‘Patriotism is, fundamentally, a conviction that a particular country is the best in the world because you were born in it’
- George Bernard Shaw
Patriotism sucks. Realising that can aid personal development too, hence why I’m writing about it. It’s one of the oldest and, for centuries, most harmful models of thought ever created.
When patriotism was good
Many centuries ago visiting other countries and doing business with them was an unusual practice, especially for island nations. Sailors, soldiers, merchants and politicians tended to be the only ones crossing borders for a long time. I can’t personally remember these times because, due to 21st century technology, my long-term memory only stretches back to May. But I’ve read books which say that countries used to keep largely to themselves like this and if books say it, it must be true.
These were grim times, apparently. Plagues, famine, Catholicism and a total lack of computers. How people read their emails I’ll never know.
And due to these circumstances patriotism was actually a good thing, because back then over 95% of a country’s population would only ever have an effect on itself. Hell, back then the average person would spend his entire life in his hometown, the neighbouring towns and, maybe, the nearest city.
So before, say, the 17th century for most countries patriotism may as well have been called communalism. It wasn’t so much about loving your country, but loving your world – and just loving humanity. Things changed though, especially in the 19th century.
And then immigration and international trading became the norm…
From the 1800s onwards people were patriotic because they were still only just learning there was an alternative to this.
In the 1900s it was because some people were behind the times.
But if you’re patriotic in the 2000s you’re woefully misinformed or just a jackass.
If you love your country I hope to have killed that love by the end of this article. I want you to feel as close to indifference about your country as possible. There are benefits of being this way, honestly.
Your country…
What is it about your country you love exactly? The arts, the people, the laws, the ideologies, the history, the mannerisms of the people, the language? Take a moment to answer.
Now, if the thing(s) you loved about your country changed, would it still be the same country?
It doesn’t matter if you answered with a rational ‘yes’: that it would still be named xyz and have the same people, government, history etc. It doesn’t matter if you answered with a more emotional ‘no’: that to you the country isn’t the country without the thing you love.
What matters is that this proves that you don’t love the country itself – you love things which happen to take place within the country. Take away those things and what do you have?
What is a country?
A country is an area of land, sometimes divided up into islands, which is laid claim to by the government of a group of people. That land, of course, isn’t literally the country – but something we define as the country. When you step on French shores you are in France. If you’re in Canada it doesn’t matter how many French immigrants live in your town or how much French culture is adopted by that town – you’re not in France. You have to be on ‘French soil’ – even if it’s just the French embassy.
This is the only constant. Everything else that you may consider to be your country is in flux. The people, due to immigrants being allowed to obtain citizenships and cross-nationality breeding, are in flux. The culture, created by these people, is thus also in flux and not tied specifically to the country of origin – and it moves around the world just like people, sometimes all but leaving the country from whence it started. A country’s history is literally a sequence of events which have taken place on that land, and plenty of it was made by invading foreigners. A language, like a culture, is constructed from outside influences. The English language may have been invented by the English, but it’s built mostly from Latin, Greek and French.
Patriotism has almost always been misguided: almost from the start everything has been in flux. The difference today is that patriotism is no longer a harmless misconception.
Improving yourself and your life
The better you appreciate that patriotism is an attachment to something which isn’t really there, the easier it is to deal with change.
To this day there are plenty of white people in England who will discreetly grumble from time to time about the number of Indians in such and such a town or the number of blacks moving into such and such a place. These people aren’t really bad or even exactly racist – they’re just uncomfortable with change. The older a person is the more accustomed they once were to a fairly homogenous race in their nation – at least relative to today. Some elderly and middle-aged people are very forward-thinking and ‘young at heart’, but plenty cling to the past as if it holds some sort of security for them. Don’t be in love with what you think your land mass is all about – as already established, your chunk of Earth really isn’t about anything at all.
Releasing patriotism also opens your mind more. You start to think in ways your fellow citizens simply don’t.
In the UK the 2012 Olympics is an on-going news story of whether we’ll screw it up, whether it will be worth the effort and how bad the logo is. I couldn’t care less that the Olympics will be held a dozen or so miles from my hometown in four years. I’m not an ‘Englishman’ – I’m a human being, so why on Earth should I give that much of a damn if a few million people, including myself, have some tax money wasted and have difficulty with crowds a few years from now? There are so many more important issues.
England doesn’t need the Olympics: we’re stupidly wealthy, just like the other countries in the top part of the North-South Divide. What most of us is any country need is personal development: we need to figure out how to take full control of our lives, create genuine value for others so that we can receive it ourselves and then help others. That would help the UK economy to an infinite degree more than a one-off sports event.
But people don’t think like this – because we have patriotism and we think what happens to the people of Great Britain is more important than what happens to the people of any other country. And as for self-help, forget about it – we’re fine how we are in this wonderful country: it’s those xyz people in xyz country that need to learn to get their act together.
Being rid of patriotic sentiments
Patriotism isn’t just an intellectual state but also an emotional one. It can be hard for some (perhaps especially communalistic people) to detach themselves from an emotional bond to their country. For all my conviction it can be tricky for me, too: when the World Cup is on I tend to watch the England matches and I find myself getting emotionally involved.
Becoming less concerned with your own country and more concerned with humanity in general won’t be an overnight shift in thinking for most of us, but it’s very much worth doing.
If you’re openly unpatriotic you will inevitably get challenged occasionally by people who love their country. The most poignant question I’ve ever been asked (which sounds tough to answer but really isn’t) is:
‘Do you mean to say that if the Middle East [or insert some other nation(s)] declared war on us you wouldn’t fight for England?’
My answer: probably not because I don’t believe in violence. But if I did fight it would be for the humanistic ideals that England holds up. So in a way that answer is a ‘yes’, but really it’s a profound ‘no’. This chunk of land in the North Sea called England is not worth fighting for. No country is worth fighting for. Only the well-being of sentient creatures matters and that cause has nothing to do with where I happened to be born.
‘Patriotism is a pernicious, psychopathic form of idiocy.’
- George Bernard Shaw
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Interesting article Richard!! Give my new blog a quick read; http://www.davidcarey.co.uk
Cheers mate,
Dave
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