A
scene in a British comedy film from probably the 1950s or ‘60s*:
The location is a movie theater (I guess I should write “theatre”)
on whose screen the last images of the film are fading away.
Suddenly, the patrons jump to their feet and make a mad rush to the
exits—until the recorded strains of “God Save the Queen” freeze
the less fleet of foot in their tracks.
*
The
Olympic games have gone, and with them their usual cornucopia of
Kitsch, Nazi-iconography, cheating, biased judging, and out-of-water
stupidity (stand up, Ryan Lochte!). With the addition this year of
the manufactured outrage at American gymnast Gabby Douglas’
non-placing of her hand over her heart during the playing of “The
Star-Spangled Banner.”**
I have watched zillions of international
sporting events and observed that members of some national teams all
do the hand-on-heart bit, while on other teams, it’s laissez
faire,
some team members do, others don’t. Same with the singing of
national anthems (except for the Spanish teams—there are no words
to their national anthem). Not that the more ostentatious displays of
patriotism equate to better athletic performance. Joe Hart,
goalkeeper of choice for the England national team at Euro 2016,
stood out for his boisterous warbling of “God Save the Queen," but
his indifferent play at the tournament has led to his being sat down by his club, Manchester City (and quite possibly, by the end of this
month, shown—if not rushed to—the door of the club).
*
Patriotism
may (or may not) be “the last refuge of the scoundrel,” as Dr.
Johnson proclaimed. But coercive patriotism is the blood sport of
nationalistic heresy-sniffers. Consider, for example, the time the
Boston police barred one of the greatest of 20th-century composers,
Igor Stravinsky, from conducting his arrangement of “The
Star-Spangled Banner.” Carly Carioli relates the story:
During World War I, the Massachusetts Legislature had narrowly passed Chapter 264, Section 9, which prohibits the performance of “The Star-Spangled Banner” as dance music, as part of a medley, or with “embellishment.” And now the officers were apparently ready to arrest Stravinsky on the spot if the conductor attempted to perform his version of the anthem. “Let him change it just once,” one reporter quoted [Captain Thomas J. Harvey, head of the police department’s “Radical Squad”] as saying, “and we’ll grab him.”
A half-hour before curtain, Boston police officers visited Stravinsky backstage and threatened to remove the sheet music from the music stands.***
Stravinsky bowed to the threat and conducted the Boston Symphony's usual version of the anthem. Carioli continues:
Shortly after the conclusion of the anthem, but before the rest of the program, Captain Harvey and his squad of would-be music critics got up and “stalked out indifferently,” according to the [Boston] Post.
It didn't matter to the radical chasers that there was no official version of “The Star-Spangled Banner.”
*
I
wonder if Stravinsky could have gotten away with conducting his
arrangement had he shown up with an American flag pinned to
his lapel. Were he around today, he could take advantage of this
offer from Fahrney's Pens:
I,
myself, will not be enticed. I don't need to wear that pin to be
patriotic.
As
Hamlet says about external displays of internal feelings:
'Tis not alone my inky cloak, good mother,
Nor customary suits of solemn black,
Nor windy suspiration of forced breath,
No, nor the fruitful river in the eye,
Nor the dejected 'havior of the visage,
Together with all forms, moods, shapes of grief,
That can denote me truly: these indeed seem,
For they are actions that a man might play:
But I have that within which passeth show. . .
Act I, Scene 2 [My Emphasis]
Besides,
how would it look on my t-shirt that reads: “I Don't Got To Show
You No Stinkin Badges”?
***
*The Smallest Show on Earth
possibly?
**For
the record—I never place my hand over my heart.
