I was just commenting in a thread on @luzcypher's post I resteemed (which is one of the best things I've read in some time) and I noticed something.
A lot of people that see nationalism as a negative are making a mistake. They are treating nationalism and imperialism as if they are the same thing. They are not. In fact, the things they tend to indicate are bad about nationalism are not really part of nationalism at all. They are part of imperialism.
Nationalism is simply about having pride and interest in your nation, your community, etc. It is much like having pride in your home and family. It is simply expanded out to your city, your state, your nation.
It has ZERO to do with attacking other nations or interfering with other nations. That is imperialism.
Someone saying Make insert country Great should not be seen as a negative. It is much like saying Make my house great. Make my family great.
It does not imply "by attacking and stealing from other people". If you decide to think it means that then realize that was YOU choosing to take it there. Yet that would again be imperialism.
Why shouldn't a person want their country/nation/home to get better? It seems like a pretty sane proposition.
If you want to help people around the world which of the following do you think you'd likely have a better chance of doing that?
- If you have stabilized your own home, taken care of the people living there, and you have extra time and resources available.
- You immediately worry about taking care of people outside of your home while there are people in your home struggling.
Now I don't present that to try to trap anyone in a false dichotomy or dilemma. I am aware there are likely other scenarios. So realize I didn't present it as a dichotomy for you to attack. In that case I can't really think of any other choices that fall outside of those two possible paths.
For me the obvious path to take if I want to be able to help people outside of my home (nation) is to take the first path.
At that point I should help people and other homes (nations) as much as I can without putting my own home in jeopardy.
Yet I should only give that help when it is ASKED for.
If I FORCE my help then that again becomes imperialism.
Imperialism and Nationalism are not the same thing.
Realize that many people have called their movements Nationalism in the past as a LABEL to hide behind. In reality they were practicing Imperialism.
Nationalism is not a bad word, nor should it be. It also does not mean you have no interest in helping others outside of defined borders. It simply means that you should get your own house in order and producing as best as it can and then you'll be in position to help more people outside that WANT your help.
I can say with high probability of certainty that the negatives about nationalism in the media and politics are not actually Nationalism at all. They are describing imperialism.
Curated for #informationwar (by @wakeupnd)
Ways you can help the @informationwar!
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That's exactly what I was wondering when the whole Venezuela campaign started. What ever happened to America first?
On the other hand, in the wake of the Khashoggi murder, the official word was the US president has to take care of his people first and his people need jobs. If that means doing business with a brutal regime, than so be it. America first can be said to mean whatever the DC policy makers want it to mean.
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You are truly right here! In Germany we deal with that problem in a more serious way. What Nationalism was in it's origin wasn't the nazis and the 3rd reich, but was a political movement of students and academics that came up after the french revolution, napoleonean wars and the "Deutsche Bund" and lead to the march revolution in 1848. This political movement first used our black red gold banner, but not in an intention of separation and backwardness, but as to unite the german-speaking people as one Nation as an opposite idea to those manys kingdoms and principalities that constituted the "deutschen bund" but still were pretty much independent and doing their own thing within their own borders. So what the german idea from 1848 was, was pretty much the same idea of those who want a united Europe today. One exception: Language, culture and tradition could have been the basis of the german nation in 1848 if this revolution would not have failed. Europe instead has to much of different languages, traditions and it is even becoming multicultural. So there is a lack of understanding as a basis of a united european nation, which is not seen or is neglected by those who see themselves as "European people" instead of whatever nationality they are.
P.S.: When my pupils at school listen to the political songs from the time of 1848 they often tell me those must be Nazi-Songs. I think they are told so somewhere, that is very sad. You will excuse me if I post some here:
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I totally agree with it. I noticed that nationalism is also seen as being hostile to foreigners. It has absolutely nothing to do with it.
Also: if you want a better world start with yourself, your own people first. Giving if you or your family is suffering will ask for revenge sooner or later.
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Trump has said several times when saying "Make America Great Again" that he thinks leaders of other nations should be saying the same about their nations. Fix your nation. Then you'll be in a better position to help other nations that WANT your help. :)
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I can only agree with that
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Can you explain then why it often seems to go hand in hand?
Genereally, the more the people put emphasis on their country, the more hostile to others they behave.
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If you live in Holland and you are 5 minutes silent at the 4th of May, celebrate liberty day (only once every 5 years) and Kingsday it is nationalism.
There is nothing wrong with that. Every country and culture has it ls own celebration Days.
Moreinteresting is why those who shout out the loudest about discrimination and nationalisme and racism are forcing their own culture and life style upon others. Not only in their homecountry but also abroad or in their new home country. If you hate the rules so much leave.
My family emigrated partly to.Holland but also to Germany, Belgium and the USA, they all had to accept the rules, make their own income and speak the language. This has nothing to do with nationalism or racism or discrimination (words my family never used, neither do I) but with intergration and understanding culture, habits, etc better.
There are many words used nowadays totally out of their context.
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Well said. The word has been hijacked an weaponized for propaganda. That is why I wrote the post. It is not NATIONALISM that is guilty of the things they point out. They single out a few nations to use to say why nations are bad, yet most nations in history have been nationalist. Those they are pointing out were actually very imperialistic, and in most cases also fascists and socialists.
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Nationalism is still super scary and I'm super shaking right now just having read that.
Remember that time @adolfhitler had that anschluss with "Austria," and the Czechs? Next thing you know, the National Socialists "invaded" Poland to get that land back too. All that wasn't right.
The Germans entered WWI like last because of defense pacts then got all that land they stole during the 30's because they wanted to take over the world.
Stalin invaded Poland around the same time as Germany. The USSR kept their portion of Poland after the
Nationalist SocialistImperial Germans tried to steal those aforementioned parts of Poland.It was crazy. Don't mess with the
JewsCommunist JewsZionistsGod's Chosen People!@openparadigm is a nice guy btw. I owe him a reply - I think.
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Friendly suggestion:
Put what you've been told and what you think you know aside. Then reread the post.
I addressed what you are talking about specifically IN the post.
I specifically spoke about Hitler and Mussolini.
Nationalism is not imperialism. Hitler and Mussolini were both imperialistic. Sure they used the label Nationalism but that was simply propaganda to manipulate their people and get them to support them. They truly had ambitions beyond their own borders. They were Imperialists, not nationalists.
Yet even back then Imperialism was considered a bad thing. So of course they are not going to claim to be Imperialists.
Nationalism is simply having pride and focusing on your own nation first. It does not mean you will not help other nations (if they want it, and you can do so without hurting your own nation). I explained this all in the post.
If you are shaking then you need to take a deep breath. meditate, and try reading it again.
The word Nationalist today has been hijacked and instilled with fear as a propaganda tool.
Yes it is equated with Hitler, Mussolini, Franco and others. Yet that is why I actually wrote the post. They were not nationalists. They were imperialists.
They thought they had the right, the moral imperative, and even possibly an obligation to force their vision upon others outside of their nation's borders.
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You don't understand, to NPCs you are a Nazi
...err, a Not "C" (C being Communist)
All other things, capitalism, nationalism, imperialism are all part of being a Not-C, and are therefor bad and should be gotten rid of.
The side that opposes nationalism is not opposing it for moral or logical reasons, they are opposing it because they have to denounce everything else and get their way.
So, although this was a very good post, and well laid out moral understanding, you are still, in their eyes, a Not-C and must be condemned, no matter how far the goal post needs to be moved, or how much they need to mangle english to get there.
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Funny thing is C is all about Imperialism. They think they have the right to FORCE others into their ideology.
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No no no no no
C is all about bring our "BETTER" system to all the people.
And sometimes there are like... these people, who are bad, that do not want us to bring a better system to the people, and so, you have to push through.
^_^
(or, just what you said)
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No, they don't force. They free people from suppressors and than those people join out of their free will.
You can say this is the wrong way, and it certainly can spiral out of control (exactly the same mechanism as nationalism btw. ) but "have the right to force" is not the general viewpoint. (Of course you will always find some fringe group for everything.)
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LOL. They don't force? You mean they just let people that don't agree with them continue to live how they want? NAH. I don't think so. If you think so you haven't been paying much attention.
They force what narrative people are able to talk about. They in some cases FORCE people into reeducation camps (which is recommended in many literature and guidelines on "revolutions"). Some cases they just kill them.
You are wrong.
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Hm... I think you didn't get it that I showed the perspective of the people you are accusing. They (generally of course, as always) don't think of it as forcing. I did not claim this was true.
It is like "pro life" people making a walk of shame for woman in front of abortion clinics don't think of themselves as forcing those woman to anthing. They only try to convince. Telling that it is wrong etc.
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Now that is definitely wrong.
I oppose nationalism because it tells people that person X is better than person Y because X was born in country Z. (which I find unmoral)
I oppose it because hightened nationalism always seems to end in (attack) wars. (wich I find extremely unmoral)
I oppose nationalism because, like it or not, there are (Trump voice) HUGE problems we have now that can only be solved on a global level, not on nation state level. People who emphazise nationalism generally play down those problems or downright call them "fake news". (logical reason)
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I do not include people like you in "The side that opposes"
That is a logical and fair view of nationalism.
But the... i will call them leftists... don't have any such arguments. Currently they are saying white american's bad. They throw anything they can, such as white american's had slaves... although white american's were among the first to free slaves. But that isn't brought up. It is just, "those people are bad"
An example, they call everyone that doesn't agree with them "Nazis" (not-Cs). They do this because Nazi is a bad word to most people, and so, they are using the worst word they know to make them feel as bad as possible. However, they do not know what the word means, or what it implies. Bernie Sanders said he was a national socialist. Nazi stands for National socialist.
Now, about nationalism.
A person needs to have a fair amount of self esteem. Too little and they cannot function. Too much and they are a pain to be around, usually getting people hurt by not knowing their limits.
Having pride in your group is important. It is the glue that holds the people together. Too little and the group falls apart. Too much and they get ideas of being better than.
However, it is really T.H.E.M. who take the patriotism and turn it into war. By creating false flags, and then saying to the patriots, "they are attacking us", T.H.E.Y. have gotten us into many wars.
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No it doesn't.
It simply says to have pride in your nation. To take care of your nation. Yet to have pride you also need to have a reason for such.
Can that be weaponized by propaganda? Sure. Yet the same can be said of every Socialist and Communist attempt as well.
In fact the boogeymen people like to hold up to point out the woes of Nationalism people like to conveniently leave out that those places also considered themselves a socialist movement. Yet ultimately because they were focused on expanding and controlling outside of their own borders they were not Nationalists. They were imperialists. Yet back then imperialism was viewed negatively, so they are not going to come out claiming to be imperialists.
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I think pride here is the important point.
Pride never seems to stop at the (positive) nationalism and always go towards the negative nationalism Chauvinism (which often turned into e.g. Hitler)
It is the difference between inclusive and exclusive nationalism.
For example you could say I am an inclusive nationalist. I am a fan of our Grundgesetz (constitution) and want as many people as possible to have it's protections. Immigration? Everyone's right. Everyone can be German, if they want.
But do I feel pride? No. Why? Putting aside that a lot is still bad, how can you feel pride towards something like a state?? I might feel pride that we uphold our constitution standards, but in the thing itself? I did not wrote a single word of it. I did not build a single meter of Autobahn. How could I be proud of it?
Than there are the "rights", the exclusive nationalists. They define Germany first point as a difference to others. You can't just come here, and becoming German? No way! This is our country, our Autobahn, our language (which is always one the biggest jokes).
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white nationalism is bogus also.
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Yep. I don't know of any completely white nations.
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I think you are wrong here.
Nationalism has for example the loyality principle: Loyality towards your state is the topmost priority.
That necessarily means that something that does not maximise the profit for your state (a compromise) is not acceptable.
Nationalism also implies that there are... uh, is there an english word? people, folks, populace that have a national character. The Brits. The German. The Swedes.
And while it can be a source for many jokes, this is of course wrong. There are people eating bread and drinking beer outside Germany, too! And by far not every German wears Lederhose.
But that thought is always bordering to racism (and often crossing) and a source for unhealthy rivaltry.
(That is also why "Make X great" is not much in favor for many people. It is always connected to a fight against others.)
If Nationalism and Imperialism are different things, you should have no problem of pointing me to a few examples in the last 100 years where you have imperialism but no nation doing it.
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False comparison there.
Is imperialism done by a nation? Yes. That doesn't make it the same thing as nationalism. So far has socialism been instituted in nations? Yes. Yet that doesn't make socialism the same thing as nationalism.
Has communism been instituted in nations? Yes. Yet that doesn't make communism the same thing as nationalism.
Nice try. Critical Thinking fail.
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Okay, my wording was a bit off. I did not mean they are the same. I meant that without nationalism, imperialism does not happen.
(That is of course talking about a time where nationalism as an idea existed. The Roman Empire was an Empire, but not a national(istic) state.)
btw. there never was communism in a nation. Not even a realized socialism. Comparisn fail ;)
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So people like to claim.
Yet the NATIONS themselves claimed to be communist. ;)
Comparison success.
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No. The leaders may have sometimes claimed to be in a communist party and adhere to communist principles (which they weren't of course), but not a single state ever claimed to be communist.
Until the end, it was the Union of SOCIALIST Sowjet Republics.
East Germany was "Real Existing Socialism" (always mistrust people who claim something is real, because why do they have to emphazise it??)
Or look at China's SOCIALISM with Chinese characteristics.
Socialism is the prerequisite to communism. If a state considered itself communist, they would have surely put it in REALLY BIG LETTERS!!! in their name etc.
It is similar when people (mostly in the US) talk about "communist China" meaning Mao's time.
That was not communist China. It was not even socialist. As Mao himself said: His Great Leap will bring China 20 years faster towards socialism.
They were far away from socialism, how could they be in communism? That is impossible!
btw. most of the deaths under Mao were not because of the ideology but because of a misunderstanding of nature. They killed sparrows to protect crops, but those sparrows could no longer eat locusts, which then eat everything. This was the reason for the big hunger catastrophe, not "communistic mismanagement".
Something like that - even if you know how bad it is - happens everywhere today too. Our extensive farming causes so much erosion that in another 50 years there will be no fertile soil left, just to point to one devastating thing.
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As I wrote above, the first national movement, even in germany, was not one that wanted classification like the Bayern, Preussen, Habsburger or whatever, they wanted one german Nation. So Nationalism as an idea, when it first came up here, had not a single thing to do with Segregation.
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It was segregation towards the other "nationalities" liek the swiss, french and so on. You cannot define a group without defining who is not in that group.
Anyway, I did not talk about segregation.
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But it is an important point here, because this is one of the main things nationalism is blamed for. When you come from small states , kingdoms and principalities a nation based on language to me seems not as an idea of segregation. Of course all the others that don't belong to that nation are somehow segregated (not saying that this must be any kind of bad in terms of peace and freedom). If Europe was a nation you would make a statement still pointing out that the rest of the world was segregated. Even human identity works by defining who you are and who you are not, cultural and subcultural membership the same. Nothing bad about it, as long as your own interests and views don't affect others rights and personal freedom. So for you possibly there is only socialism one world utopia left to call out for. To me it makes no difference if you call out for a world of nations living in peace,of course this utopian also.
In 1848 it was the most integrating way that was possible at this time for the germans. And the idea never meant "segregation". It was students proclaiming their new ideas just like the 68' movement. Of course we have seen excessive form of nationalism, this does not make it bad in general.
You can say the same of any other state form. It's the people themselves that must become free and independent, self-conscious, so they can't be misleaded by any abuse of a system whether it is nationalistic or socialistic or whatever.
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You should have replied to the person I replied to.
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