Edit the Pledge of Allegiance to remove the phrase “Under God”
The Pledge of Allegiance is said every day in schools across America. It is a government sanctioned speech, and should remain neutral in matters of religion. In its current state, it supports the existence of God, which goes against several religions, and supports others. This bias should not be supported by the country according to the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment to the United States Constitution.
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Links to books and other items on this page and elsewhere on Greg Ladens' blog may send you to Amazon, where I am a registered affiliate. As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases, which helps to fund this site.
An acquaintence of mine in high school recited the whole, revised pledge but ended with the phrase “with liberty and justice for al-most everyone.”
(I just got my CafePress teeshirt with the original pledge on it; can’t wait for the CogDiss it will cause.)
See, I think this misses the point; making kids in school recite a nationalistic creed (before they’re old enough to understand and question its implications) is creepy in and of itself, with or without deities. Nationalist indoctrination isn’t any less bad than religious indoctrination.
(And in the US, it’s the intertwining of self-congratulatory tribal nationalism and fundamentalist religion that has produced some of the worst political tendencies, not least the Tea Party. Both of these bases need to be attacked concurrently, not just one.)
Walton, it does not miss the point at all! Yes, you are correct that there are many reasons to not have the pledge.
See: http://goo.gl/WTNsR
But the particular issue here is the prayer, and there are specific organizations that specifically go after church-state issues, and they are allowed to do so in preference to state-being-stupid issues. That’s a different group!
Wouldn’t it be a case of de-editing the pledge? I seem to recall reading that the under god thing was added in the 50s, probably in the hopes of setting commie infiltrators on fire buy making them say the G word
Francis Bellamy deliberately avoided use of the words “under god” because he believed in a separation of church and state.
Bellamy also wanted to add the word “equality” but left it out because of the times he was living in – slavery was only a few years gone and the Ku Klux Klowns were on the rise. The public wouldn’t have accepted a pledge saying blacks were equal to whites.
The pledge, as Francis Bellamy wanted to say it:
“I pledge allegiance to my Flag and to the republic for which it stands, one nation, indivisible, with equality, liberty and justice for all.”
Try saying that as the pledge next time. If somebody rightwingnut gets pissy about it, employ the tactic they use: claim that they’re against equality for all people and they want legalized discrimination (which is probably true, but what the hey…).
If the wingnuts want to pretend people are “anti-god” for leaving out the offensive phrase, then claim they’re bigots who oppose equality for all because you put the word in. It’s no worse than what they’re doing.
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