Patriot Month: Redux
Our country holds special celebrations for every identity but one: American. It’s time to rectify that.
In my latest essay for Junto, I lay out a program that I’ve explored in several outlets in the past: Patriot Month. We have various identitarian celebrations all year long, focusing on identities that tend to divide Americans instead of unifying them. Patriot Month, a 30-day-long celebration of American civic identity, would be the antidote to that. It would celebrate all facets of American history, all while centering the things we share, not those that separate us. There has never been a better time to inaugurate Patriot Month, as we are fast approaching our 250th anniversary as a country. In the essay, I explain why this is needed now more than ever, how embracing a basic civic patriotism could be politically beneficial to the American right, and why patriotism is critical to the future of our shared nation.
Below is an excerpt, but you can read the whole thing at the Substack link.
Today we unfortunately face a problem the likes of which our forebears could not imagine: a stunning lack of positive sentiment about the basic facets of our country. American patriotism has declined to new polling lows, heavily weighted toward younger generations and those left-of-center politically. This turn against traditional American patriotic sentiment isn’t only a problem of the progressive left: Yet even self-identified Gen Z Republican voters show significantly less patriotic feeling than the generations before them, something reflected in the marked turn some in the right-wing media have made over the past few years to try and capture this audience. These changes are explained by two things: the wholesale embrace of educational curriculum antagonistic to the very idea of American greatness and the promotion of those noxious ideas by the majority of one of our two political parties.
These are serious trends that are not solvable overnight, but thankfully they have not yet become fully dominant. That same survey shows that 58% of Americans are still either “extremely” or “very” proud of our country and a further 19% are “moderately” proud. This remains a supermajority of the population, which opens the door to civic renewal, or at least a broader public celebration of our national identity. We already have special months to commemorate all sorts of distinct ethnic, religious, racial, and sexual identities – adopted largely by progressive activists and their allies in government in order to promote leftist politics and the centering of their preferred identity signifiers – yet we do not have a period dedicated to the one identity we all share: being Americans. That is an oversight worth rectifying.
Enter Patriot Month. The 30 days between June 4 and July 4 are a perfect time to honor our shared American civic culture and the incredible history that has built the great nation we live in today. That month-long window is replete with important and representative events from the American past, notably during the founding era, showcasing the martial, political, and civic achievements of our society. From the June 4th anniversary of the passage of the 19th amendment to the anniversary of the D-Day invasions, from Flag Day to Juneteenth, with ample other events sprinkled throughout worthy of commemoration and celebration in our nation’s historical narrative throughout, June is perfectly positioned to host a unified celebration of American history and accomplishment. Independence Day is wonderful, and would be the capstone to each Patriot Month, but one day isn’t enough to stem the rising tide of unpatriotic feeling. Honoring our country each year and focusing on the centuries of good our nation has done are an antidote to the divisive progressivism that seeks to undermine our national story and stoke negativity about the United States. And there is no better time than our auspicious 250th birthday to inaugurate these festivities. Rather than being a month of disparate, seemingly unconnected holidays, June could be a unified drumbeat of celebration for American achievement, American ideals, and American aspirations, all tied up into one month long narrative.
Patriot Month would bring Americans together, not drive us apart. Commemorating the glories of our past and the inherent and continued greatness of our nation remain popular propositions, no matter what the Democratic left and the too-online right may have you believe. Given the current predilections of the progressive faction that dominates Democratic politics, there is a major opening to claim the mantle of patriotism on the right and potentially attract independent voters who are turned off by the left’s performative anti-Americanism. If conservatives can leave the off-putting internecine debates over what truly makes a ‘real’ American aside and instead embrace a broader, civic-minded American identity, we can make political and cultural strides. Even outside of that, promoting patriotism is a good thing to do for American society and the longevity of our national project. Those on the American right have always embraced this idea and we should continue now.
Americans by and large love our country. They want to identify with it and be proud of it. But they are relentlessly told that it is and has always been a terrible place and its existence a bad thing for the world. That message is blatantly false and most people know it. The key is promulgating the truth: that America is great. That it always has been great. And that it is worth celebrating. Patriot Month would do just that.