The 75% to 25% split seen among teens in the Channel One poll is mirrored by a March 24, 2003 Gallup/CNN poll. The Gallup/CNN poll asked 1021 adults over the age of 18 what they thought of the war in Iraq and president Bush's handling of events, and how they thought the war was going for the allies thus far. The poll was conducted by telephone and has a 95% accuracy rate. If the similarities between the two polls is any indication it seems that teens and adults alike believe that now that the war has started the RIGHT thing to do is show a unified face of support. But is supporting the war patriotic or simply more palatable?
While it seems on the surface that the act of protesting a war means you don't support the troops who are fighting in it, this is not necessarily the case. It seems that the legacy of Vietnam, where soldiers where greeted with scorn and animosity upon their return home, has changed attitudes. Now many protesters will tell you that they are protesting the war FOR the soldiers and their families. They will say that not only are they honoring core values of freedom and democracy by exercising their right to free speech, but that in calling on the government to end the war they are acting to save the lives of allied troops. This argument is a valid one.
War is never a nice thing, it is never an easy thing, and it is never a fair thing. Teens who protest the war are not the enemy of patriotism, nor are they more patriotic than their pro-war counterparts. Your views on the war are a very personal thing and only you can decide what feels right to you. If you feel strongly that the war is wrong rest assured that your speaking out is a part of what makes freedom so sweet. You get to have your say and you get to say it whether it is a popular sentiment or not. Viva freedom! But in your struggle against the war don't lose sight of the fact that the troops overseas need to feel that their country is behind them. It is true that the troops need your support, and whether you protest the war or not it is possible to show them that support.
You can still support the troops and oppose the war. You can do this by protesting with pro-troop signs (ex: End the war now; our soldiers deserve to come home to their families!), by making sure that the soldiers are not vilified in the fight to end the war quickly, and by sending messages of encouragement to the soldiers in the war zone. Many anti-war protesters focus heavily on the civilian casualties and ignore the loss of soldiers, they focus on the rights of EPWs while saying nothing about the plight of their own country's POWs, this is a big part of the reason that protest is seen as unpatriotic. To protest and be patriotic remember that the soldiers are human beings too and that many of them would rather be anywhere but on the front lines.
Can you be patriotic and protest the war at the same time? Absolutely! It is not the protest that makes you patriotic (or not) but rather how you protest and what you focus on in the course of protest. It is hypocritical to support a message of peace with aggressive tactics and angry words directed at the troops. Act, don't act out. Free speech is a corner stone of democracy and exercising it is patriotic, but be prepared for the possibility of backlash because that too is a right of freedom and is also an exercise in patriotism.