Why, I wonder, do macho guys in jumbo pick-up trucks with ultra-lift suspension (trucks with custom rims and oversized tires), like to plant a huge American flag, the size of a bedsheet, in the truck bed and smile down on the rest of us while we all wait for the light to turn green? They seem proud of themselves, don’t they? Are they expressing a love for our country? Perhaps, but I wonder. Their display connotes outsized expression of something; I just don’t know what it is. It’s like chest-thumping, I suppose. They seem so full of themselves, too smudge. That’s my take. A common read on men who drive large pick-up trucks or tricked out Hummers suggests they overcompensate for insecurities, or even for the lack of male magnitude. Maybe? Who knows?
In-your-face displays of flag-waving and garish exhibits of patriotism have an off-putting effect if used to taunt an opposition viewpoint. Then, too, if someone is flying dozens of flags along with political signs or stickers, well, we know that someone is deep into partisan (probably right-wing) politics.
Getting back to the pick-up truck guy and his banquet table sized American flag mounted on the bed of his truck—my thought is he is wielding an expression of contempt for those who don’t agree with him, whatever it may be that he believes. For all I know, he may be a MAGA follower, or he may be a zealot without a partisan connection, but he is likely contemptuous of those who take umbrage at his chauvinistic display.
My next inference is that the guy in the pick-up truck has a tough time expressing himself, so he goes with the boldest image that condenses those feelings he can’t fluently form in language. Lack of verbal skills can lead to salient non-verbal demonstrations. If one has more tattoos than words in one’s vocabulary, the chance for violence or acting out is inevitable.
On Camano Island, up north from my home here in Steilacoom, Washington, I noticed flags on two side-by-side seaside homes which encapsulates the political climate in our country. One home presented a big Stars and Stripes plus a Trump flag. Next door a Stars and Stripes and a large ‘NO Kings” flag as a rejoinder. The battle of flags, yet something about that competition is childish in my view. When we use flags or other symbols to express fundamental views, we are doing what humans have always done: bearing symbols to show what we believe. That said, when we are reduced to waving flags and using emojis to express beliefs, we have cheapened those beliefs to a dumb show, and have, perhaps, given up talking to one another in a constructive and healing manner.