Flying a flag and loving your country are not the same thing. One of them costs twelve dollars at Walmart. The other one requires actual thought, sustained effort, and the willingness to hold your country accountable when it falls short.
What I keep watching is people dressing their grievances up in red, white, and blue and calling it devotion to America. It's not. It's a costume. And it's a convenient one, because the moment you question the costume, you get called unpatriotic.
Real patriotism is complicated. It means caring about the country more than you care about winning a political argument. It means defending institutions even when those institutions produce outcomes you don't like. It means acknowledging history accurately — all of it — not just the chapters that make you feel good.
The loudest people in the room are almost never the most committed ones. That's true in business. It's true in relationships. It's true in politics.
The people I see screaming about America the loudest are also the people most willing to burn down the things that make America worth defending — free press, independent courts, peaceful transfer of power — the second those things produce a result they dislike.
That's not patriotism. That's selfishness with a flag on top. And I'm tired of watching everyone tiptoe around saying so.
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