Ceremonies and traditions are as old as the oldest records of humanity, and persist in every society in history you can think of. There's probably a reason for this.

Again, I would love to see a school system with the capacity to teach our children the actual philosophical basis for our ideals (the equivalent of the "History and Moral Philosophy" class in Heinlein's "Starship Troopers"), but I ain't seeing it out there. In fact, the reverse.

I don't prefer the idea of instilling patriotism and values only by tradition, repetition, and absorption of community values any more than you do. I know quite well the dangers of such things. But the alternative we're presented with seems to be largely a vacuum. I'm open for suggestions.

If you look around, most of the thinking on these issues is a mile wide and a millimeter thick, on the level of "is he wearing a flag pin?" on one side, and on the other side a philosophical concept that can be expressed most simply as "nobody's the boss of me!"

A lack of traditions doesn't automatically result in a society of intellectuals and free thinkers. From what I'm seeing, it tends to create a society of empty heads waiting to be filled by the first appealing thing that comes along.

I hope that someday a nation of people that has been taught to doubt almost every value they hold is not easily overrun by a culture on the far end of the curve, one that is willing to wrap bombs around its own children and die in droves for even the most trivial of its beliefs.

A frightening thought: When it comes down to it, cultural evolution is as value-free as biological evolution is. I hope we don't find this out the hard way.