+
“A balm for the soul”
  review on Goodreads
GOOD PEOPLE Book
upworthy

patriotism

While many of us know Captain America from the current Marvel Cinematic Universe movies starring Chris Evans, the superhero character has been an iconic comic book character for 79 years.

A superhero with the name "Captain America" who wears a red, white, and blue uniform and fights for freedom naturally invokes a sense of patriotism. However, not everyone who considers themselves a "patriot" can truly claim the title.

The son of one of Captain America's co-creators has some harsh words for those who have co-opted Captain America symbolism in their support of Donald Trump and the storming of the Capitol by his followers. Neal Kirby, the son of Jack Kirby, who created the character with Joe Simon in 1941, aimed his message directly at the rioters.


In his "Statement to Insurrectionists," shared on Twitter by Jake Tapper, Kirby wrote:

"My father, Jack Kirby, along with this partner Joe Simon, created Captain America in 1941. Perhaps the most iconic symbol of patriotism since the 'Spirit of 1776', Captain America has stood as a symbol and protector of our democracy and the rule of law for the past 79 years. He was created by two Jewish guys from New York who hated Nazis and hated bullies. Captain America stood up for the underdog, and, as the story was written, even before he gained his strength and prowess from Army scientists, always stood for what was righteous, and never backed down.

At 72, I have a fairly vivid personal memory of every political and cultural upheaval since Castro's revolution in the mid-1950s. Add to that my father's stories, and I could probably paint a picture of the battlefields of northern France surrounding the city of Metz in WWII as well. However, the events that transpired at our nation's Capitol on Jan. 6, an insurrection inspired and fomented by our own president, will be the event that haunts me forever.

While watching one of the horrific videos of the storming of the Capitol, I thought I noticed someone in a Trump/Capt. America t-shirt! I was appalled and mortified. I believe I even caught a quick glance of someone with a Captain America shield. A quick Google search turned up Trump as Captain America on T-shirts, posters, even a flag! These images are disgusting and disgraceful. Captain America is the absolute antithesis of Donald Trump. Where Captain America is selfless, Trump is self-serving. Where Captain America fights for our country and democracy, Trump fights for personal power and autocracy. Where Captain America stands with the common man, Trump stands with the powerful and privileged. Where Captain America is courageous, Trump is a coward. Captain America and Trump couldn't be more different.

My father, Jack Kirby, and Joe Simon, the creators of Captain America and WWII veterans, would be absolutely sickened by these images. These images are an insult to both their memories.

If Donald Trump had the qualities and character of Captain America, the White House would be a shining symbol of truth and integrity, not a festering cesspool of lies and hypocrisy.

Several of our presidents held the same values as Captain America. Donald Trump is not one of them."

There you have it. It should be pretty obvious that if you're marching alongside actual Nazis you don't get to use Captain America as a symbol for your movement, but it's helpful to hear it straight from the source anyway.

When U.S. Olympic skier Lindsey Vonn is racing down snowy South Korean mountains in February, you can bet President Donald Trump will be the last person on her mind.

Ahead of the Winter Games this year in Pyeongchang, the 33-year-old gold medalist sat down with CNN's Christina MacFarlane to chat about competing once again for Team USA and the possibility of winning her second gold medal.


Vonn at the Vancouver Winter Olympics in 2010. Photo by Francis Bompard/Agence Zoom/Getty Images.

But the topic veered away from sports at one point and, as conversations often do these days, turned to Trump.

"You previously competed at three Olympic games under two presidents," MacFarlane asked. "How will it feel competing at an Olympic games for a United States whose president is Donald Trump?”

“Well, I hope to represent the people of the United States — not the president," Vonn said, her tone clearly reflecting strong disapproval of Trump.

"I take the Olympics very seriously and what they mean and what they represent, what walking under our flag means in the opening ceremonies," she continued. "I want to represent our country well, and I don't think there are a lot of people currently in our government that do that," she concluded.

Vonn's patriotism and fervent opposition to Trumpism come at a remarkable moment in presidential history.

Unlike his recent predecessors, Trump has intentionally waded into controversy, capitalizing on cultural wars by attacking black and brown professional athletes who've protested during the national anthem at their games. Contrary to the president's claims, the players aren't protesting the flag, military, or anthem itself but rather using the moment to peacefully draw attention to racial inequality in our criminal justice system — namely, police brutality.

As a prolific American athlete, Vonn's disapproval of Trump coinciding with her patriotism — which is focused on the people of the U.S. and not its leader — shouldn't be overlooked.

When asked by CNN if she'd accept an invitation to the White House by the Trump administration, Vonn quickly responded, "Absolutely not."

More

John McCain's emotional, career-encompassing speech will live on for generations to come.

Looking back on a long career, John McCain lands on an important lesson about life.

Months after being diagnosed with brain cancer, John McCain delivered one of the best speeches of his long political career.

The 81-year-old Arizona senator was this year's recipient of the Constitution Center's Liberty Medal, an award given annually to an individual who exemplifies "courage and conviction" and strives "to secure the blessings of liberty to people around the globe." Recent past recipients include Rep. John Lewis, the Dalai Lama, Malala Yousafzai, and former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.

After being introduced by former Vice President Joe Biden, McCain gave a speech that really needs to be heard by people across the political spectrum.


McCain called on lawmakers to find common ground and reject the hyper-partisanship that's infected Washington in recent years.

While he and Biden didn't always agree on policy during their time as colleagues in the U.S. Senate, McCain noted, they never doubted that the other had the best interests of the country in mind. Politics, McCain suggests, used to be more than just a game of power.

"We believed in the institution we were privileged to serve in," McCain said of his working relationship with the former VP. "We believed in our mutual responsibility to help make the place work and to cooperate in finding solutions to our country’s problems. We believed in our country and in our country’s indispensability to international peace and stability and to the progress of humanity. And through it all, whether we argued or agreed, Joe was good company."

[rebelmouse-image 19529740 dam="1" original_size="500x281" caption=""We believed in our mutual responsibility to ... cooperate in finding solutions to our country's problems." GIF from CNN/YouTube." expand=1]"We believed in our mutual responsibility to ... cooperate in finding solutions to our country's problems." GIF from CNN/YouTube.

The most headline-grabbing portion of McCain's speech was a call to reject fear and embrace the obligations the U.S. has made to the international community.

Nationalism and "America First" attitudes didn't make America great; our commitment to the outside world did. It's at this point in his speech where the war hero begins to get a bit choked up, reflecting on the country as it is and as it should be.

He asked those around him to reject "half-baked, spurious nationalism cooked up by people who would rather find scapegoats than solve problems," calling that attitude and those policies unpatriotic.

[rebelmouse-image 19529741 dam="1" original_size="500x281" caption=""We live in a land made of ideals, not blood and soil. We are the custodians of those ideals at home and their champion abroad." GIF from CNN/YouTube." expand=1]"We live in a land made of ideals, not blood and soil. We are the custodians of those ideals at home and their champion abroad." GIF from CNN/YouTube.

The common thread between those two points — finding common ground with those we disagree with and rejecting isolationism — is empathy.

To be sure, McCain's positions haven't always reflected an empathetic worldview. With hawkish positions on foreign policy and his past pushes to gut the Affordable Care Act, he's certainly an imperfect messenger of an important lesson. In this speech, though, as he reflected on some of the brightest moments in his career, it is the basic bond of human empathy as a motivating factor that stands out the most.

"I’ve seen Americans make sacrifices for our country and her causes and for people who were strangers to them but for our common humanity, sacrifices that were much harder than the service asked of me," he said, his voice wavering ever so slightly, tinged with emotion. "And I’ve seen the good they have done, the lives they freed from tyranny and injustice, the hope they encouraged, the dreams they made achievable."

Watch John McCain deliver his powerful, thoughtful retrospective on life as a public servant below.

Sportscaster Bob Costas appeared on CNN over the weekend to talk about NFL players kneeling during the national anthem — and provided an important perspective on patriotism while he was at it.

It's been more than a year since former San Francisco 49ers quarterback Colin Kaepernick quietly sat out the national anthem before a pre-season game to protest police violence in America. On Sunday, dozens of players around the league followed in his footsteps after President Donald Trump demanded players stand during the anthem.

In a brilliant segment on CNN, Costas contextualized the protests, asking us all to take a step back and ask ourselves a few fundamental questions about what it means to be a patriot.


How did we get to this place where professional sports have become so linked to patriotism and the military, anyway?

"Patriotism and the flag have been conflated," Costas explained.

GIFs via CNN.

"If you go to see 'Hamilton,' which is about the founding of the republic, no one says, 'Wait a minute! Don’t raise the curtain until we hear the national anthem.' When you went to see '[Saving] Private Ryan,' no one said, 'Turn off the projector until we’ve had the national anthem,'" Costas said. "It’s in sports where this stuff happens — sometimes movingly, sometimes, I’d submit, cynically."

The story of how sports became synonymous with patriotism has roots in wartime support for soldiers but also in "paid patriotism." A 2015 report commissioned by the offices of Sens. John McCain and Jeff Flake (both R-Arizona) found that the Department of Defense had spent millions of dollars in recent years paying pro sports leagues to hold "patriotic" events. Until 2009, NFL players weren't even required to be on the sidelines during the anthem, much less stand at attention as it played.

Members of the New England Patriots kneel during the national anthem before their Sept. 24, 2017 game. Photo by Jim Rogash/Getty Images.

As Costas suggested, if patriotism only means showing blind fealty to the flag and military, that's easy. Much more difficult is recognizing that patriotism can take many other forms.

"Because wrapping yourself in the flag and honoring the military is something which nobody is going to object to," he said. "We all respect their sacrifice. We all honor their sacrifice, and yet what it has come to mean, is that the flag is primarily and only about the military."

Patriotism can be expressed in a lot of different ways, Costas emphasized — and those forms of patriotism don't always relate to the flag or the military.

"Martin Luther King was a patriot, Susan B. Anthony was a patriot, dissidents are patriots, school teachers and social workers are patriots," he explained.

Patriotism means fighting for a better country and living up to the ideals that the flag and the anthem are supposed to represent.

The flag and the anthem are symbols. It's the ideals behind them that matter.

"People cannot see that in his own way, Colin Kaepernick, however imperfectly, is doing a patriotic thing," Costas said.

Colin Kaepernick (right) and Eric Reid kneel before the 49ers' Sept. 12, 2016, game. Photo by Thearon W. Henderson/Getty Images.

Back in 2016, after Kaepernick first sat out the anthem (he sat for one game but switched to taking a knee as a way to show respect for the flag and the military, as ironic in the current context as it may be), he explained why he was protesting. His explanation fits perfectly with Costas's definition of patriotism.

"When there’s significant change and I feel like that flag represents what it’s supposed to represent, this country is representing people the way that it’s supposed to, I’ll stand," Kaepernick said at the time. "There’s a lot of things that need to change. One specifically? Police brutality. There’s people being murdered unjustly and not being held accountable. People are being given paid leave for killing people. That’s not right. That’s not right by anyone’s standards."

Those are the patriots we need in this country, now more than ever. The ones unwilling to simply accept the status quo, but to fight for American ideals.

Watch Costas's powerful interview on CNN below.