by Tanner J. Willbanks
As we quickly approach Independence Day here in the United States, my mind keeps wandering towards the idea of just what it means to be a patriot in the modern American landscape. If you were to ask the Tea Party crowd, you’d be told that a patriot is somebody who despises taxes, healthcare, and government interference in any form of life(except the bedroom). These are the people who look at Sarah Palin, Rush Limbaugh, and Glenn Beck as the true heroes of this country. Personally, I look at that trio and fear that may face will melt off like when they open the Ark of the Covenant in Raiders of the Lost Ark. To me these are not patriots. In fact, they are damn near criminals, in my opinion. No, I hold a much different vision of what makes somebody a patriot.
In the last decade, especially since the passing of the laughingly named PATRIOT Act, my vision of what makes a patriot has fallen out of favor in much of mainstream America. On one side of the ideological divide are the aforementioned tea-baggers and their fear-mongering view that patriotism means blind allegiance to the view of their talking heads. These are the people who show up at rallies carrying signs with the latest bit of drivel spouted by Sean Hannity, Mike Huckabee, or Michelle Malkin. The people who think that Ann Coulter is a sex symbol. These people frighten me.
On the other side, which is admittedly my side of the divide, even the word “patriot” has fallen out of favor, taking on a negative connotation that instantly brings to mind racist militia groups held up in the Idaho wilderness while the ATF plots a sting to bring down their entire operation. The word has become tied to the Patriot Movement which is a term used to describe the whacko anti-government types that get a lot of press when they do something remarkably stupid. Tim McVeigh, The Unabomber, and white supremacists. This is what is called to mind by the word “patriot” in modern America for many people.
The original vision for what makes a true American patriot has been turned into an ideological battleground instead of the clearly defined symbol that it once was. Glenn Beck and Michael Moore compare each other to Nazis while each trying to say that they have American’s best values at heart. How can both of these people be correct? Is this truly what the modern definition of an American patriot should be? I don’t think so. Luckily, for people who think like me, it is still possible to find those shining beacons of a patriotism long forgotten in the era of the twenty-four hour news cycle.
First, let us look at an example of a true American patriot. Here is a man who, straight out of high school, volunteered to join the U.S. Army even though he knew his country was at war. In fact, he was so desperate to join our fighting forces that he agreed to highly experimental medical experiments to make him the ultimate soldier, a super-soldier, if you will. He became a leader of men and a symbol of what America could be to not only his fellow soldiers, but to the American public at large. At the height of his war efforts and popularity, he appeared to make the ultimate sacrifice, his life, to ensure the success of his fellow soldiers’ mission. The fact that he was later found alive did nothing to diminish this great man’s status as a paragon of patriotism, nor does the fact that he happens to be a comic book character. The man I’m talking about is Steve Rogers, better known to most as Captain America.
Nobody in their right minds, no matter where they fall on the political spectrum, would argue with Captain America’s credentials as an American patriot. He’s Captain Freakin’ America! He has spent his entire adult life fighting for the American ideals of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. However, at times, Cap’s fight for those ideals has taken a guise that would, in most situations, be considered unpatriotic in the era of the PATRIOT Act. In fact, some of his actions probably would have landed him in a cell in Guantanamo Bay(and nearly did end up with him in a fictionalized version of it). When Steve Rogers sees injustice, he can’t help but stand up against it. He started by fighting the Nazis, an injustice that even Glenn Beck agrees is one of, if not the easiest, injustice to spot in all of history. But what makes Rogers a true American patriot is that he doesn’t just stand up to injustice outside of the government. In the 1970s, in response to the Watergate scandal, Rogers, disgusted by the corruption of the government, stopped calling himself Captain America for a time. He adopted the persona of Nomad because he thought that the country had left its, and his, ideals behind. He would later take the title back but did drop the “America,” briefly, in the 1980s for a similar reason. Steve Rogers is a man who has ideals. He is a man who takes a stand, whether popular or not, when those ideals are threatened. Steve Rogers is a patriot.
Perhaps you are wondering why I would go to such length to demonstrate the patriotism of a fictional character (a comic book character, no less). I do it because I want to remind everyone, especially in a time of such horrific attacks on the patriotism of good Americans, what it truly means to be a patriot. Being a patriot isn’t about parroting the opinions of a few misguided morons. It isn’t about questioning the birth certificate of the duly-elected President of the United States of America. It is about taking a stand. It is “Give me liberty or give me death.” It is standing up for your ideals in the face of impossible odds.
I can hear the argument forming against me already. “But, Tanner, Steve Rogers is a fictional character. It is easy to take a fictional stand for fictional ideals. It isn’t nearly as easy in the real world.” You’re right. It isn’t easy to take a stand in the real world. But who said that being a patriot was easy? In my daily life I encounter real world patriots at every turn. These are people, just like you and me, who have seen injustices around them and decided that they will not let these transgressions stand.
For example, there is my friend John. John grew up in middle America. He attended high school and college within the same seventy five mile radius of each other. He, by all rights, should be your basic Midwestern kid with basic Midwestern values. Yet, in the time that I’ve known him, John has never been content with that. He was a member of damn near every social justice organization available at his university. If a group didn’t exist to combat an injustice that John saw in the world, he would stand up and inspire people to form one, or do it himself. After graduating, he took a low-paying job with the local Democratic party to coordinate volunteers. Why? Because John had seen what eight years of a President with absolutely no social conscience could do to a country that he loves and couldn’t stand to see it any more. John is a patriot in every sense of the word. It really is no wonder that he loves Captain America as much as he does.
Another example of a real world from my everyday life is a bit closer to home. She’s my girlfriend, Liz. Liz has spent, without exaggeration, damn near her entire life attempting to improve the treatment of individuals who belong to minorities in this country. Whether it be her tireless work on behalf of women’s rights throughout her college career (and beyond) or the year she spent in Americorps working with Native Americans, Liz has never been able to look at an injustice without dedicating her, not insubstantial, skill set to rectifying the ills caused by the slight. Is there a more truly patriotic cause in a country built on the principle that everybody is created equal?
These are just two of the multitude of examples that I encounter of patriotism, in the truest, purest sense of the word, in my daily activities. We all see these everyday patriots on the street, on TV, or on the internet, yet we focus on the negative actions of folks like Dick Cheney and Michael Moore. Perhaps, if we were all a bit more like Steve Rogers and embraced the patriotism exemplified by Cap, John, and Liz the world would be a more pleasant place to be. Turn off the hate, the vitriol, and the fear and stand up for your rights, your beliefs, and your ideals. Take patriotism back and make it what the founding fathers truly meant. Let us join John and Liz in making it so that standing up for patriotism once again means standing up for “liberty and justice for all.” Equality, liberty, and justice are worth standing up for. It is what Captain America would want you to do.