Word,look no further than Kaep being blackballed for speaking out against police brutality...
The negative responses to Kaep kneeling to protest against racism and police brutality (aka patriotism) is pretty disturbing to me. Same with the constant pledges of allegiance etc.
Those people would have an aneurysm in Belgium
Personally I've never had to pledge allegiance and the only time I've had to sing the national anthem is a few times in music class in elementary. Other than that I have never been required or expected to sing the anthem since then.
Hence why I literally don't know a single line of our anthem. Neither do my parents or everyone else I know.
The only time I see Belgian flags is when our national soccer team is playing a big match. Not a single flag in sight on our national holiday but if our national team is playing a big match in the FIFA Worldcup or the Euros cup there's flags on the houses everywhere
Even better, most of our national team doesn't seem to have a clue what our anthem is either. Either that or they just don't care since most of them never sing along. Doesn't bother anyone here, we'd me more surprised if our national team started singing the anthem all of a sudden
I'm certainly a proud Belgian and love my country but I don't see knowing the anthem or (repeatedly) pledging allegiance as having any relevance to patriotism. We can be proud Belgians without engaging in what amounts to cult-like rituals as I see it.