Dear Blligerentyouth,
I think my posts until now suggest my agreement with the substance of your reply. For obvious reasons, The Star Spangled Banner became an emblem, to many, of shame during the Vietnam War. I grew up during that era and, believe me, the song still makes me uncomfortable. But listening to it--actually, singing it to myself--yesterday, I heard not something new in it but something old. The anthem does not glorify war but pays homage to indomitable spirit, to knowing what you would die for and living for it. Not even "the rockets' red glare" glorifies war. It speaks of the mortal danger of being under attack and standing firm, surviving with the integrity of one's humanity. As I write this I also realize that Key was not writing about *our rockets, but the rockets of the British. He is writing of the irony, if you will, of that same indomitable spirit made apparent in adversity.
That spirit is not something I have really understood before, and it is fundamental. Regarding the question of will, I would suggest we may not, in certain ways, will to live: we have no choice in the matter. As Heidegger says, sort of, we are thrown into being. But we can will how we live--we can know what we live for. This is related to what I meant when I replied to bel that people are not inherently good. To be 'good' is to choose to be good, to know what you would die for, and live for it.
The tenacity of life is palpable on many levels here, these days. On both the 'rudimentary' level of "throwness" and fear of death, and on the levels I have suggested are the sacred illusion of humanity. It is an illusion, partly, because we are not born with it. We choose it.
Speaking for myself, and emotionally, I would have no problem seeing the criminals who killed these members of our, yes, cosmopolitan community put before the firing squad. That may well be a 'justified' emotion and an unjustifiable response. I can't really work it out right now. But there must be no more carnage.
The birth memorialized in The Star Spangled Banner is of a nation which, in spite of our bitter history, has been dedicated to the principle that all [men] are created equal and are endowed by their creator with certain unalienable rights...
I know the above paragraph is rife with irony and susceptible to skeptical retort. In spite of all the carnage and injustice in our history, our country is not without nobility. In spite of our parochialism, our country is hugely cosmopolitan.
I remain uncomfortable singing the national anthem and, if I may, to do so publicly is an act of courage, not so much before others as before myself. I sing it to remember the good, long buried in the export--and domestic implementation--of violence and economic repression. And I sang it yesterday because, I hoped, we could sing it together: Muslim and non-Muslim to say "all of us belong here, and the guarantee of freedom belongs to us all."
Seeing all the flags sprouting, it is hard not to be concerned about nationalism. But in the wake of these events, we-here--seek symbols which unite us. It is hard to express just how important this is. Patriotism is fraught with difficulty and yet, we recognize will to stand by each other. This rift in time will pass, and symbols will be reburdened with there usual difficult meanings. The display of the flag--my displaying it--or singing the national anthem is without rancor. It is to memorialize, in what might be described as an existential sense, the very best this country has stood for. It is to live for freedom and the sanctity of life. At the very least, it is to try to step away from cynicism and endorse as something far deeper than rhetoric, the spirit we may preserve in our constitution.
As a final note, I am surprised I could write this. I am not even sure I agree with everything I've said. I do, however, think the orthodox rejection of this symbolism and adoption of that is, in its particular development, often as narrow-minded and divisive as the qualities it derides.
The crisis here produces some unusual thoughts.
