Americans have grown less proud of their country’s history or the way its democracy works over the past decade, according to a new AP-NORC poll.
Americans’ pride in the U.S. on several key attributes has dropped since 2017 — including the nation’s military and its political influence around the globe — according to the survey from The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research. This poll was conducted in April, as the United States and Iran fought over the Strait of Hormuz in a prolonged war that started with the U.S. and Israel launching strikes on Iran.
New Gallup polling also finds that only 53% of U.S. adults are “extremely” or “very” proud to be an American, the lowest reading in the trend dating back to 2001.
When you want to be pumped to celebrate America’s 250th birthday but remember all the history you weren’t taught in school.
we’re a bunch of obnoxious assholes what’s to be proud of
To be fair that was true before, we just didn’t see the full picture before. People of color been living like this the entire time.
People are realizing they are free-range slaves and the institutions of both government and religion are false paths built from ideas that were once authentic. Both being used as conquering techniques to own control of humanity, not necessarily protect, serve, or secure an honest future for it.
Humanity isn’t a godly experience anymore, it’s a business, and the people got so manipulated they are proud enough to kill to be a form of owned cattle.
If there is an awakening socially maybe we will end up seeing the issue stems not from America alone, but western culture as a whole. America is just like the selfish arrogant rich kid that made it blatantly obvious.
Being proud of something you had no part in creating always seemed weird to me.
Write a novel. Perform a song. Win a race. Makes sense to be proud.
Happen to be born someplace? Big fucking deal. Most of the people who go on about being proud of the US are going out of their way to make it worse
Because being a citizen of that country/city means you are inherently responsible for and add to the culture of said country/city. There’s no song, novel, or individual that is created without outside influence and in the vast majority of cases that influence comes from a village/city/country. You literally wouldn’t exist as the person you know if you were born somewhere else.
There’s nothing wrong with being proud of where you come from. It only becomes problematic when it becomes nationalism
There’s no song, novel, or individual that is created without outside influence and in the vast majority of cases that influence comes from a village/city/country. You literally wouldn’t exist as the person you know if you were born somewhere else.
This is true but seems irrelevant to the point. You wouldn’t exist without the sun, but no one’s out being proud of the sun.
Because being a citizen of that country/city means you are inherently responsible for and add to the culture of said country/city.
A lot of the flag waving types I’m thinking of, the maga hats et al, are making the country worse. If only they were responsible (as in, accountable).
You wouldn’t exist without the sun, but no one’s out being proud of the sun.
Either my point flew over your head like a 737 or you’re just bad at arguing…
If you were born one town, city, or state away from where you were born you’d essentially be a completely different person. Its perfectly reasonable for someone to be proud of where they come from because the overall experience there shaped them as a person in what they consider a net positive.
Its perfectly reasonable for someone to be proud of where they come from because the overall experience there shaped them as a person in what they consider a net positive.
It’s not “perfectly reasonable” to be proud of that. It’s common, but the whole dispute here is people saying that it is unreasonable.
Many people consider a personal accomplishment of some sort a prerequisite for feeling proud. Being born somewhere is not that. You can see other people in this thread rejecting being proud of a sports team they don’t play for.
(There’s also pride like LGBT pride, but that’s more of an explicit rejection of being told to be ashamed. And surviving while queer is something of an accomplishment.)
Well if that’s the case someone from a formerly poor or war torn nation can have pride being from there because their ppl survived. You’re just moving the goal post
I think the idea is if we had a functional democracy we would have a part in creating it.
The lack of patriotism is just more people waking up to the fact that neither Republican nor Democratic politicians give two shits about the American people.
Sports team fans have always been a weird thing to me. Love the sport? Sure, but caring how a team does you have no influence over is weird.
The emotional buy-in makes it more exhilarating. And it’s really easy to do, the human mind loves to give things an identity and a story. And it satisfies the primal urge to belong to a community. Team sports basically hack your brain in some very satisfying ways.
It gets messy when people with poor emotional regulation rely on the sports feelings.
“WE WON!!”
You didn’t win anything. You watched highly-trained and compensated professionals win. You got literally nothing out of it.
Give me something to be proud of, and I’ll be fucking proud.
But currently…
We have hands down, the most corrupt federal government in our history.
We’re blowing up non-military boats without any due process.
We’re shooting missiles in elementary schools and threatening the death of an entire country.
We’re financially and materially supporting/encouraging a genocide.
We’ve hung Ukraine out to dry.
We’ve absolutely skull fucked the global economy.
We’re being lead by (probably) a core member of the largest child trafficking operation in the last century.
Our people can’t afford healthcare, childcare, housing and food.
The right to vote is actively being undermined.
You know what would make me fucking proud?
Fining (or better yet liquidating) the corrupt companies, individuals and organizations that are party to trumps grifts, using that money to establish UBI, pay reparations to Iran (of all fucking things), establish fair and sensible taxation policies, reset the supreme court, and put every fucking member of the Trump admin through an actual justice system that is accountable to the people.
Franky, anyone who is proud of the US right now needs to be fucking locked up.
Oh, I forgot, we have literal concentration camps in the US right now… For the second time in 10 years!
To all the bots and the ideological batshit insane people I’m seeing in this comment zone: he who’s nation has no guilt, cast the first stone.
I am left wondering is any of these comments are from actual humans.
So we can’t criticize our own nation’s faults because other nations might also have faults? Do you not see why that’s ridiculous?
Where did you get that? Almost everything in here is talking about how America is evil has always been evil and will forever more be evil. No way for anyone or anything to change. Nobody here has ever aspired for anything better nobody’s fought for the benefit of others.
You think that’s a reasonable approach?
Take note, it all started because I was criticizing my own country, and trolls and Bots piled on telling me I’m so naive.
Never understood the national pride thing. People born here didn’t choose here.
People can be proud of what they are. It is how it is, I guess.
There are no countries, only people. Patriotism divides.
Sounds like something someone from a shit country would say. My country rules! Go patriotism!
Nationalism generally should be shunned.
I’ve never been “proud” of the country I happened to have been born in and have lived in because I’ve never had the means to move anywhere else.
I’m much less satisfied with how things are going in this country over the past 10 years, but it’s never been great. Healthcare is a constant struggle, and terrible, for instance.
I don’t take pride in anything billionaires accomplish for themselves, which is 95% of what is usually pushed forward to take pride in. It’s all bullshit.
Recently, we’ve bombed children in other countries, should we be proud of that? I’m ashamed of my country at the moment.
Everything is shit because our leaders don’t feel any common identity with the people. They don’t feel any need to represent us. We need more nationalism, not less. I don’t see how we could have any less nationalism than we already have. The soul of the USA has been torn out and stomped under corporate boots.
“soul of USA” as if USA isnt doing exactly what it was meant for, what it has always stood for
I’m proud to be an American because of the principles upon which this country was founded, its triumphs through struggle, and what it aspires to be. It is, at its best, a great nation.
I’m pretty ashamed of America at the moment because of what it’s doing, what it’s been doing, and the state of it. Trump and his entire administration are corrupt monsters ruining not only this country, but having a terrible effect on the rest of the world.
There are a lot of Americans Im particularly ashamed of, especially the surprisingly small minority who are responsible for electing the current administration, but I’m especially disappointed in the vast majority of Americans who have completely checked out of participating the system at all. But I’m especially proud of those Americans who stand up and do their best to fight back, and there are plenty of those, too.
Noble principles… Like kicking Native Americans off of their land?
Or slavery? Or women is second class citizens? Or every other form of inequality, tyranny, or whatever else was present at the end of the 18th century in North America?
No, actually. I wouldn’t call that a noble principal at all.
I’m able to appreciate the good things about this country while recognizing the incredibly shitty things about our past and present. that should be pretty obvious after I spoke about being proud of those Americans who fight back against tyranny and oppression.
Actually, one of the key motivators for the War of Independence was the fact that Britain had decided to stop expanding the colonies westward. The colonists wanted to do more genocide but the British wouldn’t let them, therefore war.
*citation needed
America was founded on the principle that it’s worthwhile to start a war and kill thousands of people if it benefits your tea-smuggling margins.
The US was founded on genocide of indigenous people and slavery was embedded in that society at the time (“all men’s are created equal” my ass). While some aspects of it were good and “modern”, most of it was something most of other world societies experimented with already centuries prior. I agree the US was one of the first big nation implementing democracy in a world dominated by monarchies.
The US was founded on genocide of indigenous people and slavery was embedded in that society at the time
i’m not denying any of this. I fully acknowledge that these are terrible sins of our past. but the same founding fathers, the same ones who even practiced these horrible atrocities themselves, foresaw (or at least aspired to) a future free of these terrible inequities. And they also hoped that future generations would strive for a society free of them. And so we have succeeded… to some degree, and continue to work towards that goal. But just because we have not accomplished each and every goal to 100% does not mean that we have failed.
I’m proud to be part of a society that has accomplished these things at least to the point that we have so far. I’m proud of a society that continues to fight for these things, to achieve them further, even when a shameful segment of our society wishes to return to such a shameful past. And that’s my point.
It’s not so - pardon the pun - black and white. A great deal of progress has been made. Surly, there have been setbacks, but we are a lot better off than we used to be, and were constantly working towards that goal. And take pride in our accomplishments. I acknowledge our setbacks.
Like half of these noble founding fathers were rapists and slave owners. I don’t think their aspirations were that people like themselves would disappear
Why should I have a conversation with someone who starts their conversations in bad faith, arguments by willingly admitting that they don’t think?
I don’t think
That may have reasonable … but it’s not anymore. Shall we start from the beginning?
Are you angry that not everyone in this comment section glazes the genocidal imperialistic entity that calls itself the united states of america? You certainly seem to like insulting others for criticizing slavers.
Since there’s nothing I’ve said that could pass as what could be attributed to any emotion, let alone, anger, I’ll just chalk that up to you projecting some unresolved emotions of your own.
Best of luck with that bullshit. 😊 I’m gonna have a nice relaxing bath. Hope you work that out!
(And since I don’t wanna deal with your unresolved, crap, I’m blocking you. Best of luck!)
America: Asians discovered it, Africans built it, White people destroyed it.
I’ve never been proud to be a US citizen. Pride is something that should only be towards something that you achieved. I think the USA has missed a lot of opportunities to become more powerful because of individualistic greed and lowering taxes on corporations.
America is not my country. It is my prison.
Can’t say that I ever felt pride as an American. What IS an American anyway? I don’t feel kinship with much of the land and its peoples.
I don’t understand how you don’t feel a kinship with the land. If you mean that it’s fucked up how America came to “own” it then yeah, that’s fucked up, but the land didn’t do that, fucked up people did. I love the beautiful land of America so much and that’s honestly the biggest/only thing I’m proud to be American for right now, and I spend as much time enjoying it as I can.
I haven’t ever had enough money to travel beyond my city, nor to afford third places. My PC is the world to me, because it is the closest I can get to wandering off to somewhere else.
For people who lack wealth, it is difficult to develop a connection with many places, let alone a deep one. The Lincoln Memorial, Yellow Stone Park, Florida, Hawaii, all are just places in a picture. No different from Cuba, Switzerland, or Japan. All these places are even more fictional than those in my videogames, because I can’t even visit.
I would probably feel more pride and connection if it weren’t for the fact that it’s only mine to enjoy because of theft and genocide.
It would also help if so much of it weren’t covered in parking lots, strip malls, and car dealerships.
Weird!
The rise of the surveillance state that none of us wanted. Roaming death squads putting kids into concentration camps. Threatening to annex Canada, Greenland, Venezuela. A system of checks and balances that turned out to be a complete fiction. We spend billions on bombs and missiles so that we can get involved with Israeli genocide/rape/torture and other war crimes. AN INSANE NARCISSIST FLEECING US ALL AND NOONE SEEMS ABLE TO STOP HIM.
What’s not to love?
THANK YOU FOR YOUR ATTENTION TO THIS MATTER.
The fucked up thing is that you could post this comment every day, with the reasons replaced with different (equally fucked up) reasons, and it would take months to run out of examples.
The scale of the rot is truly breathtaking.
Imagine Billy Joel remakes “We didn’t start the fire” but replaced it all with stuff happening over the last couple years… The song would last 45 minutes
Americans have grown less proud of their country’s history or the way its democracy works over the past decade
That’s because we’ve watched the veil of democracy fall and the Epstein class can do as they will with no recourse.
I have no pride in this shit hole country, only shame.
