Ask Lemmy

I think what you and many others here are hovering around is the American Civil Religion. A blend of quasi religious dogma and beliefs sold to us at a young age to form a foundation for the shared delusion of American exceptionalism.

Might sound crazy but check out the precepts below and then keep them in mind when you hear politicians and observe the rituals that reinforce American propaganda.

The next time you are asked to stand and put your hand over your heart for the pledge of allegiance... the moments of silence for first responders.. or you hear someone say "thank you for your service"' to some dude who at best rode a desk and at worse tortured people at a black site like gitmo. Nowadays there is less overt mention of god but the ideals themselves take the place. When I hear someone grateful for freedom I ask to do what? And if there is not more context its probably just a little prayer to uncle sam.

In a survey of more than fifty years of American civil religion scholarship, Squiers identifies fourteen principal tenets:

Filial piety (veneration of founding fathers in context)
Reverence to certain sacred texts and symbols such as the Constitution, the Declaration of Independence, and the flag
The sanctity of American institutions
The belief in God or a deity
The idea that rights are divinely given
The notion that freedom comes from God through government
Governmental authority comes from God or a higher transcendent authority
The conviction that God can be known through the American experience
God is the supreme judge
God is sovereign
America's prosperity results from God's providence
**America is a "city on a hill" or a beacon of hope and righteousness**
The principle of sacrificial death and rebirth
America serves a higher purpose than self-interests (AKA spreading democracy, liberating any county that nationalizes their resources [or has very good bananas)](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/1954_Guatemalan_coup_d%27%C3%A9tat)

He further found that there are no statistically significant differences in the amount of American civil religious language between Democrats and Republicans, incumbents and non-incumbents nor Presidential and Vice-Presidential candidates.[5]: 51–74 

Rotted everyones brains out