There has been a lot of talk in this election about Patriotism. There is a large segment of this country that is highly patriotic, and considers it a character weakness if you are not highly patriotic too.
I don't know how much of that is real, and how much of that is lemming-like flag waving because nobody wants to be seen as un-patriotic. I fully believe the "Patriot Act" would not have received as many votes if it did not have the word "Patriot" in the name.
"Patriot" is such an emotional word that it is often abused for political gain.
For people born in the first half of the 20th century, I can see how America would be so inspiring. They witnessed America win World War I, World War II, survive the Great Depression, stand up to the Soviet Union, and be the first to put a man on the moon.
But for people born post moon-landing (like me), we've seen misguided wars, political corruption at the highest levels, deficit spending, staggering debt, political payback for decades of abusive foreign policy, declining education standards, the best jobs going overseas, a declining standard of living, a crumbling infrastructure, an ugly culture war, a wrecked economy brought down by greed, and George W. Bush.
America has lost its sparkle, it has lost its moral high ground, and it just doesn't inspire rabid patriotism the way it probably did for previous generations.
I like America well enough, and it's still my favorite country. I see no immediate need to move to another country...although the thought did BRIEFLY cross my mind after the 2004 election. :)
So what's the big deal about Patriotism? Why all the flag waving and chest thumping?
Has everyone forgotten that we are a nation made ENTIRELY of traitors who abandoned their home country in search of a better life here in America? Our Founding Fathers were first class traitors! (Even Native Americans had to abandon Asia to come here)
Are we trying to say that abandoning your country when times get tough is a bad thing? If so, then we are nation of bad, un-patriotic people!
There would be reason to be patriotic if we had something really special that no other country had. For almost two hundred years, America offered freedoms that were rare. I'm sure those were the really great times to be an American.
But now there are many democratic nations, and the differences between America and other European countries is becoming less dramatic. European countries tend to have higher taxes than America, but a different tax rate isn't as much of a disction as, say, "Freedom of Speech". I *love* our freedoms, and I dearly appreciate them, but we aren't the only country with such freedoms.
Our lower tax rates and hard driving capitalism was supposed to be what made us so prosperous. But now even that line of thought has been called into question as we sink deeper in debt that many of our European counterparts. We are now a debtor nation to socialist China, and we spend our borrowed money for the oil we purchase from dictatorships.
Maybe I'm missing some kind of "Tribal Allegiance" gene, because I also don't root for any sports teams, and it seems to be a quite natural behavior for people (mostly men) to form passionate ties to sports teams.
Maybe people root for America the same way they root for the Dallas Cowboys (or whoever) and there's nothing more magical to patriotism than that? Maybe America is just a big "team" that people emotionally bond to?
It's not that I'm not loyal; I consider myself fiercely loyal to the things that actually play a part in my life. I'm loyal to my friends. I'm loyal to my team at work...so much so that I am often blind to their weaknesses.
At one job (many years ago) there was a guy on my team who was a total jerk, and I never realized he was a jerk until he joined another team. This sort of thing has happened to me many times.
So, maybe Patriotism is like that...a kind of loyalty that makes you blind to the weaknesses of your country? In that light, I guess I can understand it, but I just don't have it at the "country" scale.
If I step back and try to think of humanity at that large of a scale, then I am only reminded of one of my core values that believes that everyone is basically the same and we are all part of this planet, and the human race as a whole is more important than any one country.
