Tomorrow, June 14, is Flag Day. It is a day when Americans reflect on the nation’s most powerful symbol. On that day, it is respectful and customary to retire old, ragged flags by burning them. But not everyone feels the flag deserves respect. Others burn it in protest. Regardless of how you feel, we have instructions on how to burn the American flag, two ways, as explained by experts, below. —Chris Hatler, deputy editor
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One, a ceremony of respect. The other, a form of protest. Both explained here.
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To some, the American flag is a symbol of freedom. To others, of oppression. You know precisely how you feel when you see it in flames.
The Federal Flag Code, published in 1923 and adopted by Congress in 1942, states that when a flag is “no longer a fitting emblem for display”—tattered, unraveling, or otherwise damaged—burning is the preferred method of disposal. In 1937, the country’s largest veterans’ association, the American Legion, codified a retirement ceremony. The flag, the Legion’s resolution reads, must be treated with respect, and our citizens must be taught how to pay it “proper courtesies.”
Whether burned in reverence or in protest, burners share a characteristically American passion. They have a message they believe in, a message that’s central to their identity and the identity of their nation, that can only be expressed through a singular, incendiary act. Esquire spoke to two men whose lives have been defined by their willingness to ignite the country’s most potent symbol. Here are their step-by-step instructions on how to burn the American flag, two ways.
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Toward the end of The Smashing Machine, Benny Safdie creates a soundtrack moment as powerful as the use of “Layla” in Goodfellas, “Fight the Power” in Do the Right Thing, or “Ode to Joy” in Die Hard. During an operatic eight-minute scene in which a struggling couple is giving in to near-total emotional destruction, “Jungleland,” the 1975 Bruce Springsteen song that’s an opera in itself, plays pretty much uninterrupted, its cadence timed perfectly to the rhythms of the scene. Johnson, as Kerr, flips from quiet to explosive.
In my brain at the moment—remember that a bottle of tequila is a lot of tequila—“Jungleland” is a good segue to politics and the fact that I’d seen a Springsteen show in L.A. two nights before: “You could be like Springsteen, who I saw the other night—he’s on this tour people are calling the No Kings tour, because he’s seventy-six years old and, fuck it, this is what he wants to say,” I tell him.
“So is this more of a political show?”
I say yes, it is overtly political. I ask whether he stays away from talking much about politics because he wants everyone to see his movies, which would be a perfectly understandable thing. He doesn’t fill the silence right away. He sits back, looks up. Then: “Let me think about this for a moment.” He allows more space.
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Folks in Little Rock, Arkansas didn’t exactly jibe with Hart Denton’s early roles on 13 Reasons Why or Riverdale. You can’t blame ’em—that’s teen stuff. But after appearing as 10 Petal ranch foreman Chet in the Yellowstone spin-off Dutton Ranch, which recently became the most watched original series debut in Paramount+ history? Denton finally earned his stripes as a hometown hero.
“Taylor Sheridan brought this cowboy thing back,” the 32-year-old actor tells me over Zoom. “The people of Arkansas have reached out to me in a way that I’ve never heard from them before, because it’s like they’re finally proud of me. Even my grandma watches. She’s obsessed with it. She’ll call me and ask me questions. I’m like, ‘Grandma, I can’t tell you these things. And if I knew, I still couldn’t tell you.’”
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