The Pledge and the Truth

This is a repost from my Myspace in response to a post from some other people.  The text of the original post can be found in the Snopes.com response.



A couple of people have posted the bulletin calling for some sort of boycott of Pepsi’s supposed new can. I feel that I need to say a few things on this so forgive my soapbox, but I just think in this day and age these things need to be said.

First, this posting is a hoax. Pepsi has absolutely no plans to introduce this can and never did. The genesis of this hoax comes from a Dr. Pepper can which was briefly put into production after September 11th, but was pulled after the public objection to the exclusion of the words “under God”. Dr. Pepper is not a Pepsi product, it is an independent company. All the information can be found on Snopes.com here.

Second, I know that there are a lot of things floating around the internet, My Space in particular. I have personally seen so many messages come by that are outright lies about a whole variety of subjects. The internet can be a great tool for communication and education, but we have to be responsible users, and responsible citizens. It doesn’t take much time at all to do a little bit of research on any posting and find out if it is valid or not. There are even a number of websites that are dedicated to debunking internet hoaxes from financial to political. www.snopes.com is one of them, as is http://urbanlegends.about.com. Or you can simply Google the main idea and come up with a whole set of valuable information.

Third, I want to take a moment and talk about one of the main ideas in the Pepsi hoax, and in this is a history lesson. The pledge was originally published anonymously in 1892 in The Youth’s Companion, the Reader’s Digest of its day. Though it was published without an author, it is believed to have been written by Francis Bellamy, a Socialist Baptist Minister. I won't go into great detail but the pledge was actually based in his Socialist ideals and inspired by the French concept of liberté, égalité, fraternité (liberty, equality and fraternity) which was the motto of their revolution.

The original language of the pledge was: ‘I pledge allegiance to my Flag and to the Republic for which it stands, one nation, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.’ By 1924 the American Legion and the Daughters of the American Revolution were successful in changing ‘my Flag’ to ‘the flag’ and adding ‘of the United States of America’ to the pledge.

Please note that until 1954 (62 years from its creation), it did not include the words ‘under God’. It was only after a campaign by the Knights of Columbus that the United States Congress added the two words and solidified the pledge as we know it today.

So, what does all this mean? Well, it seems that the only time the pledge is questioned is the inclusion or exclusion of the two words ‘under God’, which were not part of the original spirit of the pledge. It was written to focus on a shared community and the hope of liberty and justice for all, in a nation that is united for the common cause. It had nothing to do with God.

For the record, I don’t believe that ‘under God’ should be in the pledge, nor should it be printed on our money, on our courtrooms or on any surface associated with our Government. I find it odd that a deeply religious Bellamy, saw fit to leave God out of the pledge as the founding fathers saw fit to leave it out of the Constitution. We are nation of the people first and their Gods second, and we should not forget that.

Read more here.