Queshire
Istar
I have the awkward stance of 100% agreeing with you here and seeing that these words as you've spoken them here are now seen as politically charged and it's disturbing to me that "pride for my country" can be taken as meaning I'm a fascist and displaying the could mean I'm a nationalist (nazi sympathizer or worse) and calling the nation's founders "great men" supports colonialism, the patriarchy, oppression and bigotry.
My mind has become soup in recent years because of the vocal minority in these matters. It's nutters, rediculous, and hard to process how we got to the point of racism (against whites) and sexism (against men and straight people) to fight against racism and sexism.
I'd like to ignore the lunacy of it all but I feel I do so at my own peril. Do you follow?
Hmmm... for advice let's see...
Ah! I got it. Why I agree with Pmmg here. Truth.
You can't control others. That's just a fact of life. So consider your own beliefs. What lies at their core? What seems so obviously, so self evidently true that the idea that anyone would question them is just mystifying?
For me an example of such is that, 'Effort should be Respected,' and that, 'Virtue Challenged is stronger than Virtue taken for Granted.' I like putting them in little snappy phrases because, well, writing.
When you can recognize such things about yourself then it doesn't matter what others say or do.