It's like Elizabeth said about America's Pledge of Allegiance. It is a tribute to those who fought so many wars and gave their lives at a young age so that today's children can be free and live under self-rule.
The people in the US that protest pledge of allegiance are the type of people who will protest anything, just for the sake of protest.

Andımız is the same. It honors Turkey's hero's that kept Turkey out of the hand's of its enemies after the fall of the Osmans.

I agree with both Keith and Alameda. Global Village project was a lame one from the very beginning. We are all different countries, cultures, nations. I am astounded at seeing how easily some of us have solved the mystery of foreign cultures.

In today's world, you cannot run even the simplest form of international business unless you understand the internal mechanisms of the society you are doing business in.

I am neither like Roswitha, Catwoman, Deli Kizin, Alameda or anyone else belonging to a different nation. I am what I am and it is your problem if you think I am doing the right thing when I live up to your expectations in terms of thinking and reasoning. All that you are doing is trying to reverse irreversible values deep rooted into cultures. I have an accomplished culture which is not like yours, my music is not even similar to yours, my philosophy can be something to be ridiculed from say a German's point of view but in fact it is my life and soul and I am proud of being a member of this culture because it makes me happy.

The schools in Turkey educate Turkish children. Those children will live in Turkey not in Washington or London. They will hopefully stay and work for their country. We know how weakness is penalized in the international arena of politics where everyone works for their interests. We would like them to love their country at least as much as a US, English or Polish person does. (We don't even want them to love it as much as the French do).

Summarily, we would like to hold on to our cultural heritage by living and dying as Turks.

Vineyards, I certainly respect your feelings and opinions, but I would also like to give my opinion in response to you. I am not trying to change you (or anybody else), I am only responding to what I see. At the same time, I am not only not criticizing you and your culture as a whole, but only certain aspects of it. And my only purpose in doing that is to point out things that might be to your benefit and to the benefit of other people living in your country. Don't you think that people/cultures should take a critical look at themselves every once in a while in order to keep getting better and not to stagnate?

Catwoman, we Turks criticize ourselves more than you know. We have been doing this for at least a couple of centuries.
Sadly, nothing gets better by criticizing when critics contain destructive elements.

For example, when someone implies that our oath is wrong because it contains racist, nationalistic elements then I am entitled to asking this question: why am I supposed to understand that oath the way you do? Why should I not use the word Turk whereas it means nothing more than a citizen of Turkey.

Ethnically, you can be a Kurd, Armenian or whatever but if you are a citizen of this country you are a Turk. You can call yourself an Armenian Turk but it is different from being an Armenian citizen living in Armenia. You need to serve this country. If you don't want to serve this country international laws permit immigration rights. If you feel loyal to Armenia, you are free to go and live there.

For my own part, I never thought about immigrating to the US or the UK because I never felt like serving American or British people or their intererests. I have always wanted to preserve my culture and values, and let me tell you I am very, very, very and very comfortable with a great majority of those values.