6th grade I really started paying attention to the pledge of allegiance in really what something like that meant. I question why I was pledging my allegiance to a flag every morning. It wasn’t my choice I was told to do this. And that didn’t feel right to me until I stopped.
In high school. Noticed the various branches of the military would never leave and were always trying to recruit. I noticed in the kids around me behavioral differences, as they were hyped up to join the military. But my great-grandfather who is in the military and was on Normandy Beach… He wasn’t hype about the military. My uncle who is in the Navy barely speaks of it. And my other uncle who was in the Vietnam war… Seemed rather traumatized by the whole experience. And George W Bush and everything surrounding 9/11, the definite WMDs that totally existed.
Also in high school I got to meet foreign exchange students. Made friends with a bunch of them and got to learn about how things are in various parts of the world that really didn’t add up to the things that I was being told.
Then in college and post college, thanks though like early YouTube and even early Reddit, I got to learn a lot more about the world than anything grade school had ever taught me.
Your path is similar to mine. It also almost identical to my religious path too. Essentially I was born into something, told I was supposed to respect and obey it (without a reason for why), and realized there are so many competing groups saying they’re also the best/correct, but that can only be true for one of them. This means most people have to be wrong, if not everyone.
I was also in boy scouts and am an eagle scout. One of the requirements for that is the belief in a god of some kind (usually the Christian one, but not strictly required), and it has tons of nationalism involved. I still finished with the rank of eagle, but it’s fair to say I was faking a lot of stuff by the end of it. (Tangent: I really like the idea of scouting, but it really needs to get rid of this stuff. There are alternatives, but none are as good.)
6th grade I really started paying attention to the pledge of allegiance in really what something like that meant. I question why I was pledging my allegiance to a flag every morning. It wasn’t my choice I was told to do this. And that didn’t feel right to me until I stopped.
In high school. Noticed the various branches of the military would never leave and were always trying to recruit. I noticed in the kids around me behavioral differences, as they were hyped up to join the military. But my great-grandfather who is in the military and was on Normandy Beach… He wasn’t hype about the military. My uncle who is in the Navy barely speaks of it. And my other uncle who was in the Vietnam war… Seemed rather traumatized by the whole experience. And George W Bush and everything surrounding 9/11, the definite WMDs that totally existed.
Also in high school I got to meet foreign exchange students. Made friends with a bunch of them and got to learn about how things are in various parts of the world that really didn’t add up to the things that I was being told.
Then in college and post college, thanks though like early YouTube and even early Reddit, I got to learn a lot more about the world than anything grade school had ever taught me.
Your path is similar to mine. It also almost identical to my religious path too. Essentially I was born into something, told I was supposed to respect and obey it (without a reason for why), and realized there are so many competing groups saying they’re also the best/correct, but that can only be true for one of them. This means most people have to be wrong, if not everyone.
I was also in boy scouts and am an eagle scout. One of the requirements for that is the belief in a god of some kind (usually the Christian one, but not strictly required), and it has tons of nationalism involved. I still finished with the rank of eagle, but it’s fair to say I was faking a lot of stuff by the end of it. (Tangent: I really like the idea of scouting, but it really needs to get rid of this stuff. There are alternatives, but none are as good.)