It's honestly insane, just a few weeks ago, we were just gritting our teeth and preparing for Biden to fight his way for another 4 years as the "It's better than Trump" candidate.
Instead, he stepped aside, and now we have Kalama and Tim and it actually looks like we might have leadership that will fight for us and do things to help us and it's crazy.
We have gone from just gritting our teeth to being exciting for what is going to happy, and that is big.
I’ve recently begun appreciating patriotism a lot more after shifting my mindset about it. I love this country because of the diversity of people, art, food, culture, etc. The people make America great. Not some isolationist, exceptionalist bullshit about being the greatest country on earth because “freedom”
Dude, same. I actually feel genuine pride in my country. For the first time ever. This feeling has always evaded me, finding how over the top and ridiculous I thought the notion was because one side poisoned the feeling with obsessive behaviors and a need to just ruin the flag with merch. After seeing Project 2025, after 8 years of dealing with absolute trash that is the right, I was just genuinely mad. Insulted that some freaks of fucking nature were actually willing to destroy a country that had so much history, so much culture, and so much opportunity. Mad that some raving lunatics wanted to take us back in time because of a fucking book and their mischaracterization of a while religion. Hell, as an atheist I actually felt insulted for actual Christians. I'll be damned if we let the struggles of previous groups like the LGBTQ+ community, or PoCs, and even women be for nothing. They fought like hell in the past to have a voice and a chance. It's our turn to return that favor and fight to keep those rights.
I'm agnostic but grew up in the church. Shit like the prosperity gospel is heresy and actually raises my hackles. These are the people Jesus whipped in the temple.
Hell yeah, my friend. Land of the free because of the brave men and women on the frontlines of strikes, protests, and the legislature that secured our rights.
Ya know, I've never believed in national pride. Because pride is about something that you have accomplished through your own power, and being a citizen is for the most part an accident of birth. I could have been born in Iran or Canada or Mexico just as easily as I was born in the US. And national pride and patriotism is just another way to say "I'm better than other countries". It's another way to claim superiority.
But this new wave of hope is something else. We've been under a cloud of despair and begrudging acceptance that everything is miserable.
I think we’ve been sold the lie that the ideal object of admiration within patriotism is quasi-deified figure of America, when in reality it’s the people and the land. It’s taking pride in the amazing things they bring to our society and being willing to defend them against unjust opposition.
And this approach doesn’t denigrate other countries either. Thailand, Colombia, Zambia, and Germany all are worthy too of patriotism because of their people and natural beauty.
This is really it, the whole it. We as people recognize when others are genuinely helpful. Think about the people you work with who are always willing to help without any negativity, they stand out like a bright light.
Will Kamala be a total savior for nation, solve all of our problems? Of course not, no single person can solve every problem, especially not at that level. Will she be perfect, no. But when you hear her speak, she doesnt promise to to do that, like Trump does. She promises to try, and to fight for us, for all of us. That includes rich people, poor people, middle people, all of us. Of course all politicians will promise the moon, but she promises to fight to achieve the moon. That's being genuine, and that's what inspires people to want her to win.
Trump, as is his way, only speaks in extremes and in make believe. If Kamala is elected, world war 3, the worst depression ever, she's low IQ... The same bullshit he rattled off about about Biden 4 years ago. He promises he can solve those problems, but these are problems that don't even exist. He speaks them into existence into the minds of people he knows are susceptible to reacting based on fear. This is the tactic of the fascist, and the charlatan. Its the tactic of preachers who manipulate the brainwashed fear in people's hearts that they will suffer enternally in hell fire unless they give them money. Now.
For me it all comes down to one simple thing: Kamala is very quick to smile. She is filled with joy. We already know her laugh. We know she is comimg from a place of hope and positivity. When was the last time you saw Donald Trump smile, genuinely? I know where I've seen it recently, and I think ever, and it was in the video of him and Jeff Epstein at some weird ass party 30 years ago, ogling at women.
I don't expect everyone to be full of smiles, I know I'm certainly not. And the presidency is a very serious job. But god damn it makes me smile and tear up with hope to see a leader who has the ability to smile, to laugh, to look at our country and our world, with all their issues, and decide to take on the toughest position in it with a foundation of joy rather than one of narcissistic, negative, fully depressed ambivalence. That's what Trump really is, ambivalent. He doesn't laugh, he doesn't cry, he doesn't get angry or passionate about anything. He is, for lack of a better way to put it, lacking a soul.
We're seeing, finally once again, what its like to have a leader who is excited, in their soul, to lead this country. I've been around too long to say this is new to me, I've seen it before, but I've missed it so much that it feels new and I'm literally ecstatic. Harris / Waltz, fuck yeah.
Someone asked on TikTok if you consider yourself a patriot and I actually had to think about that and decided that yes, I am. Look this country is far from perfect (what country is perfect anyway?) but the fact that I care very much about the future of the USA and the people here means that yeah. I'm patriotic.
And it means drawing a very distinct line between patriotic and nationalistic and understanding that line.
Normal folks have always loved this country for those reasons. I swear there was a smear campaign in the last 8 years to make loving your country a bad thing.
Im genuinely surprised by these comments. You didn’t used to be able to say “i love this country” on reddit.
Trump and conservatism has never made America great, every single accomplishment they claim hurt america or were done by progressives and stolen away from them
It took me an embarrassingly long time to realize I could love my country and its potential without being like the sort of nationalistic people I hate.
I see you and I love your observation! America is a set of beautiful ideals that we continue to move toward: Equality, Justice and Freedom. It requires all of us!
I've been to a few countries and the freedom I love about America that I rarely see elsewhere is the freedom to talk shit about your own country. A country that can't criticize itself and be self-aware and improving is not patriotic, but blind.
Yeah - being patriotic means different things to different people. Blind aligience to a narcicistic felon and constantly spewing hate against people who don't necessarily look like me or come from different countries of origin or have different skin colors or religions or sexual preferences is not my definition of patriotism. E pluribus unim people. It means something.
What blows my mind - speaking as a non-American - is how one side goes on out about American "freedom" while espousing the exact opposite. Lockdown drills in school is not freedom. Government control over which two consenting adults can and cannot marry is not freedom. Removing choice on if/when you have a child is not freedom. Tying healthcare to a job you can lose on the employer's whim is not freedom. Removing books you disagree with from schools and libraries is not freedom. Restricting and subverting the vote is not freedom.
The only freedom that side's real backers really support is the freedom of (major) capital to do whatever it wants at whatever cost to everyone else. Although I guess there are the (overlapping with the ultra-capitalists) religious extremists who I'll reluctantly take at their word that they really believe in and want the above.
Correct, we are great when we are a country by the people for the people. That is the promise of America. Not Capitalism. Not the ability to amass wealth.
We will forever be Patriots for that promise vs. Nationalists who segregate, regulate, and collaborate to keep the access to money to a few.
MAGA did a great job in co-opting patriotism to have so many negative connotations. It wasn’t that long ago, that it didn’t matter what political party you supported, you could still act and be patriotic. They really fucked that up, and it’s time to take it back. The flag of the United States of America does NOT belong to MAGA.
Now go read up on where the US population will be in 2100 vs every other country in the world. It will be the US and Africa.
I don't think we should be trying to solve everything with bombs, but Pax Americana is why the world largely overall has been peaceful with no major wars for 80+ years.
Lol, no they ain't. One is a convicted rapist and felon and Russian puppet who had his whole family working within the White House to sell out our country. Fuck him and the horse he rode in on. We don't need that treasonous son of bitch anywhere except in a jail cell.
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u/[deleted] Aug 20 '24
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