From a very early age, we begin to master half the freedom equation: my freedom. We start working on this as toddlers and perhaps reach the natural pinnacle in our late teens or early twenties.

The other half of the equation though, your freedom, is a bit more challenging. It does not come so naturally to most people. It has to be cultivated and reinforced so that we may all live in freedom.

The first freedom cannot exist if the second does not. So we have little choice but the protect the freedom of others.

The reason ingenuity and bravery and pluck, as you say, are what matters in the US, is because people have a relatively high degree of freedom here. Freedom to fail, and that is the same freedom to succeed. It is the freedom to try.

It is the fact that places without freedom cause these same personal attributes to lead to imprisonment or isolation or death that drives people to America and always has.

So I suppose I disagree that it is not important to teach “American culture” in schools or in home schooling. I believe it is important to teach our children to be not just residents of a place, but good citizens of this, our, nation. Or at least of our civilization.

Do schools get it wrong a lot of the time? Sure, Are there problems? Anything with freedom to succeed also has the freedom to fail. You cannot rid a system of failure without ridding it of freedom and that is something there are always factions willing to promote.

The push to teach “patriotism” came from the oligarchy after the turn of the century. They were reacting to the massive immigration wave and feared nothing more than labor unrest. These were the robber baron types after all. They pushed for a massive expansion of schooling so they could Americanize this rabble horde. Students were to learn to be obedient to authority, to learn English and patriotism (e.g. Pledge of Allegiance), and at the same time they were to be severed from not only their cultural heritage, but also from their parents and their religion. All of this is copiously explained and documented in John Taylor Gatto’s terrific books.

I agree with PT’s conclusions but not her method. I think that instruction in American culture would be almost unavoidable in homeschooling because it exercises a hegemonic influence over the entire world, so that much of what passes for culture in general is in fact American culture. For example, I am a fan of American literature, so I happily share Twain with my children – as did most parents in Russia for generations.

Our government doesn’t have to prop up our cinematography industry, because we make movies for the world, and every dirt-floor diesel-generator cinema in the back of beyond plays our movies. The project of familiarity with the basics of American culture, literature, and philosophy could be achieved quite easily – say, by watching the longest running prime-time series in history. It’s all right out there. They don’t have such a luxury in France, where the culture, like the language, needs a little help from the government to survive.

As far as the intentional instruction in nationalism in public schools, PT has it quite right: it’s just shallow jingoism, at which the upper classes laugh. The idea that it’s an expression of our superb freedom is perhaps an example of its success. I don’t think anybody would be advised to come to the United States to reduce the likelihood of imprisonment, for example – we imprison more citizens than any other country.

Nationalism, the formation of a national character, and the codification of a common language, are all part of the fundamental project of public schools since they were invented in 18th century Prussia. It is no accident that the unification of Germany and the extension of a uniform educational system happened around the same time. Likewise, the majority of Frenchmen did not speak French at all before compulsory public education was instituted. And in America, public education had the acculturation of our many immigrants and the fabrication of a common nationality as part of their original mission. For the poor and middle class, that is; the rich had other plans.

One of the big differences between the US and countries like France or Germany is that here, following the English model, the upper class has never sent its kids to public school. The founders of the country didn’t, and the rulers of the country don’t. The founders of public schooling itself didn’t, and the heads of our public school system still don’t. There’s always been one system for the few and another for the many.

The project of American nationalism is to some degree congruous with this fact: to a greater degree here than in other countries, it’s what you say to the little people while you expatriate capital behind their backs. This may derive from our origins as (and, lately, return to) an extractive economy. The plantation lives on, though its headquarters have been moved to Dubai.

Damn. I also hate typing at night on my phone. My typos are horrible. Sorry.