what am I pledging when I pledge the pledge of Allegiance?

Honestly, it doesn't mean a whole lot, especially when students are forced to recite it every morning without knowing or caring what it means. Basically, you are pledging allegiance (loyalty) to the flag and the country it stands for. (I can see being loyal to the country, but to the flag itself? It doesn't really make sense.) The rest of it is just descriptive language about America, including the added "under god" phrase, which flies in the face of the First Amendment.

These are confusing times for all of us, I know what it meant when I attended middle school, and I know what it means to me today.

After a proclamation by President Benjamin Harrison, the Pledge was first used in public schools on October 12, 1892, during Columbus Day

When speaking the Pledge it is a self promise to protect and defend The Republic

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pledge_of_Allegiance

Its like going to church. Yada, yada, yada, just get it over with.

I pledge allegiance to (the flag of) the United States of America and to the country (some say republic) for which it stands.

One nation [under god was added in the 1950's] with liberty and justice for all.

It's not a bad thing.

You might want to get other opinions other than yahoo answers. I don't think there is a person in the U.S. who can quote who ever wrote it, but trust me, the "under god" thing was added later.

It was so ingrained in me when I was a child that while reciting it in the 5th grade (nine years old), I actually said "Amen" afterward. My classmates and my teacher all looked at me like I had just strangled the cat.

For me, it’s a pledge to the (constitutional) republic (of states) for which the flag is the main seen image. quite a quantity people have a thought that the words "under god" might desire to be bothered from the pledge. in my view, I quite have a difficulty with the words "one u . s . a .", yet they might stay. The words carry the connotation of "one people" well matched in all issues, consolidated, and "prepared" to be "led" with the aid of a single all-effective vital government. i recover from my objection to those words with the aid of thinking of the moments we do "unite" as distinctive as we are. those moments are rooted interior the form and that they derive from the factor that if a state is attacked, then so too are all the different states and "united" they're going to take care of one yet another.

You are (if in the U.S.A.) pledging allegiance to the flag of the U.S. and by association, to the U.S.A.

It is not a forced thing. you may, thanks to the first amendment, choose not to make that pledge.

That is the same amendment that allows me to say,

The politicians have come to believe that they are our masters rather than our servants.

They are out of control.

It's time to vote ALL of them out of office.

We need to have a "REMOVE INCUMBENT" option on the ballot.

Loyalty to the United States.

The closest thing Right Wing Conservatives could get to forcing kids to pray each morning.

it means if we get in a war with anybody (including australia) you have pledged (promised) to fight for our side.

Unthinking submission to the absolute will of the State.

"Just Say No."

Not really anything it's just symbolic