Welcome to The Newsfeed.

This week, as the US is on the cusp of turning 250 years old and the nation is deeply divided, we've been discussing the meaning of patriotism in our reporting.

In early June, at the Cascade PBS Ideas Festival, NPR Fresh Air co-host Tonya Mosley asked Princeton University professor and author Eddie Glaude Jr.

his thoughts on patriotism.

And I wonder, what's your relationship to patriotism overall, and to that idea of us holding such reverence and such pride in this myth and this idea of of freedom being something that could be bestowed upon us?

-Yeah.

Patriotism.

You know, the first sentence, what it's trying to do, is hold off idolatry.

The idolatry of the state, right?

Something so morally dubious and so abstract, right?

But sometimes patriotism, to my ear, sounds like a rebel yell.

Those people who embrace the flag, who wrap themselves up in the piety of the country, are often, more than not, folk who think, I should be in my place.

Folk who are behind the assault on voting rights, Folk who want to deny the specificity of the experience that shapes how I see this place.

So usually when I hear a robust, visceral embrace of love of country.

You know, my head goes on a swivel.

Who's saying it and for what ends?

And for what purposes, you see?

Next time, we'll continue sharing what people told us patriotism means to them.

I'm Paris Jackson, thanks for watching The Newsfeed.