I heard the press interviewing a woman who had traveled from her home in Virginia to the white power protest in Tennessee explain that she was doing this to protest how “multiculturalism” was being “crammed down her throat”.

I’ve heard this throat-cramming metaphor before, it refers to the inclusion in popular media of interracial couples and LGBT individuals. I’ve experienced it myself, every time I’m expected to say the Pledge of Allegiance, or stand for the National Anthem, or Salute the Flag, or pretend I am being reverent while a Protestant Christian prayer is recited at a public ceremony, or a Christmas nativity scene is erected at public expense on public property.

No, I’ve got nothing against the Pledge, the Anthem, the Flag, or even people flaunting their superstitions in public. I often participate willingly, or, at least show respect, in these ceremonies. But I do resent the social pressure being exerted to make me participate in these displays of public fealty and acquiescence. Its been our own American version of the Hitler Salute. They force you to participate by using social pressure, forcing you also to collaborate and cooperate with the activities and attitudes these harmless gestures are symbolic of, and thereby making you symbolically complicit in them. I am proud to render a military salute to the national colors, or stand for the Anthem at a sporting event, but I really loathe being expected to do so.

I saw a really good example of throat-cramming on TV Saturday Night. An animated Halloween special was broadcast, and the little white boy protagonist is depicted as having a romantic crush on the pretty little black girl at his school. I hope our Confederate Virginia Lady was watching. Although it would have been even better, and much more educational, if it had been a little black boy having a crush on a pretty little white girl.