Austin+P’s+Final+AmEx+2015+Speech


 * American Pride **

American Pride York county, South Carolina: A high school teen drives to school with a 4 foot by 6 foot American Flag bolted in the bed of his truck, simply to display his pride for his country. And how does his school respond to this? The administrative officers climb into the bed of his truck and remove the bolts from the teen’s vehicle to remove the flag. They say his American Flag was “offending people”. An American Flag. The greatest symbol of freedom. Offending people.

To me this just seems senseless and quite honestly kind of stupid. People of the United States of America felt offended by a teenager flying the American Flag. Offended by the flag of the country in which they reside.

There are too many people in this country, and i'm sure even in this very classroom that would disagree with the opinion that the United States of America is the best country there is. I, myself might even disagree with it. I would correct it by saying that America WAS the greatest country in all of the world. The US used to be a land of liberty and patriotism. And now? Now we are weakened with the lack of patriotism and American Pride. As I often times say to my friends, “Everybody wants to be offended by something” and that, is going to be the downfall of us in the US.

In American history, we have seen time and time again that war and national disaster has always been a sure fire way to bring Americans together creating a superior sense of nationalism. Our last major disaster was 9/11. After this event there was a crazy spike in nationalism. Everyone realized that we needed to unite upon the common grounds of being Americans and stay strong despite the massive losses our country had to recover from. The attack on the world trade center was 14 years ago. It increased our national pride on an exponential scale. About 4 years ago, Osama Bin Laden was killed. This important american success also spiked Nationalism in the US, but since then peoples nationalism and pride for this beautiful country has slowly dwindled and for many people died. people seem to be borderline ashamed of government and military actions, and almost embarrassed to be a part of this great nation. This breaks my heart. America is the best country there ever was and ought to be celebrated year round simply because it is America. We as Americans have everything we could want. We have more freedoms than any other country in the entire world, yet you are going to complain, and choose to be offended by our flag.

Every day the United States armed forces fight and die so ungrateful people have the right to talk trash about their country. Every time you bash our country, you ought to realize what had to happen; who had to fight; who had to DIE, and whose children were left with one less parent, to uphold your right to disrespect your country. If you don’t like the US, I hope I don’t offend you in saying, feel free to travel back to your home-land. If something as simple as the American Flag offends you then I would suggest you vacate to a land whose national symbol doesn't offend you. Because if that is the case, and somebody feels that way about my country's flag, then that person is probably only providing my country with more unwanted negativity.

As of January 31st of this year there were close to 1.4 million people serving in the various branches of the United States Armed Forces. That’s 0.4 % of our country's population. 0.4% of the population is dedicating their time and in some cases their lives to keep you and the other 99.6%, 320 million people safe, and protect their rights. And how do you thank them? By disrespecting the country they serve for.

A personal pet peeve of mine is when people tell me, or anyone really, that their American pride is “in the way” or blocking their ability to see current events clearly. Earlier this year there was a few comments saying that a friend of mine needed to pull his head out of his ass because his American pride was only proving his ignorance and racism. Im sorry but I can’t help but call BS on that one. Nobody can have too much pride for their country. A mentor of mine served in the military as a sergeant and tactical sniper. When he was barely any older than any of us he enlisted and served for about 15 years. He served 3 tours in Afghanistan, each one ranging from 2 to 6 months. This man has had more bullets shot at him than all of us in this classroom combined have so much as seen in our lives. This man is more proud to be an American than any person I have ever met, and told me that true American pride has nothing to do with race, but rather a love for his country. Simple as that.

So if you dare say that my American pride means I'm a racist or ignorant, then I want to tell you that you yourself is ignorant. Ignorant of the history of the United States and the feats we have conquered, making us the most powerful, free country in the world.

In the America I want to grow old in everyone's happy to be American. Everyone is grateful for the freedoms we have been granted over the years, and grateful for the sacrifices millions of soldiers have made to uphold those freedoms. I wish I could live in an America that is free of ignorant people who refuse to see how fortunate they really are. Nobody would be ashamed of our country, and nobody would be offended by the fact that right now I have a 4 foot by 6 foot American flag bolted into the bed of my truck.

Thank you.


 * Cite your sources: **

http://www.nydailynews.com/news/national/s-teen-banned-flying-flag-truck-school-article-1.2222298