Is Nationalism a stupid belief?
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The Cats Venm
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Very foolish.
People should be working to improve the lives of everyone, instead of forming little groups and trying to take everything for themselves.
Next question.
People should be working to improve the lives of everyone, instead of forming little groups and trying to take everything for themselves.
Next question.
Marquis de Carabas
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It depends in large part on how powerful your country is, and how likely it is to exert that power to protect your interests.
edited to add: it also depends on how likely it is to exert its power to squash you like a little bug if you don't hold this belief.
edited to add: it also depends on how likely it is to exert its power to squash you like a little bug if you don't hold this belief.
The Cats Venm
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Iacchus said:
Nope. The world as a whole is still more important than a small group.
Just because I say this however doesn't mean that I neglect the family. They are part of the whole group as well. One should do there best to help everyone, but as you can't always do that you have to start somewhere. Might as well start with those you know.
Yes, but where do we begin, if not with ourselves?The Cats Venm said:
"And why beholdest thou the mote that is in thy brother's eye, but considerest not the beam that is in thine own eye?" ~ Matthew 7:3
Gulliamo
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It seems there may be some confusion of Nationalism with Patriotism .
na·tion·al·ism ( P ) (nsh-n-lzm, nshn-)n.
1. Devotion to the interests or culture of one's nation.
2. The belief that nations will benefit from acting independently rather than collectively, emphasizing national rather than international goals.
3. Aspirations for national independence in a country under foreign domination.
4. An idiom, trait, or character peculiar to any nation.
Definition 1= I wholeheartedly support
Definition 2= I halfheartedly support, this could be right or wrong depending upon the policy
Definition 3= I do not have enough experience with to judge
Definition 4= No comment needed
Reguarding Patriotism I happen to agree with the following...
Patriotism is the willingness to kill and be killed for trivial reasons.
Bertrand Russell (1872 - 1970)
You're not to be so blind with patriotism that you can't face reality. Wrong is wrong, no matter who does it or says it.
Malcolm X (1925 - 1965)
You'll never have a quiet world till you knock the patriotism out of the human race.
George Bernard Shaw (1856 - 1950)
Patriotism is a pernicious, psychopathic form of idiocy.
George Bernard Shaw (1856 - 1950)
na·tion·al·ism ( P ) (nsh-n-lzm, nshn-)n.
1. Devotion to the interests or culture of one's nation.
2. The belief that nations will benefit from acting independently rather than collectively, emphasizing national rather than international goals.
3. Aspirations for national independence in a country under foreign domination.
4. An idiom, trait, or character peculiar to any nation.
Definition 1= I wholeheartedly support
Definition 2= I halfheartedly support, this could be right or wrong depending upon the policy
Definition 3= I do not have enough experience with to judge
Definition 4= No comment needed
Reguarding Patriotism I happen to agree with the following...
Patriotism is the willingness to kill and be killed for trivial reasons.
Bertrand Russell (1872 - 1970)
You're not to be so blind with patriotism that you can't face reality. Wrong is wrong, no matter who does it or says it.
Malcolm X (1925 - 1965)
You'll never have a quiet world till you knock the patriotism out of the human race.
George Bernard Shaw (1856 - 1950)
Patriotism is a pernicious, psychopathic form of idiocy.
George Bernard Shaw (1856 - 1950)
Bottle or the Gun
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Either concept is just fanaticism if it is unquestioned and blindly followed.
Maledict
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I was born with two nationalities - Thai and Australian - I lived in Thailand for the first 6 years of my life. Afterwards, I moved to Hong Kong where I have lived thus for the next 11 years until now, and gained permanent residency, I've never even lived in Australia.
And since Estonia was accepted into the EU, and my father's line from my grandmother was of Estonian Descent - you guessed it - My family has applied for a third passport / nationality for me.
Which has left me with no feelings of nationalism whatsoever (Which one am I going to be nationalistic about??), and from my perspective - I see nationalism as a a belief that people use to to try to unify themselves into a homogenous mass, which it hardly ever is.
And since Estonia was accepted into the EU, and my father's line from my grandmother was of Estonian Descent - you guessed it - My family has applied for a third passport / nationality for me.
Which has left me with no feelings of nationalism whatsoever (Which one am I going to be nationalistic about??), and from my perspective - I see nationalism as a a belief that people use to to try to unify themselves into a homogenous mass, which it hardly ever is.
Gulliamo
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I think that is one of the big problems with the world today. People feel too tied to a "national identity" or feel that since they are Jewish {insert any nation here} they should live on the Jewish {insert any nation here} soil. The Germans want to live in Germany the Palestinians in Palestine.RabbiSatan said:
I am a mix of 3 different nationalities and my son is at least 5. If the piece of dirt that I lived on was compromised I would move, not fight to the death for it. We have no ties to any irrational nationalism / patriotisms. Hell, we can't even identify with a particular race... White, black, Latin, Asian, etc.
Maledict
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Gulliamo said:
Agreed - I was never able to figure out just why people wanted to be nationalistic when I was younger - it's slowly dawned on my later on that it's just a belief that people cling onto in hopes of feeling like they "belong" to a group - like Religion.
There was a big row (and still is) in Hong Kong some time ago when the Mainland Chinese Government said that, "Only Patriots should Govern Hong Kong", apparently copying on the success of the American "Patriot" Act, in an attempt to discredit the Democratic Partly Leader Martin Lee, who are calling for actual elections in Hong Kong, which Beijing is deathly scared of.
From what I can gather, genetically, I'm: Chinese, Australian, Estonian, Swedish, and various other assortments. And along with my several nationalities - gives me a hard time trying to answer the question of "where" I come from.
Question posed to average person:
Q) Oh, where do you come from by the way?
A) Ah, I'm [insert Nationality here]
Question posed to me:
Q) Oh, where do you come from by the way?
A) Ah....*sigh*....not this again....I'm.........er.......a member of the Human Race?
You might argue that a particular nation upholds great ideals, however, the ideal of nationalism—i.e. which is to say the ideology of what a nation is—came first. And it gets particularly nasty when a particular nation, say Britain for instance, decides to recast other territories in the nation-state image, say the Ottoman Empire for instance; the world is still dealing witht he consequences of that particular expedition.Iacchus said:
Although dictionaries will give you two separate, if related, definitions, in my opinion I don't see how you can be the former without some degree of the latter; which is to say, in current times, you carnt be a patriot without a country to love, and you carnt have a country which isn't a nation-state.