Jack White thinks flying the flag during a pretty depressing time in American history is actually pretty cool — especially if you’re not a fan of President Donald Trump.
The White Stripes frontman published a patriotic Instagram post on July Fourth, and in it, he gives Americans who may feel disenchanted with the current state of the country under the leadership of a “tyrant” a simple “reminder.”
“I leave you with a reminder: MAGA doesn’t own our flag and never will,” White wrote at the tail end of his post. “And definitely not on this anniversary of a nation currently in peril that was founded on the indelible human right, duty, and endeavor to fight against tyranny and the current tyrant we suffer under today.”
Despite the diss to Trump, the Grammy-winner reserved the majority of his post to highlighting the aspects of American life that make him proud to be a citizen.
“Happy 250th to America! And even more importantly the concept that America is a possibility, a promise of an attainable ideal, all things achievable in the pursuit of happiness and true freedom,” White wrote.
He continued, “I believe in the rock and roll band in the garage, the protest in town square, the drive in theater, the workers on the way to the car plant, the melting pot and the integration of faiths, Woody Guthrie and Lead Belly.”
The “Seven Nation Army” singer went on to mention other slices of Americana that he loves.
“Thanksgiving dinner, the soup kitchen feeding the homeless, the sunrise in the Grand Canyon and the building and climbing of the tallest sky scrapers.”
White’s argument about the American flag is a resonant one, considering many on the left feel like the flag has become MAGA-coded under the Trump administration.
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“I do a side-eye every time I see something that is overly flagged up, like people with a big flag on their shirt, because I feel like it has been co-opted into a conservative thing,” Ryan, an anonymous Ohio-based Democrat, admitted to HuffPost in June.
It doesn’t help that Trump has been photographed hugging and kissing the American flag, and has a tendency to conflate patriotism with partisanship.
But hey, for a second there, White really did make flying the flag seem kind of punk rock.
