Chronicle.

 

First off why does this have anything to do with the WUSA?

Aside from your political views....

Secondly, do any of the "We Hate Toni" types out there get their XXL panties in a bunch when people ain't standing at attention when the anthem is being played? My money says "no".

I was at a basketball game at my alma mater yesterday afternoon and the anthem began as soon as we stepped onto the third floor concourse. I stopped. It took my friends several seconds to figure out what was going on. There were ALOT of folks that were oblivious to the fact that the anthem was being played and we were saluting the flag. They were still putting mustard on their hotdogs. Their FAT hands were digging into a bucket of popcorn. Thier FAT faces were still yapping on their cell phones.

If you find her turning her back to the flag as a sign of disrespect so be it. But I want you folks to also raise a stink when other forms of disrespect to the anthem and flag occur at your next sporting event. The only reason why everyone is running with this one is because the media has made to big of a deal out of it.

In no way am I supporting her stance on her political views (a college kid nonetheless...she probably has not really "lived" in the real world yet so her views are not valid IMNSHO). She can feel however she wants about this whole war issue. If she wants to turn her back to the flag that's fine with me. But a very tiny molehill has turned into an 8000 meter peak by us and the media.

 

oh so we should celebrate the freedom we have in the US... as long as its not somebody you disagree with - then they should hide their opinions to please others - my fellow americans have LOST THEIR COLLECTIVE FREAKIN' MINDS!!!!!!!!!!!!! grow the hell up! celebrities opinions dont matter, college kids opinions dont matter - what a joke!! last time i checked, were all americans and each of our opinions count as much as any other (even the stupid ones, ie the 49.9% that voted for the biggest piece of trash president ever!)

i laud her for her conviction and her courage to be herself even when the chattle are cryin about an essentially meaningless (to anyone but the girl) protest - as teddy roosevelt (who we could really use right now IMO) once said - to put the president above criticism is an ultimate act of treason

 

a form of protest - that's all it is. the constitution will survive.

the real question is:
why do we require expressions of patriotism at a game, especially non-national-team games?

 

Subject: Zel Miller on why we need to do Baghdad

Don't know if you are familiar with the past governor of Georgia, Zell
Miller, who is now Georgia's junior senator in Washington or not. By the
way - he is a democrat. I thought this article in the paper was very apropos.

Zell Miller knows how to boil things down to the basics. That's what
Georgia's junior senator did when he explained why it's important that
Saddam Hussein be defanged. But he's also a good storyteller.

Here's the text of Mr. Miller's remarks, made on the Senate floor about
the need to help President Bush deal with Iraq. We couldn't say it any better.

"Mr. President, I have signed on as an original co-sponsor of the Iraq resolution,
and I'd like to tell you a story about why I think it is the right path to take:

A few weeks ago, we were doing some work on my back porch back home,
tearing out a section of old stacked rocks, when all of a sudden I uncovered a
nest of copperhead snakes. Now, I'm not one to get alarmed at snakes.
I know they perform some useful functions, like eating rats. And when I was a
young lad, I kept snakes as pets. I had an indigo snake, a bull snake, a corn snake
and many others. I must have had a dozen king snakes at one time or another.
They make great pets and you only had to feed them a mouse every 30 days.

I read all the books by Raymond C. Ditmars, who was the foremost herpetologist
of his day. That's an expert on snakes. For a while, I wanted to be a herpetologist,
but the pull of being a big-league shortstop outran that childhood dream. I reminisce
this way to explain that snakes don't scare me like they do some people. And I
guess the reason is that I know the difference between those that are harmless
and those that will kill you. In fact, I bet I may be the only senator in this body who
can look at the last three inches of a snake's tail and tell you whether it's poisonous
or not. I can also tell the sex of a snake, but that's another story.

A copperhead will kill you. It could kill one of my dogs. It could kill one of my
grandchildren. It could kill any of my four great grandchildren. They play all the
time where I found these killers. And you know, when I discovered these copperheads, I didn't call my wife Shirley and ask her advice, like I do on most things. I didn't
yell for help from my neighbors or take it to the city council. I just took a hoe and knocked them in the head and killed them. Dead as a doorknob. I guess you could
call it a unilateral action. Or pre-emptive or even bellicose and reactive. I took
their poisonous heads off because they were a threat to me. And they were a
threat to my home and my family. They were a threat to all I hold dear.

And isn't that what this is all about?"

 

Excellent question- why indeed? Why do we have them at all?

This woman's flag pretest was the subject of a thread in Free For All a couple of weeks ago. I posted there that we engage in all sorts of ritualistic behavior (national anthem, school prayer, pre-game prayer, pledge of allegiance, etc.)that serves no real purpose. This woman decided that she didn't want to participate because of her views on the war in general and the Cheney administration in particular. Now, she's become the center of a masses/media blitz, and it happened because the anthem was there for her to use to make her statement.

If you stop to think about it, these feel-good moments can be used in more than one way. Obviously, there are those among us who feel the need to publicly proclaim their membership in the masses, and to rail against people who take their patriotism, faith, whatever a bit more seriously and personally. For those that (for whatever reason) are not inclined to value the herd mentality, the rituals serve as a method of forcing them to:

1) go along with the ritual and betray themselves, so that they can bee seen by the masses as "with us", or

2) refuse to participate and risk being seen by the masses as "agin' us". How many of us peek to see who else is praying in church, whose hat is on during the anthem, who seems to know the words to the anthem, etc.? Childlike behavior befitting childish customs.

The rituals serve as a litmus test (intended or not) for malleability. They also give those who want to protest a stage on which to do so.

 

This has nothing to do with the WUSA and does not belong in this forum.

 

You ever been to the Other Sports forum or FFA or Politics? This issue has been discussed in there and it's now old.

Hell if she wants to do it then it's fine by me. I just won't agree with it. But I want to make sure you get all riled up at the folks at RFK that still wear their hats and bang their Thunder Stix during the anthem. That, IMNSHO, is still a form of disrespect.

 

i feel that way about the chicago blackhawks fans screaming bloody murder over the anthem - my mom cringes everytime she sees it lol

 

That's what I thought. It does not belong in this forum.

There is a politics forum and a FFA forum.

Thread closed.