QOTD -- Freakout

 

"If the Super Bowl freakout sounds familiar, it’s because it is. Like so many other issues, this is about control — control of U.S. history, of shared culture and of public spaces. Why do MAGA Republicans become so enraged when some Americans choose to say 'Happy Holidays' instead of 'Merry Christmas'? Why do they go berserk when the College Board constructs an AP African American studies course?  [snip]

"This is a manifestation of the resentment among many Americans that the way they understood their country is being “taken” from them. In their concept of the United States, America is a White and Christian country, and every other group is a footnote — peripheral to the majesty of the 'real' American story.

"Some might argue that not everyone who objects to 'Lift Every Voice and Sing' is a white nationalist. But far too many people have become so attuned to the status quo that something new or different is off-putting. They should consider the source of that irritation. What is wrong with allowing a richer, fuller expression of American identity? Why shouldn’t others who are not culturally dominant have their own source of patriotic devotion?"  -- Jennifer Rubin in the Washington Post on yet another "freakout" by right- wing, perpetually aggrieved MAGAts, this time because "Lift Every Voice and Sing," who some refer to as the Black national anthem, was sung alongside the National Anthem and "America the Beautiful" at Sunday's Super Bowl.