The problem with ‘Are you proud to be an American?'

Boston Globe

08-07-2025

Predictably,
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I'll take a pass on jumping into the left-vs.-right ideological scuffle (
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The wording of that question has always struck me as awkward and ambiguous. It confuses very different feelings — gratitude, approval, and identity — by jumbling them into a single, emotionally charged term.
The phrase 'proud to be an American' has been a staple of America's civic vocabulary for decades. It was famously enshrined in Lee Greenwood's 1984 anthem, '
Gallup has been asking the question in essentially the same form for over two decades, making it a useful barometer of national sentiment. And yet, looked at closely, the question is clumsy. Respondents aren't being asked about their pride in America, or America's achievements, or America's values. The question Gallup keeps polling is about people's pride in being American. But what does it mean to be proud of something you didn't choose or achieve?
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Most Americans were born in this country, which is no more of an accomplishment than being born in February. The case is different for naturalized immigrants, who become Americans by choice, often devoting much time, effort, and commitment to do so. For them, 'being an American' is indeed an achievement for which they're entitled to feel proud. That is because pride, to be meaningful, requires agency: You are entitled to be proud of the things you have done, the learning you have acquired, the contributions you have made — but not of mere accidents of birth you had no say in.
What makes far more sense, in this context, is to ask about gratitude. Americans can and should feel grateful for the freedoms, opportunities, and protections afforded to them by virtue of living in this country. Similarly, Americans can and should express admiration for what their country stands for, or what it has achieved, without reducing that feeling to shallow self-congratulation for being born here.
When Gallup,
The question functions as a proxy for loyalty and belonging, for emotional identification with the nation. Respondents aren't being asked about status but about solidarity. What is being measured is a kind of affective nationalism: Do you feel positively about being an American? Do you embrace that identity in an era when many feel disillusioned or alienated from their government and fellow citizens?
The question is slippery. It allows critics to pounce on a decline in 'pride' as evidence of disloyalty or lack of patriotism. And it invites supporters to wave the flag without reckoning seriously with what pride in being an American should actually entail. To be sure, there are
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Uncritical pride is not the mark of a healthy patriotism. The British writer G.K. Chesterton warned against just such confusion when he observed: ''
The German-born
The decline in 'pride to be an American' doesn't necessarily mean Americans are growing less patriotic. More likely it reflects frustration with the nation's faults and with the political leadership that enables them. As the plunge in pride among Democrats indicates, it is clearly bound up with partisan antipathy for the Trump administration.
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It is also generational: Young Americans of every partisan stripe — Democratic, Republican, and independent — express pride in being American at lower rates than their older counterparts. Does that mean they don't care about their country? Or does it signal a deeper moral engagement with what they believe America ought to be?
It would be more illuminating — and less inflammatory — if pollsters distinguished between these different sentiments. Instead of asking simply, 'Are you proud to be an American?', why not ask:
Are you grateful to be an American?
Are you proud of what America stands for?
Are you proud of what America has done in the past year?
Do you feel attached to or alienated from American identity?
Each of those questions measures something real and distinct — gratitude for circumstances, embrace of values, approval of conduct, and emotional belonging. Lumping them all into a single catchphrase encourages people to speak in clichés rather than grapple candidly with the complexity of their feelings about their country.
The simple question has persisted over time in part because it's familiar and easy to track and in part because Americans have been conditioned to respond to it in a certain way.
The Greenwood song is still sung, the flag still waved, and the phrase 'proud to be an American' still used as a kind of civic password, even when many who say it harbor deep reservations about the country's direction. And for those who refuse to say it are framed in the headlines as outsiders ungrateful or disloyal, even when their criticism is rooted in love of country and a desire to see it live up to its promise.
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Patriotism ought to be more than a reflexive cheer or a performative protest. We can express pride in our ideals without ignoring the ways we have betrayed them. We can love our country without idolizing it, and criticize America without abandoning it. What if we stopped asking people whether they're proud to be Americans, and started asking instead what they're doing to ensure America remains a country worthy of pride.
This is adapted from the current
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