Is Plibersek for real, or is she just taking the pledge?

Some of them - like late-night talk shows and anointing its winning sports teams "world champions" - are delightful.

Others are downright disturbing - like 18th-century gun laws and feature-length pharmaceutical commercials.

But of all the cultural artefacts the Yanks have managed to wrestle into the modern era, the pledge of allegiance has to be among the most distasteful.

If you're unfamiliar with this sordid little ceremony, each morning American public school students stand with their hands on their hearts and commit themselves to do Lord-knows-what in service of "the flag of the United States of America and the Republic for which it stands - one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all".

The monotone incantation brings to mind - if you're open to a little hyperbole - devotees of a cult purging themselves of their last ounce of free will.

In short, I'd have thought it was about the last practice we would want to import.

Which is why Tanya Plibersek's proposal to do (almost) just that is so baffling.

Labor's former deputy leader used an Australia Day address at the Sydney Opera House to float the idea that our students should be taught the Australian Citizenship Affirmation.

Granted, as a pledge it's a little more laid back than the Americans', with notably fewer references to flags and deities.

Here's the text:

"From this time forward, I pledge my loyalty to Australia and its people, whose democratic beliefs I share, whose rights and liberties I respect, and whose laws I will uphold and obey."

Admirable sentiments, to be sure - but you've got to wonder what's to be gained from imposing them on schoolkids.

Surely respect for democracy, rights and the rule of law are values best developed over time, rather than instilled via rote learning - the educational equivalent of blunt-force trauma?

For evidence of this, I proudly point to my own experience as an eight-year-old reciting the Cub Scout's Promise - which, I will concede to Plibersek, I still remember to this day.

READ MORE:

It includes the usual platitudes, but also a commitment to "do my duty to my God, and to the Queen of Australia" - not to mention to "live by the Cub Scout Law".

That last line might have set back my understanding of civics by a few years - I may have believed I was operating outside Commonwealth jurisdiction - but I can't pretend it made me a better Cub Scout (I was out the door not too long afterwards).

Politicians will occasionally float an idea like this to grab some headlines. A certain amount of Twitter backlash is factored in as the cost of doing business (or is, in some cases, the goal itself).

But that kind of nudge-nudge, wink-wink media game is usually played from the backbench - or the crossbench. Only occasionally does it come from someone who earnestly believes their proposal to be the panacea for all of society's ills.

I'm reluctant to believe one of the more progressive and cosmopolitan members of the Labor Left has suddenly developed a penchant for the trappings of nationalism.

Indeed, Plibersek points out the affirmation, which she has championed for some time, pledges allegiance to a country and its people, rather than a flag or a government.

So I can only surmise it was an attempt at political triangulation - in which case I'd love to meet the voters some backroom genius believes are going to be swayed by this.

Why it would be brought up at a time when the government is self-destructing on the bushfire response and Bridget McKenzie is knee-deep in the sports rorts scandal (let alone on a day when the very notion of a benevolent, pledge-worthy Australian state is increasingly and rightfully contested) is beyond me.

There are many wonderful traditions we could still borrow from America. But on this issue, I prefer the approach we seem to have locked in place already - a healthy and reflexive disdain for authority.