Flag of the Week: USA

The flag of the United States of America is probably the world's best known flag. It's the flag that everyone knows second best after his own flag. Its official name is the American Flag, but it's better known by its nicknames: the Stars and Stripes, the Star-Spangled Banner or Old Glory.

Here's a quick question for non-Americans. How many stars and stripes are there? Don't count them, just guess if you don't know.

Here's the answer that every schoolchild in America knows: 50 stars and seven stripes. The 50 stars signify the 50 states of the USA. But what about the seven stripes? The answer is to look at the white between the red stripes not as a background, but as white stripes. That brings the total up to 13, which is the number of states that the USA had when it declared independence in 1776.

The original American flag, first used in 1777, had 13 stars and 13 stripes.

Every time a new state joined the Union a star was added to the flag, not immediately, but on the next July 4th. Sometimes more than one state joined at once. This means that the USA has had a total of 27 different flags since independence. To give just one other example, the flag used from 1912 to 1959 had 48 stars.

The Americans are proud of their flag as a symbol of their country, probably prouder than any other country except Switzerland. All public buildings, such as court houses and post offices, fly the flag outside. Many private citizens fly the flag in their front garden to show their patriotism.

The pride in the American flag is so extreme that it's considered an insult to burn it. This has been latched onto by many protesters in foreign countries. When they want to show hatred for the USA they burn the American flag. Often they burn the flags of other countries, such as Great Britain and Israel, not realising that these countries don't care whether their flag is burnt or not. At least it keeps the protesters warm.

When America entered World War Two in 1941 it became popular for pinup photos to be taken by models either waving an American flag or wearing clothes with a design based on the flag. DC Comics answered this trend by introducing a new super-heroine called Wonder Woman. Her costume only had the stars, not the stripes, but it was obvious that she was a symbol of American patriotism. This was ironic, because in the comics she wasn't even an American.

Over the following decades her costume was modified. This is the costume that she wore in the 1970's. Her skirt has been replaced by a swim suit bottom, and the eagle on her chest has been replaced by the letters WW, although remnants of the eagle wings have remained.

When Lynda Carter played Wonder Woman in the television series the yellow was removed from her costume to keep the American flag's original colours, red, white and blue. In the upper half it's a shiny white that borders on silver. Most other versions of the costume retain the yellow.

Pinup photos with the American flag are still popular today. A simple web search will uncover hundreds of models wearing bikinis or swimsuits with flag designs. Here's just one example, in which Nicki Minaj salutes the flag and makes me wish I were American. She would definitely look good as Wonder Woman.

To bring me back to reality, here's the cover of last week's "Stern" magazine. This photo of Donald Trump makes me glad that I'm not an American. Why can't Nicki Minaj be the American president instead?