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People definitely don't show the level of respect for the National Anthem that it deserves. I was brought up that when the National Anthem plays, you stop whatever you are doing, especially if you are talking, you stand up, and at the very least you stand there still. Preferably, you stand with you hand over your heart or you salute the flag. Yet, I have found that not everyone has this same level of respect for the National Anthem and for the flag of the United States of America.

When I was going to college, every evening at six o'clock, the National Anthem would play as a few ROTC students took the flag down off the flagpole. The first time I experienced this, I stopped what I was doing and stood there with my hand over my heart as I looked at the flag coming down off the pole. Yet, not everyone did this. I have to admit I was a little surprised. I guess I had assumed everyone else had been taught this same level of respect for the National Anthem and for the flag. Many people were rushing by, talking loudly with their friends, laughing, and just in a hurry. I couldn't believe it. It probably took two minutes for the whole process. Couldn't they take those two minutes to show a little respect for their country? Were they in that much of hurry that they couldn't take the two minutes to stop and respect their country?

I tried to give the people the benefit of the doubt. Maybe they didn't realize they were suppose to stop and show respect toward the flag and the National Anthem. Maybe they were from a foreign country, and they didn't know our culture said that you should show respect toward the National Anthem and toward the flag. We did, after all, have a lot of students on campus from foreign countries. So I started to watch whenever I was out and about during this time. It wasn't the foreign students who had the problem stopping to respect the flag. They were often the first to stop. It was the ones from the United States. Sometimes I would even hear them joking with their friends about how they knew they should stop and how they knew people were giving them dirty looks for not stopping, but they didn't want to stop. It was too much of a bother for them. I wonder if they realized they were showing disrespect for their country, a country which provided them freedoms and rights that weren't provided to people from many other countries.

Another place where people don't show respect toward the National Anthem is at sporting events. I'm sure at one point the excited shouting and noise making at the end of the song showed some respect and excitement about the National Anthem, but now it just seems like a bunch of people wanting to make more noise than the people next to them. The National Anthem, something we should hold dear to our hearts, plays. Then a bunch of people shout and make as much noise as they can. Do they even know why they are doing this? I feel like the shouting and noise takes away from the special feeling this moment should and could create. I hope that next time each of us finds ourselves in a situation where the National Anthem is played, before joining in making all the noise, we will at least contemplate why we are joining in. If it's just because everyone else is making noise, or if it's just to make more noise than the person next us, maybe we shouldn't do it. Maybe instead we should just stand there and appreciate what the National Anthem really means to us.

Learn more about this author, Shilo Dawn Goodson.
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