Dixie is better than the Star Spangled Banner

Without getting into the political and historical arguments, Dixie is a better national anthem than the Star Spangled Banner. I mean this strictly in the musical sense.

It has been a long time since I have heard the Star Spangled Banner sung live in a respectful way in public. Every time I'm told to rise for the national anthem, I literally cringe. It has become a cheesy nightclub act. Instead of calling attention to country and patriotism, hearth and home, valor and sacrifice - the anthem has become a showtune, an American Idol audition-like excuse to warble and show off one's vocal improvisation and embellishment. It is (now) always performed in such a way as to call attention to the "performer" - who typically gyrates and makes hand gestures to the "oohs" and "ahs" of the audience.

While things may have changed since my latest sojourn to the Great White North, I haven't heard O Canada performed in this way that we've come to expect as the "standard" rendering of the American national anthem.

The Star Spangled Banner is the Anthem that has become a pop song.

Ironically, Dixie has had the opposite journey. It was a pop song that became a national anthem. Dixie was a popular minstrel show tune at the time of the secession crisis. Its nostalgic lyrics and peppy beat made it a popular tune in North and South alike - a tune you can whistle. When the Southern states seceded and forged a new "national" identity (the Confederacy carefully avoided centralized political nationalization, while certainly maintaining a cultural identity as a "nation"), Dixie spontaneously became the national anthem of the Confederate States of America. Only, in this case, the pop song became an Anthem - often performed by military bands as a march.

As the losses mounted in the South, Dixie became an emotional reminder of the sacrifices of civilians and soldiers alike to secure independence. After the fall of the government and the imposition of reconstruction, Dixie became a somber tribute to those who fell in battle - as well as to those who endured oppression at the hands of puppet governments. In subsequent decades, Dixie was greeted by moist eyes, standing at attention, doffed hats, and hands raised in salute or placed over hearts - as fallen comrades, fathers, and later, grandfathers were called to mind.

As the deep wounds of war began to heal, Dixie served as a source of regional pride - being used for both civilian and military uses. Football games in the South opened with Dixie. Dixie came to be used as a rousing song to cheer on teams of "Rebels" in the North and the South as the legacy of the Confederate soldier became "nationalized" and came to be celebrated by all regions in the re-United States.

Today, Dixie has largely fallen into disuse - a casualty of political correctness and warped racial identity politics. However, those who continue to sing Dixie (such as members of the Sons of Confederate Veterans and the United Daughters of the Confederacy) do so reverently - with no ornamentation, embellishment, or other forms of disrespectful caterwauling. Dixie continues to be performed by brass bands and sung both slowly and swiftly at ceremonies honoring the war dead. It continues here and there as a "fight song."

Aside from the Elvis Presley rendition in the 1960s that perversely combined Dixie and the so-called Battle Hymn of the Republic, Dixie has avoided the cheesiness that typifies the Star Spangled Banner. Whether this is due to an increased sense of reverence for the dead in a war-vanquished region that lost its independence by force, or perhaps because it simply isn't performed by pop-star wannabes at sporting events today, I don't know. We have become a "flip-flop" culture bereft of respect and reverence - a phenomenon which manifests itself in the church as well under the guise of "contemporary worship" and the "emerging church."

But I know this much - I know when I do hear Dixie sung, it will be sung with respect and reverence. I stand, remove my hat, cover my hand over my heart, and reflect on the sacrifices of my ancestors. When I hear the Star Spangled Banner being sung, it's all I can do not to throw up.

How sad is that?