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As I was walking to my car after class yesterday, my eye was caught by an American flag waving in the wind. I idly thought about the bold patterns and colors of our flag, and remembered the name we sometimes call it-- Old Glory. This, in turn, made me wonder what other informal (or perhaps formal) names are used for flags of the world. I know only a few, the Union Jack being one example. Anyone care to add to the list?
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Carpal Tunnel
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Y'all caint forgit the Stars 'n' Bars. Right there in the back window of the pickup.
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TEd
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old hand
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Isn't the Japanese flag sometimes referred to as the Rising Sun?
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Old Glory, Stars and Stripes ... these colors don't run
Interesting question, Rapunzel. Americans generally are known to be more overtly patriotic than the citizens of most other countries. So it should not come as a surprise that the Yanks have more terms of endearment for their flag than anyone else. In fact, in some english speaking countries, the term "flag wavers", describing people who indulge in displays of patriotic fervor, usually to distract attention from their real agenda, is a pejorative term. There is a famous quote on this subject. Who said? "Patriotism is the last refuge of a scoundrel."
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Who said? "Patriotism is the last refuge of a scoundrel."
Wrong Johnson, Max. In was Samuel Johnson (Boswell's Life, April 7, 1775).
However, Johnson recognized that a principle may be perfectly valid, and is not responsible for the idiots or schoundrels who may espouse it. The full quote from Boswell:
Patriotism having become one of our topicks, Johnson suddenly uttered, in a strong determined tone, an apophthegm, at which many will start: "Patriotism is the last refuge of a scoundrel." But let it be considered that he did not mean a real and generous love of our country, but that pretended patriotism which so many, in all ages and countries, have made a cloak of self-interest.
In a more humorous vein is Ambrose Bierce's gloss on Johnson. "In Dr. Johnson’s famous dictionary patriotism is defined as the last resort of a scoundrel. With all due respect to an enlightened but inferior lexicographer I beg to submit that it is the first."
For another gloss: "No matter that patriotism is too often the refuge of scoundrels. Dissent, rebellion, and all-around hell-raising remain the true duty of
patriots." -- Barbara Ehrenreich
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Carpal Tunnel
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Who said, "patriotism is a pernicious, psycopathic form of idiocy"? He also said "patriotism is the conviction that your country is superior because you were born in it." That was George Bernard Shaw.
Unlike Johnson, who attacked phony patriots, Shaw took the absolutist position that there is never any such thing as admirable patriotism.
Neither Shaw quotation made it into bartleby.
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