What is Patriotism?

I know its not putting some symbols on a higher level than my fellow citizens, but what is it?

Its a bit of an odd concept in many ways since the country we live in is two things, an area on the map and the people who occupy that area.

So are we loyal to the geography or to the people or something else.

We talk about our native land, our mother land and sometimes vow to defend it, but many Americans can't identify parts of their country on a map.

Some parts of it are call National Treasures and we protect treasures, so maybe its Niagara Falls, the Grand Canyon, the Great Plains or Death Valley that we support?

No they don't really need us to do much and certainly they are simply geographic characteristics.

What about the people?  Patriotism or nationalism arose from the sense of clan and tribe that was essential to our early survival.  Clearly you needed help to protect yourself and your family and the scale of that protection obviously varied based on the circumstances.  In fact many countries that we know today are named after tribes that occupied them, France and Franks, England and Angles for example. 

Of course the tribes demanded a certain loyalty and as our modern world developed this grew into what we call patriotism.  Of course it started as loyalty to the leader or King who symbolized the tribe for all.  So is patriotism a commitment to our fellow citizens?

It is to some extent, however, in many cases they don't really like each other.  Its hard to imagine that a gun supporting evangelical is supporting a transgender anti gun atheist and vice versa.

They may support the right of each other to exist but maybe just barely.

So what do we support?

Well to some extent its an idea and that idea is symbolized by our constitution and our laws. 

These are the only things that bind us together as a nation and what we all share.

The constitution expresses the fundamental rights of its citizens in its amendments and those rights and obligations are what make us a people.  Not the color of our skin or our religion or our national origin. 

It makes us Americans.