The Black Lives Matter hashtag and slogan was developed in 2013 in reaction to the (lawful self-defense) shooting of Trayvon Martin by George Zimmerman. The following year, 2014, the organization was formalized by self-avowed “trained Marxists” after the (lawful) police shooting of Michael Brown in Ferguson, Mo.

Those two shootings falsely were portrayed as racially motivated, while the facts (which we covered in exhaustive detail at the time) proved otherwise. Nonetheless the narrative was set and hating America and being American was necessary to be accepted into Democrat spaces. Even Bernie was not spared the wrath of BLM activists.

The formation of Black Lives Matter as an organized movement led to over a decade of non-stop virtue-signaling activism deriding the U.S. as systemically racist and worthy of deconstruction. It all culminated in the post-George Floyd riots and “anti-racism” activism whose bubble finally appears to have burst.

But not before severe damage was done to the nation, particularly Democrat pride in being American.

In fact, 2013-2014 is when Democrats’ pride in being American fell off a cliff and never recovered, as a just-released Gallup survey shows:

A record-low 58% of U.S. adults say they are “extremely” (41%) or “very” (17%) proud to be an American, down nine percentage points from last year and five points below the prior low from 2020. The 41% who are “extremely proud” is not statistically different from prior lows of 38% in 2022 and 39% in 2023, indicating most of the change this year is attributable to a decline in the percentage who are “very proud.” ….

Democrats are mostly responsible for the drop in U.S. pride this year, with 36% saying they are extremely or very proud, down from 62% a year ago. This is only the second time Democrats’ pride has fallen below the majority level, along with a 42% reading in 2020, the last year of the first Trump administration. That poll was conducted during the early stages of the COVID-19 pandemic and shortly after the murder of George Floyd by Minneapolis police officers.

Political independents’ pride has also reached a low point, with 53% expressing a great deal of pride, down seven points from last year, which had been the previous low for this group. Independents’ pride has been declining since the early 2000s, dropping below 80% for the first time in 2005, then below 70% in 2019 and below 60% this year.

Republicans’ level of national pride has been much steadier, typically registering above 90%, including 92% this year, up from 85% in 2024. The only years in which fewer than nine in 10 Republicans were proud were 2016 and 2020 through 2024. All but 2020 were when a Democratic president was in office.

It’s pretty easy to see the inflection point in Democrat (lack of) pride occuring in 2013-2014, and never recovering. Independents also showed a decline but not as steep or severe:

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Coincidence?

Correlation does not equal causation?

Sure. Don’t believe your own eyes or memories.

William A. Jacobson, Legal Insurrection