Libs Just Do Not Get Patriotism.

Started by Solar, May 20, 2018, 05:33:37 PM

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Solar

Here's some wishful thinking on their part.

These should be the end times for American patriotism

But wait, it only gets better. :rolleyes:
I was going to parse this, but you're all smart enough, I know, I've read your posts. :cool:


Patriotism is the organising passion of modern political life in the United States yet its vitality defies obvious explanation. The country has no national education system. There's neither compulsory military nor civil service. No government agency distributes the ubiquitous US flags, nor enforces observance of the rituals to country performed at schools and sporting and political events throughout the country. Despite lacking the classic machinery for inculcating patriotism and spreading it among the people, American patriotism is a norm in the true sense: at least within the US itself, it exists in a place without question.

One of the conceits of American patriotism – that it is a salubrious version of the pernicious nationalism that other countries have – has helped to protect it from critical questioning of almost any type. The kinds of 20th-century Leftist political movements that in principle opposed nationalism fared poorly in the US, and this might be why popular justifications for the country's patriotism tend to be shallow. They are often based on appeals to treasured details of family or community life: patriotism is Little League baseball on a warm summer day, the courtesy of the small-town merchant, a neighbourhood rebuilding together after a destructive storm. All nationalisms make sentimental appeal to intimate but generic experience, and the effects can help to raise armies and start wars. They carry, in other words, formidable political force. But they are not any kind of serious moral or intellectual case for patriotism.

American patriotism is in some ways old. It is notable for being perhaps the first nationalism in the fully modern sense of the concept, ie the loyalty to nation of a kingless people. Some of its defining qualities have changed very little, including the distinctive cult of the 'founding fathers', which began while they were still living. The strength of the preoccupation with the founders is that it is an open way to demonstrate national belonging. Talking about 'the founders', declaring loyalty to them and their texts, has been second only to military service as an effective way for immigrants and descendants of slaves to assimilate, and to become, at least in one sense, American. The great weakness of this preoccupation with the founders is that it's a convoluted, limiting device through which to think about the world today – much like the country's overestimation of its constitution – yet it plays an outsized role in American political debate and thought.

Most patriotisms enlist territorial rivals in the required role of the enemy: France has Germany; India has China; Britain has France. But America's particular historical experience in the New World reshaped this need. The US colonised a very rich continent without ever facing a real geopolitical rival. Lacking a serious competitor for land and other resources, American patriotism turned to the task of conjuring ideological enemies, drawing on an Anglo, especially Puritan, propensity for recasting outsiders as fearsome maleficents. The Puritan minister Cotton Mather (1663-1728) gave this impulse a paradigmatic expression when he speculated that the devil resembled either an Indian sagamore or a French dragoon.

Much more~~~
https://aeon.co/ideas/these-should-be-the-end-times-for-american-patriotism#
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Q PATRIOT!!!

zewazir

What makes American patriotism different from the nationalism that is an integral part of the general concept of patriotism from around the world?

In most cases of patriotism throughout history, the allegiance of the patriot includes allegiance to government, a king, the illustrious leader, whatever. While such gives a concrete "personality" (for lack of a better term) to patriotism, this aspect also tends to give a limited focus.

This is not so with American patriotism. American patriots can love or detest the government; depending on who is in power at the time. An American patriot can shift from loving government to hating it according to the results of an election, or the results of a particular bill being passed into law. But the patriotism is still there, probably more deeply seated, and more deeply felt than the patriotism of those countries in which allegiance of country is inseparable from allegiance to government.

The thing about American patriotism is the allegiance is to the ideology on which the nation was founded: the ideology of the sanctity of the human spirit, that freedom is inherent to the human being, that liberty is not something granted by government, but rather is to be protected by government. American patriotism is an allegiance to ideas, not people. And as such, changes in leadership, changes in law, cannot reduce the patriotism of the American. No matter who gets elected, no matter what BS laws are passed, the basic ideology on which American patriotism is founded will be there, calling to those who understand what it is.

Progs don't get it. Why? Because their allegiance is to government. Government is supposed to be there to solve all their problems. So, when government changes, so does their allegiance. And, because their own patriotism is unstable, because their own view of patriotism cannot separate government from country, they conclude that patriotism is nationalism, and nationalism is bad because it might require allegiance to a government they do not like.

Walter Josh

Ironically, when the Treaty of  Westphalia defined national borders;
it created a sense of attachment to and identity w/the homeland;
the essence of patriotism.

Solar

Quote from: zewazir on May 20, 2018, 08:19:54 PM
What makes American patriotism different from the nationalism that is an integral part of the general concept of patriotism from around the world?

In most cases of patriotism throughout history, the allegiance of the patriot includes allegiance to government, a king, the illustrious leader, whatever. While such gives a concrete "personality" (for lack of a better term) to patriotism, this aspect also tends to give a limited focus.

This is not so with American patriotism. American patriots can love or detest the government; depending on who is in power at the time. An American patriot can shift from loving government to hating it according to the results of an election, or the results of a particular bill being passed into law. But the patriotism is still there, probably more deeply seated, and more deeply felt than the patriotism of those countries in which allegiance of country is inseparable from allegiance to government.

The thing about American patriotism is the allegiance is to the ideology on which the nation was founded: the ideology of the sanctity of the human spirit, that freedom is inherent to the human being, that liberty is not something granted by government, but rather is to be protected by government. American patriotism is an allegiance to ideas, not people. And as such, changes in leadership, changes in law, cannot reduce the patriotism of the American. No matter who gets elected, no matter what BS laws are passed, the basic ideology on which American patriotism is founded will be there, calling to those who understand what it is.

Progs don't get it. Why? Because their allegiance is to government. Government is supposed to be there to solve all their problems. So, when government changes, so does their allegiance. And, because their own patriotism is unstable, because their own view of patriotism cannot separate government from country, they conclude that patriotism is nationalism, and nationalism is bad because it might require allegiance to a government they do not like.
I'm surprised someone got it so succinctly and so quickly. I expected many to hit on a point or two, but you did it all in the first post.
Well said. You get the Reagan Cowboy hat for the week. :thumbup:
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Cryptic Bert

Is that why they are so afraid of patriotism?

Solar

Quote from: The Boo Man... on May 20, 2018, 09:45:14 PM
Is that why they are so afraid of patriotism?
They've always feared what they didn't understand, which is why they always try and destroy everything.
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AndyJackson

Quote from: The Boo Man... on May 20, 2018, 09:45:14 PM
Is that why they are so afraid of patriotism?
It all goes back to Marx / Alinsky / Cloward-Piven, and all the other rank & file assholes.

They have all stated quite clearly that for the world to belong to them and theirs, they need to be rid of -

-Police authority
-Military Authority
-The church altogether (except for Islam which will help the left kill everyone they don't like)
-Parents' / family authority
-Patriotism
-Patriotic / Religious / Self-Reliance based organizations like scouts, YMCA, etc. (unless they can sneak in and change them to a soft blob of socialism / SJW ideals, as they seem to have accomplished with these 2 examples)
-Traditional schools (as anything other than communism vectors)

It's only been written in Marx for over 100 years, and loudly proclaimed by Obama when he took office.  Too bad people are still waking up and noticing this.