Last month at an academic freedom conference in England, a friend from a traditional part of the Middle East jokingly dismissed the sea of Pride flags festooning Oxford as the new “flags of the empire.” They observed that Pride flags outnumbered the Union Jack, the United Kingdom’s flag and that of the old British Empire, by at least fifty to one, which seemed excessive even for Pride Month in a university town. The next day in London, I saw Pride flags all about, with the Union Jack reserved for tourist sites like the Tower of London, which also sported Pride flags. My friend was onto something.
Great Britain is a great nation; it should fly its flag. As Thomas Sowell details in Conquests and Cultures: An International History and “The Real History of Slavery,” the British paid enormous sums in blood and treasure to end slavery throughout their vast empire, while spreading democratic institutions. In 1940, under Prime Minister Winston Churchill, Britain later played the singular and essential role in fighting Hitler when no other countries dared, quite literally saving Western civilization, something leftist educators are now busily erasing from consciousness as British academic Frank Furedi details in The War Against the Past: Why The West Must Fight For Its History.
Can Pride flags be flown beneath—or, on special dates, alongside—the Union Jack or the American flag, rather than replacing them? After all, would Pride even be possible without the freedoms secured by Anglo-American democracy? You don’t see Pride movements flourishing in Cuba, Russia, China, or Gaza.
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Unfortunately, the postmodern left often seems more interested in replacing the Western democratic nation-state—which has held diverse societies like the U.S. and U.K. together—with subnational identities that divide rather than unite. We need better ways to fly our flags—ways that honor both our shared history and our common freedoms.
I’ve supported same sex marriage since the 1970s, publishing essays explaining why back when it was a live controversy. As my ally Jonathan Rauch said in January in a passionate speech at the Censorship in the Sciences Conference, what seemed impossible back in the 1990s when he first sought the right to marry now “isn’t even controversial.”
The triumph of same sex marriage is a testament to what free people in free countries can do when they use free speech and persuasion rather than bureaucratic coercion to win the rights of citizenship, not special rights. That special part makes something seem off about pride.
As left-leaning political scientist Mark Lilla wrote in The Once and Future Liberal: After Identity Politics, a political movement based on subnational identities had better not leave any identity out. And there are a lot of identities out there, with competing narratives and often zero-sum demands. For example, its internal reports show substantial anti-Semitism and hostility toward Israeli students at Columbia University, yet no one is asking Columbia to fly Israeli flags to show their inclusiveness toward Jews and Israelis. (Please, Mr. Trump, don’t get any ideas.)
As Sociologist George Yancey showed empirically a decade ago in Compromising Scholarship: Religious and Political Bias in American Higher Education, higher education suffers systemic anti-Christian bias, particularly against Evangelicals and Mormons, who have trouble getting academic jobs. Yet I would not want my university to fly the Mormon Deseret Flag to signal our inclusiveness; nor would this Italian American want his American university to fly Italian flags. Speaking of which, if you think that 21st-century identity politics are rough, consider that 19th-century President Benjamin Harrison proclaimed Columbus Day to mollify Italian American voters and the Italian government after a New Orleans mob lynched 11 alleged Mafiosi, some of whom may have killed the local police chief.
Instead of avoiding culture wars like recent Republicans, the Trump administration is leaning in, not always constructively.
Consider the Defense Department’s renaming of the U.S. Navy ship Harvey Milk. Milk was an influential and courageous gay elected official and Navy veteran, murdered by a deranged, homophobic politician. The killer got a reduced sentence via the so-called “Twinkie defense,” saying that high blood sugar made him do it. (Even in the 1970s, California courts had un-American views of personal responsibility.) Harvey Milk had an imperfect personal life, including at least one relationship with someone underage, who was also half his age. Milk was, as the saying goes, a man of his time, 1960s-70s sexually libertine San Francisco.
Yet, traditionally, it was leftists rather than conservatives who toppled statues and renamed ships, buildings, and mountains. To respect history’s great men and women, we should retain and explain rather than erase and destroy. Renaming the U.S. Harvey Milk is far less atrocious than the ongoing leftist efforts chronicled by Professor Furedi, to, among other things, erase Abraham Lincoln for imposing the death penalty for some of the Minnesota Sioux who violently revolted, and erase Winston Churchill for his colonialism. Lincoln freed U.S. slaves and saved the Union. Churchill helped end slavery worldwide and literally saved civilization first from the Nazis, and then from the communists.
[RELATED: Put the Statues Back]
Milk’s achievements pale in comparison. Yet, he was a historical figure worth a minor naval vessel—and two wrongs don’t make a right. Generally, whether right or—mainly—left, postmodern efforts at toppling unifying heroes stoke internal divisions exploited by our enemies, namely authoritarian Russia and Communist China.
Instead, we should highlight what we Americans should revere in common: the rule of law, free speech, democratic mechanisms assuring peaceful transfers of power, and the rights to live as we choose, which will differ from what others choose—all now under attack by (mainly leftist) postmodernism, as I show in “Education’s Critical Condition.”
A moving example of the beautiful things we should value together came in 1790 when George Washington wrote to America’s first Jewish congregation, Rhode Island’s Touro Synagogue, where his words remain inscribed. Washington wrote that he would never speak of toleration of non-Christians “as if it was by the indulgence of one class of people, that another enjoyed the exercise of their inherent natural rights.” Instead, so long as all followed the law, all enjoyed the liberty to “sit in safety under his own vine and fig-tree.” Those rights are universal for citizens, not special.
What Washington wrote goes for all of us. It is the key reason I am proud to be American and fly my national flag above all others—not that you can do that on some college campuses.
Image: “Oxford Town Hall hoisting the banner of diversity, equality, inclusiveness and freedom” by patrickdevries2003 on Flickr
