The flag as a fetish.

[MadHound]

Periodically it comes around, somebody in the US burns a flag and lots of people, right, left and center, get all upset about desecration of the flag, calling for new laws, prosecution, or at least a good scolding of those who put did the torching. Lots of odes to the flag are printed and spoken, lots of vitriol is spewed, and all in all, a good time is had by all and things go back to normal, until the next time.

A bit of perspective is needed however.

First of all, what is the flag? In concrete terms, the flag is nothing more than cloth, stitched into a design that we all recognize. In short, it is a symbol, that's all. Burning a flag does not damage the country, it doesn't kill anybody, in fact the proper way to discard of an old flag is to. . .burn it.

Meanwhile Americans put the flag on everything, their cars, their heads, hell even their asses(and frankly I think putting a flag on your ass is more of a desecration than burning it). Yet despite using the flag as corporate propaganda, slapping it on our bottoms, using it as a condom(yes, you can get red white and blue rubbers), despite desecrating it in every form imaginable, people only get up in arms when we burn it.

What that says to me is that we've developed a fetish about the flag. Not as in some kinky sex fixation(though go to any adult toy store and you can find all kinds of patriotic flag toys), but rather in the sense that it has become some magic talisman that in many minds has actually taken the place of what it stands for. We have watched as our country has been taken away from us and given to the few, the elite. We have stood by as politicians of all stripes have shredded the Constitution, and continue to do so. But relatively little fuss is raised though these ongoing acts of destruction continue.

But burn a flag, oh the horror. Even though it is a Constitutionally accepted form of free speech, whenever the rare occasion arises where a flag is burned a huge uproar is raised. Some tsk-tsk that it makes a particular group look bad. Others demand even further destruction of the Constitution via an anti flag-burning amendment. Some even threaten death to those who perform such an act. All this uproar over a symbol, yet so little ruckus raised when what that symbol stands for is shredded, ripped or burned.

What a strange reversal that is, truly. It reminds me of another society where the flag became a fetish, Nazi Germany. There, every single flag was physically "blessed" by the original blood flag, the flag that flew and was bled on at the head of the beer hall putsch. No, I am not saying that we are Nazi Germany, or some sort of fascist nation. But the similarities between then and now in the way we fetishize the flag are indeed striking, striking and troubling.

For when you put more stock in a symbol than you do in what that symbol stands for it is a certain sign that your country, your society is in trouble. It is a sign that we have lost our way when we put more stock in defending a symbol from freedom of expression than actual freedom of expression itself. It means that we are traveling a path where symbol means more than substance, illusion is worth more than reality, that we are manipulated into false outrage over a piece of cloth, but unmoved when what that cloth stands for is desecrated.

So I say let the flag burn. Better a flag burning to make a point about our disappearing freedom than having it fly unscathed over a nation where there is no freedom. Rather than getting outraged about a symbol, it is time to take action over the outrages currently besetting our country. We have much more important issues to worry about than a perfectly legal form of free expression, we have the real thing, our country, to regain and restore to all of us.