Every day you're hit with some stat from some alleged expert. If you look hard enough, you can find some very loosely organized 'science' that will tell you each state's favorite dog breed and safest city to trick-or-treat in and blah blah blah. These 'experts' never leave their computer chair, they simply crunch or, type, numbers, and phrases into Google to pull some faux science out of their butt and get you to click on it.

For me, it often works. Some of these are worth the read and make interesting water cooler talk. But in the case of patriotism, it's both arbitrary and stupid to call one state more patriotic because Google searches said so. That said, Iowa is still, according to the study I am referencing, ranked pretty high.

How do you rank one state as more patriotic?

So first off, the website I'm referring to is WalletHub's Most Patriotic State Study. They're a credit site, I think? In this case, they're dabbling in patriotism cuz clicks. Hey, I clicked, maybe you did on my link... so that's fine. But are they experts? Their study does have an 'ask the experts' section near the bottom if that means anything to you.

My gripe with studies like this is they're too subjective. They rank the population that voted in the 2020 election (this one makes total sense), vets per capita, military enlistees, and other stats. Some of these, including veterans per capita, could represent people who moved. Someone may have retired, relocated for work, or simply up and left the state they repped while they were serving.

How do you place more weight on one category over another? Take Georgia for example, they ranked #29 out of 50 but were ranked highest in military enlistees. Alaska ranked highest in the retired military (veterans) category, and they ranked #2 overall. New Jersey ranked highest in population to vote in 2020 but finished #44th overall. Waaaay down near the bottom... Whaaa. How?

If you're going to rank states by patriotism you should go there

What counts as patriotic to you? People who have an American flag on their mantel or have an actual flagpole? People who join the military, or do volunteer work? I just don't think it's fair to call one state more patriotic than another based on a handful of metrics.

Oh, by the way, Iowa was ranked #16 out of 50 according to the study.

 

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