Student sits during pledge of allegiance; gets chair kicked out from beneath him

[Brian37]

I served. For what it's worth, I really don't want people standing for the pledge if they don't want to, no matter what the reason. It loses all meaning if you stand for any other reason than to express your patriotism. Standing to meet people's expectations isn't exactly noble.

This.   Whether compelled or coerced via social convention, the oath is rendered effectively meaningless as anything other than a tool to promote so-called "patriotism".

I already swore a meaningful oath to that effect, I certainly don't need to recite a wholly meaningless one, and I won't expect anyone else to either.

Any agreement entered into has to be voluntary, ritual does not constitute law, and is always highly subject to point of view in any case. Peer pressure is childish, the tactic of a bully or despot. The acts of consenting adults are as they should be voluntary, not out of shame, or coercion.

And since ritual is highly subjective to the individual, to force such on any individual is not defense pluralism, or protection of, but counter to such.

Common law is the only thing we all have. Whether we have served or not, our duty is to common law, not common view of "what should be" or "what we want to be". The First Amendment and the Oath of Office are the law, not ritual. Pluralism is not forced ritual, pluralism is based on consent and common law.

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You could just not shake the person's hand.  Some people are germophobes and some people are simply uncomfortable with physical contact.

If I don't want to shake your hand, I'm just not going to do it.

Yeah, if you have a reason, not shaking hands is perfectly reasonable.  If you just refuse to adopt social norms because "you're not the boss of me!", that's fine too.  But you'll have to deal with the somewhat deserved repercussions as well.

So glad Susan B Anthony obeyed the sexist majority of her time. Damned glad Rosa Parks sat at the back of the bus too. 

We are the boss of OUR government, not the other way around. 45 has ran his campaign based on despot talk, not talk of consent, but "I know what is best for everyone".

To the bigoted assholes on the right, I say, "Bring it on assholes".