to think we really are 2 completely different cultures - the USA and the UK - just looking at the 'rebellion' taking place

[chomalungma]

www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-8228769/Bleak-figures-China-US-economic-hit-virus.html

I know it's only some Americans. I know that it's a massive country with many many more people than the UK

But these scenes are astounding. People flocking to beaches. Protesting about lockdown.
Protesting with guns about lockdown

You just can't imagine these scenes in the UK at the moment.
Especially not the Ohio Zombie picture

It just amazes me - sometimes you think we are very similar to the USA, and then many times, you realise we are completely different.

@MockersxxxxxxxSocialDistancing

We also have an abundance of American flag towels, shirts, doormats, etc here in the US.

I’d personally never purchase any of that both because I think it’s obnoxious and because I have respect for the symbol and what it represents to me.

What Hushpuppy1 described reflects my own experience. If a child opted out of the pledge my class wouldn’t likely have known or noticed. The teachers would not have made it into a scene. I definitely knew it was optional.

If any American on here can say that you were personally able to opt out of the pledge of allegiance in school, please say it

My son opted out. No problem.

I have been to various schools in both the UK and Ireland, and I was not made to do daily prayers anywhere

I was made to recite prayers at all 6 UK schools I attended. I vividly remember early on a teacher being astonished that I didn't know the Lord's Prayer.

@holdmylobster yes, you were probably a generation behind me

I'm 50, Annamaria14. Are you in your late 60s?

I meant that you are a generatio older than me.

I am thirties

@holdmylobster

@chomalungma the section of the 1998 Act regarding collective worship requirement in schools doesn't apply in Scotland. The law you mention only covers England and Wales. Northern Ireland is also covered by different legislation. Scotland's education system is completely separate.

If any American on here can say that you were personally able to opt out of the pledge of allegiance in school, please say it

I didn't personally, but there were Jehovah's Witnesses in my school who did.

As to required acts of collective worship in state schools in England, there are posts on MN periodically about parents wanting to opt out, so some schools are definitely doing it. It's an aspect of having state-sponsored religion in England.

@SchadenfreudePersonified I well recall the dreadful incident over the wild dogs in the zoo - also the one at Disneyland, where an alligator got a 2 year old in a lagoon (and before anyone asks there were, of course, "no swimming" signs posted)

At least those particular parents didn't try to sue though ...

We also have an abundance of American flag towels, shirts, doormats, etc

You do, I've seen them. But you also had a Supreme Court case over flag-burning and laws over how it is to be handled. We don't give a toss. Burn it if it's yours, but safely with a fire extinguisher to hand.

And maybe I shouldn't mention this in case anyone's listening, but flying the Union Flag upside down is a secret distress signal. Lucky that no forriners know that.

....And another thing is all the flying flags. You see them in abundance near borders and in disputed territories. The only place you see union jacks flying from private houses in numbers is Northern Ireland, where you are equally likely to see an Irish Tricolour.

Only in the USA do you see flags on private houses in the middle of the country where there is no ambiguity about where you are.

mockers

We do indeed have many American flags flying from homes and private businesses. My husband has one on his house. Many houses here do, more than most places because it’s a community full of active and retired members of the US Army. Bought this house from a WW2 vet.

Our neighbors have both US and Italian flags flying now.

We know it’s unusual because we don’t see it when traveling in other countries. And much more prevalent here in rural than urban settings. Urban settings where I live it’s all sports team and university flags, rainbow flags or decorative ones are also common.

Only in the USA do you see flags on private houses in the middle of the country where there is no ambiguity about where you are.

Lots of flag flying in Denmark, I believe.

I saw shiteloads flying on private houses in Canada, too.

I have a sneaky dinky little NZ flag in my kitchen window. . .

Patriotism isn't a bad thing. It's when it crosses over to Nationalism, that it's a bit of a worry. . .

We'll see how much they value their freedom when they're in a hospital bed (if they can get one) drowning in their own mucus.

Wow

Americans will say to me, every time, "what state are you from", they don't even consider that I might be from another country

At least, when hearing someone's from England, they didn't ask "what state is that?", as happened to me years ago ... though TBF the questioner was only about eight

On the subject of flag flying, I was in Boston just after 9/11 and have never seen anything like it: flags absolutely everywhere, some of them even floodlit. I quite liked it actually, and could see the point as it was Boston the murderers took off from

But with no disrespect to our American friends, I also remembered it's Boston where a great deal of money was raised for our own IRA killers ...

On a flight to Scotland from the US a few years ago multiple people, both American and Scottish, asked my family if we were going home.
We were like, oh, that’s cool. They think we are from another place! Yay!

I got asked directions in Paris once and thought it was amazing.

I grew up thinking anyone from anywhere else, especially Europe, was automatically interesting in cool. That was how most kids I knew felt also. We had a family join our school after fleeing Cuba. collective heads exploding. “please be my friend!”

• @Annamaria14

I still want to know - did you have the option to say the pledge of allegiance in school, were you able to say that you didn't want to say it?

Yes, I did. We could be standing up and mumbling it and the teachers didn’t care. Many of us stood up with bored expression. Some even popped to the loo with permission. It was simply something that was a part of the school announcements. I’m not even sure they still do it anymore tbh. It obviously wasn’t that much of an issue if we weren’t doing it in middle school/junior high and secondary school.

Some states are a bit more strict about it, but they would be breaking the law to force anyone.

@Anamarie...That is so funny. I was forced to study religion in primary school in Cardiff. Back stateside in the Conservative,American South I never learned the pledge. Never participated in saying it and no one ever cared. I honestly didn't learn until I was at Basic Training

@Phoenixrosehere....They din't do it at schools here. My middle schooler just told me they stopped doing that around 2nd grade

Yes I think my lot stopped around 2nd grade as well. They didn't say it in middle or high school.

@Roussette...The Constitution is working and keeping him in line

British expat in a red state here. Others are right about the regional variation. We noticed a HUGE difference in people/values/beliefs when we moved from our large (relatively liberal) city to a community only about 30 miles outside due to rising cost of living. DH is from the city we lived in and even he hates it out here. It’s like a different world. All large trucks and ‘don’t tread on me’ bumper stickers.

The US is just far more focused on the individual than the UK. It took me years to even start getting my head around the mindset, and it still seems inherently ‘wrong’ to me. My DH and his Mum are the only two Dems in a family of staunch Baptist Trumpists so the extended family don’t have much to do with us. DH loves going to the UK.