Why no one in America call America "Motherland"?

AmericanWannabe

Registered Users (C)
Is it because of ideology? As you can see in Holleywood movies,
only in those countries hostile to USA, politicians call
upon everyone to fight for "Motherland" or "Fatherland".

Or could be the reason be that indeed America is no
Motherland to nobody because it always refers to
the country where one's ancestors came from.
 
AmericanWannabe said:
Is it because of ideology? As you can see in Holleywood movies,
only in those countries hostile to USA, politicians call
upon everyone to fight for "Motherland" or "Fatherland".

Or could be the reason be that indeed America is no
Motherland to nobody because it always refers to
the country where one's ancestors came from.

I guess Homeland is a more PC way of saying Motherland. Remember, US today is 50% settlers, and 50% immigrants. And in this age of Dual Citizenship and ampersand citizens, the word Motherland could conflict some people's belief of correctness.


----------------------------
Vote Bush '04
 
JoeF said:
It is quite simple: citizens don't pledge allegiance to the country. They pledge allegiance to the flag and the republic, i.e., a specific government form.
See Martin Diamond, "The Founding of the Democratic Republic" (which is required reading in probably all PolSci courses.)


But it does not explain why many Americans often say
"I fight for my country". They don't say "I fight
for my motherland", but they don't say "I fight
for the flag or the governemnt" a lot either.
 
JoeF said:
It is quite simple: citizens don't pledge allegiance to the country. They pledge allegiance to the flag and the republic, i.e., a specific government form.
See Martin Diamond, "The Founding of the Democratic Republic" (which is required reading in probably all PolSci courses.)

Flag is an emblem of the country. It would be foolish to think that we as US citizens are pledging allegiance to the US flag and not what it represents. The flag represents the country, the nation and more importantly, the American Creed.


----------------------------
Vote Bush '04
 
JoeF my dear cyber-stalker.. Quoting words from a book written by one person does not make it right.

We who took the Pledge understand that Flag is the symbol we protect, but we are really using the Flag as a emblem of this United States. We citizens understand that we are commited to protecting this country and its people... not just its Flag.

I do not expect you understand it, JoeF the blabbering Joker.. You are not US citizen, hence don't understand the meaning of Pledge we citizens take.


----------------------------
Vote Bush '04
 
JoeF the Blabbering Joker said:
blah blah blah

What part of "Quoting words from a book written by one person does not make it right." did you not understand? Maybe you could tell us what your native language is, and I can try to translate that simple statement into a language you undestand.


----------------------------
Vote Bush '04
 
dsfgh100 said:
JoeF my dear cyber-stalker.. Quoting words from a book written by one person does not make it right.

We who took the Pledge understand that Flag is the symbol we protect, but we are really using the Flag as a emblem of this United States. We citizens understand that we are commited to protecting this country and its people... not just its Flag.

I do not expect you understand it, JoeF the blabbering Joker.. You are not US citizen, hence don't understand the meaning of Pledge we citizens take.


----------------------------
Vote Bush '04

Since you seem to like to lord your US Citizenship over everyone with the implication that is somehow make you more knowlegeable, I figured I'd jump in here. I was born a US citizen has were both my parents and all four of my grandparents. Further back than that (and now we are back to the late 1800's, since my mother is now 86) some were immigrants. The pledge is a very simple statement that it does not require US citizenship to understand or comprehend. I find your statements (although as explained below I disagree with Joe's conclusions) extremely condesending and rude. Get over you US Citizenship already and try to educate rather than annoy.

As to why I think (again this is my OPINION, the outline of my ancestry above does not make my analysis or opinion on this any more correct than anyone else's) Americans do not refer to a mother or father country or a Motherland or Fatherland is that it brings forth memories (maybe from movies or maybe reality) of Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union. Frequently, american television has scenes of Nazis refering to the "Fatherland" and Russians referring to "Mother Russia". Whether a reality or a creation of Hollywood is really irrelevant. The perception creates the reality.


I may be wrong but I think (at least I hope) this is a better explanation than "you are not a US citizen so you wouldn't understand."
 
I think that the term "Mother Russia" was there way before Soviet Union
was created,maybe by Tolstoy or Gogol or some other Russian writers.
By ideology, Soviet Union was not supposed to be nationalistic but ironically
Stalin was forced to invoke such feelings in WWII because he found out
that in order to encourage the peopel to fight, passion for Mother
Russia was more powerful
 
I think I can answer your question

why don't we call it "motherland"

I was born here but my grandfather came through ellis island.

Most families that are here have only been here maybe 3 to 5 generations.

People in countries that call their lands "motherlands" have been there much longer.

Also there is no so called "american" culture we are a mixture of many different cultures. People came here as many of you are coming here for opportunity. Here is the only place that you can immigrate here and thus call yourself "american". I don't think you can do that in russia or germany.

Imagine me immigrating china and thus calling myself chinese.

My wife is Korean. But I know that no matter how well I learn the language and even if I move to korea and become citizen I will never be truely "korean" whereas in the US you can be truely "american"

since we are a nation of immigrants everyone other than Native americans have to qualify who they are by saying "Mexican American" or "Korean American" or in my case "European American".

Now the pledge of allegiance that I had to recite every morning from 1st grade to 8th grade is something that every kid has to recite so that we can brainwash them into thinking they are citizens of a great country. Now if you read carefully you are not just pledging to the flag but you are also pledging to the "republic for which it [the flag] stands".

on a side note there was a time in this country, and still somewhat the case today, where people had a greater allegiance to the state they were born in than to the United states as a whole. I was born and raised in California and I feel like I will always be a californian no matter where I go.
 
I guess in early part of American history, the statehood also played a role - atleast till the days of civil war. The republic was considered more of an unifying power ("United") than emotional words like "fatherland" or "motherland". In regional politics, the state identity was more important and emotional than the republic.
 
JoeF is correct ... and so is everyone else, with the exception, that JoeF is pointedly precise and legalistic in pointing to the source of truth rather than personal interpretations
 
Top