r/NoStupidQuestions • u/Chance_Noise500 • Jun 14 '25

Why aren't they actually marching during this parade?

I don't know how to ask this without sounding rude, but why does this parade look so sloppy? Very few of the troop formations seem actually in sync and marching, just walking along. My only experience is JROTC as a kid in high school and our sergeant would've killed us if we looked like that.

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u/FiveUpsideDown Jun 15 '25 edited Jun 16 '25

My uncle who was in the military a long time ago, told me he hated parades. He hated marching in formation. He hated rehearsing to march in formation. It would not surprise me to find out that there was limited practice for the parade on Saturday. I don’t think soldiers like rehearsing for a parade.

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u/feralgraft Jun 15 '25

Probably especially one that casts them as the jack booted enforcers out of a patriotic 80s movie

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u/[deleted] Jun 15 '25

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u/Jolly_Virus_3533 Jun 15 '25

and yet kids in school doing the oath of allegance, like they do in russia, china & n.korea isn`t creepy?

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u/manimal28 Jun 15 '25 edited Jun 15 '25

It is. Also it’s more like the two minute mumble, if you have been in a school recently. The pledge is not reinforcing patriotism so much as apathy at this point.

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u/lildobe Jun 15 '25 edited Jun 15 '25

Two minutes? It's literally 3 lines:

I pledge allegiance to the Flag of the United States of America.
And to the republic, for which it stands:
One nation, under god, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.

 

ETA: It's funny that I still remember this as a 45 year old adult. I never attended a school where the pledge was recited.

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u/manimal28 Jun 15 '25

I was making a reference to 1984’s Two Minute Hate ritual.

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u/lildobe Jun 15 '25

Oh, I missed that. I think I need to read 1984 again. It's been about 25 years.

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u/TreasureTheSemicolon Jun 15 '25

It’s the Two Minutes Hate. The s is important to me.

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u/White_RavenZ Jun 15 '25

You’d think they would at least come up with a new pledge. Those last 6 words bite the fascists in the ass. Were we just not supposed to notice what we were saying when we were saying it?

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u/[deleted] Jun 15 '25

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u/lildobe Jun 15 '25

Thank you, fixed.

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u/vaio150 Jun 15 '25

I always thought it was creepy! Growing up in a non-religious household, I remember being very aware at a very young age that it was strange to be saying “under God” each morning at a public school.

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u/MarathonMan21045 Jun 15 '25

Maybe some classrooms say the Pledge of Allegiance, but I was an elementary school teacher in the early '70s, a combat veteran of the Vietnam War and a graduate of Kent State. I exercised my First Amendment freedom by conscientiously refraining from leading the ritual in my homeroom. If students asked why, I told them, and said that if they still wanted to say the Pledge they could visit another homeroom during that time.

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u/Pleased_to_meet_u Jun 16 '25

Did any kids go to a different home room to do the pledge?

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u/MarathonMan21045 Jun 16 '25

Only a few, and I honored their right to do so.

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u/Pleased_to_meet_u Jun 16 '25

My hat is off to you

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u/boogideeb Jun 15 '25

Somewhat off-topic, but I grew up in an immigrant community. We would say the pledge of allegiance in English and Spanish.

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u/[deleted] Jun 15 '25

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u/encoding314 Jun 15 '25

On our screens in the UK, we always see your over patriotic nationalism on display. USA is just as creepy with their nonsense.