If you or perhaps one of your misguided friends or associates think this is an outmoded or jingoistic concept, perhaps you might take a note from a few who came before you...
Seneca... Epictetus... Thucydides... John the Baptist... all wise and noble men of their ancient times. Thomas Paine, Benjamin Franklin, Thomas Jefferson were great and noble men, with minds that spoke to the heart of the poorest grunt - that Freedom... especially the freedom we enjoy in the US, it's not free. It has, and will continue to come at a great cost... but always worth it!
"He who is brave is free!" - Seneca
"No man is free who is not master of himself." - Epictetus
"The secret of freedom, courage." - Thucydides
"Then you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free." - John 8:32 (NIV)
"He who would make his own liberty secure must guard even his enemy from oppression; for if he violates this duty he establishes a precedent that will reach to himself." - Thomas Paine
"Those who desire to give up freedom in order to gain security, will not have, nor do they deserve, either one." - Benjamin Franklin
"I would rather be exposed to the inconveniences attending too much liberty than to those attending too small a degree of it." - Thomas Jefferson
"In every country where man is free to think and to speak, differences of opinion will arise from difference of perception, and the imperfection of reason; but these differences when permitted, as in this happy country, to purify themselves by free discussion, are but as passing clouds overspreading our land transiently and leaving our horizon more bright and serene." - Thomas Jefferson
"Most men, after a little freedom, have preferred authority with the consoling assurances and the economy of effort it brings." - Walter Lippmann (A Preface to Morals)
"Liberty means responsibility. That's why most men dread it." - Antonio de Mendoza
"Loyalty to petrified opinion never yet broke a chain or freed a human soul." - Mark Twain
Wear it proud, and say to those freedom hating enemies within and beyond our country's borders -
"I disapprove of everything you say but I Will defend to the death your right to say it!" - S.G. Tallentyre (1907)
"...If you love something, set it free.
If it returns, it's yours forever.
If it doesn't it was never yours to begin with..."
- Anonymous
"Freedom isn't Free", and will always return when threatened the most!