Why is dissent considered unpatriotic?

Question

I'm serious, I want to know why, in America, it's considered unpatriotic to disagree with your President.

Answer 1

Dissent is not unpatriotic. Libeling our troops & leaders is. Wanting us to lose is.

Answer 2

It is not unpatriotic to disagree with the president. It is however unpatriotic to cheer against your own country in wartime. Not standing behind the Commander in Chief at that time in such a manner that the enemy is easily aware of that lack of support gives him comfort..

Answer 3

People put the descripion of unpatriotic on anyone that dissagrees with them. Its a tactic thats commonly used by people who have nothing to back up their arguments.

As it pertains to the U.S. my feeling is that people that call other unpatriotic for voicing their criticisms of our government are the ones who are being unpatriotic. As our constitution and society as a whole is based on the right to say whatever we want regardless of someone wants to hear it or not, trying to silence others is quite unpatriotic.

Also, I find it a little funny that people say that attacking one person (the president) is unpatriotic. Conservatives did the same thing to Bill Clinton over his personal life. Something that effected no one outside of those directly involved. Bush has done so many more blatently illegal things yet its unpatriotic to say he should be held accountable for them.

1. Illegal wire taps.
2. Using false information as a means to attack Iraq. I'm speaking of the photos of mobil chemical labs. They were proved to not be real in any sense.
3. Detaining people with no due process of law.
4. Authorizing torture on detainees.

Should I keep going?

Answer 4

Dissent is essential for the benefit of the intent of the founding fathers and our constitutional rights.
If Americans become too complacent and allow Socialism and/or Capitolism to become our countries common law we will be right back to the social structure America was fighting against in the first place.
The United States of America is suppose to be a country....
BY the people....For the people!!

Not the rich over the poor!
Not the haves over the have nots!
Not Conservative Big Money/Special Interest over the simple family just trying to maintain in America!

Actually if you think about it ....It is every Americans DUTY to question their leaders and make sure they are conducting the policies of our government to the approval of the majority of the masses of the population.
Government officials HAVE TO remember that WE elected them to represent ...US!
They are not entitled to their office!!!
We are entitled to make sure they uphold that office in the best interest of ALL Americans!! Not just the privileged few!!
God Bless America!!

Answer 5

It is not unpatriotic, until you start calling him and anyone that supports his decision to go to war Hitler, war monger, saying that our soldiers as a whole are killing women and children just to do it. When Cindy Sheehan goes to another country to oppose our government and their decisions, I do call that unpatriotic! If you really truly believe that some of the dissent is not unpatriotic you have blinders on!

Answer 6

From a particular potential, that ignores most of the information you'd be perceived as being correct on your idea procedure. What you're lacking is: Bush went to conflict over terrorism, at the same time as you received't consider conflict, the theory is to guard our united states of america. a lot of human beings forget that when 9/11 maximum individuals needed this, yet they bored and drained and discontent at the same time as it wasn't over in a week. of route we under no circumstances gave our troops the authority to strive against a conflict, yet more desirable the flexibility of a police rigidity. this isn't to say Bush became a good president. yet interior the right context to face hostile to holding your united states of america that one of those vast quantity of affection is unpatriotic. Obama, refused to placed on a flag pin or cover his heart because he would offend. He has approached different overseas leaders as being subservient. He does not love our united states of america. He does not comprehend the structure. he's making an attempt to take us from a Republic from what we were depending to Socialism. He opt for to take this united states of america and swap it into something different and align it with a international league of ability. he's American from the starting off position of our structure to his middle. to face by assessment is unquestionably Patriotic as you're status hostile to authorities oppression and burden, and replacing the way we were depending. Protesting is Protesting. To outline even if it really is patriotic or not is in protecting with what you're representing. if you're status for the rules, middle values, regulations, and the starting off position of the country, that's patriotic. To oppose such issues is unpatriotic.

Answer 7

Indeed. I wonder if George Washington, John Hancock, Thomas Paine, or MLK would be considered unpatriotic.

Answer 8

Without Dissent THERE IS NO DEMOCRACY

That is how you can tell an undemocratic leader or news pundit If they criticise you for dissent their is no Democracy, like free speech, free speech is either free or not, FULL not partial, the fact for instance that in London there are FREE SPEECH ZONES, means that the UK no longer tolerates FREE SPEECH, only in APPROVED areas

Answer 9

The people who think it unpatriotic are out of touch with the type of government that our forefathers put together. Our country could never have become what it was without the ideas of the enlightenment that spoke of rights like dissent as our natural right.

One of the best speeches I have personally ever heard was given at Faneuil Hall in Boston on April 22, 2006. Faneuil Hall has a plaque on it that explains how it is a meeting place for public discussion from colonial times to the present. That speech by John Kerry includes a history of that demonstrates the importance of dissent in US history. Here are 4 paragraphs and a link to the text of the entire speech. (Given on the 35th anniversary of his speaking before the Senate in 1971)

" This is not the first time in American history when patriotism has been distorted to deflect criticism and mislead the nation.
In the infancy of the Republic, in 1798, Congress enacted the Alien and Sedition Acts to smear Thomas Jefferson and accuse him of treason. Newspapers were shut down, and their editors arrested, including Benjamin Franklin's grandson. No wonder Thomas Jefferson himself said: "Dissent is the greatest form of patriotism."

In the Mexican War, a young Congressman named Abraham Lincoln was driven from public life for raising doubts about official claims. And in World War I, America's values were degraded, not defended, when dissenters were jailed and the teaching of German was banned in public schools in some states. At that time it was apparently sounding German, not looking French, that got you in trouble. And it was panic and prejudice, not true patriotism, that brought the internment of Japanese-Americans during World War II-a measure upheld by Supreme Court Justices who did not uphold their oaths to defend the Constitution. We are stronger today because no less a rock-ribbed conservative than Robert Taft - "Mr. Republican" himself - stood up and said at the height of the second World War that, "the maintenance of the right of criticism in the long run will do the country maintaining it a great deal more good than it will do the enemy, and will prevent mistakes which might otherwise occur."

Even during the Cold War-an undeclared war, and often more a war of nerves and diplomacy than of arms-even the mildest dissenters from official policy were sometimes silenced, blacklisted, or arrested, especially during the McCarthy era of the early 1950s. Indeed, it was only when Joseph McCarthy went through the gates of delirium and began accusing distinguished U.S. diplomats and military leaders of treason that the two parties in Washington and the news media realized the common stake they had in the right to dissent. They stood up to a bully and brought down McCarthyism's ugly and contrived appeals to a phony form of 100% Americanism.

Dissenters are not always right, but it is always a warning sign when they are accused of unpatriotic sentiments by politicians seeking a safe harbor from debate, from accountability, or from the simple truth. Truth is the American bottom line. Truth above all is fundamental to who we are. It is no accident that among the first words of the first declaration of our national existence it is proclaimed: "We hold these truths to be self-evident".

http://www.johnkerry.com/news/speeches/speech.html?id=16




Truth is the American bottom line. Truth above all is fundamental to who we are. It is no accident that among the first words of the first declaration of our national existence it is proclaimed: "We hold these truths to be self-evident…".

Answer 10

It's not consider unpatriotic except by dittohead idiots towing the party line no matter where it leads.

Answer 11

It's not. Anybody who thinks this is unpatriotic