“The flag and the national anthem receive an unhealthy amount of attention in the United States. It’s unnatural for a republic built upon the enlightenment values of freedom of speech, freedom of association, and representative government to put so much emphasis on a piece of cloth that merely represents these values. We behave as though the red, white, and blue is where the value resides.”
https://medium.com/@craig.axford/the-flag-figuratively-takes-a-knee-all-the-time-no-one-seems-to-mind-2349e6f033e2