Pride in one's Country - Serious or silly ?

[Void]

Man, seriously. They let you pull a knob every few years for voting and you actually think you are part of the government, you think it somehow lives upto the great virtue of democracy. Well, the knob pulling might make you feel good but let me tell you something. Democracy originated with each individual citizens having equal say, having a voice, and being heard by the majority. It started with every individual person being a politician of equal standing and involved with the decision making of the country. Now, how many american's here can say they have had a tangible influence with the decision making process. Have you ever given an argument, and had each topic and issue you raised discussed by the nation? How many can say they actaully know why their fellow brothers die in wars, or why those wars are faught. Note: its not for a flag. It could happen with our current level of telecommunication technology. They could hook up a keybaord to a TV, in every house in america, and establish an intranet where there is actual information sharing and where each individual person is involved with real debates on national/state levels. That doesn't happen. You are not your government. Every election they bring up a "crisis" that usually ignores the real issues and the real struggles American's face every day.
Furthermore, being proud of the accomplishments of your culture is one thing. Killing other people cause of a line drawn in the sand is another thing. We all live in one global economy, we all live in a system with one large global governing body. You think some damn line in the sand that makes up your nation is that important, you think it justifies killing and destroying everyone else? You country is just a bunch of lines. The line is not that important, cause in the end we are all part of the one planet, the one global society, and we will sink or swim together. If we are divided in pieces, then that just makes us food for the sharks doesnt it?
But of coarse i am not against armerica or americans in any way sense or form. I just think that as THE world leader the US gov't (not the people obviously) set the tone, rules, and laws other countries align themselves too... and they have not directed the world towards a very beneficial existance. They may have directed americas interests, or at least certain global corperations towards profitable waters, but like i said, were all in it together. In the end we all live in the one global ecosystem with limited resources.

 

[Setarcos]

Great thread, thanks!
Totally agree with Void, no country that takes an election once every 3 - 5 years on a package government (rather than individual policies) can claim to be a democracy.
Originally posted by psychoblast:
"Once you realize that an American life is not worth more than the life of any other person, that an American is not more likely to be decent and good than any other person, then you realize that patriotism is not a positive feeling. It is really only good for getting the people in a country mad at people in another country."
(Sorry this is in a different direction to most of the thread)
EXACTLY! Why the fuck is it that this seems to be ignored? I am really tired of Americans acting like they are more important than others (some say they don't, but just in the way they see the world they put an American life above another).
September 11th -> how many people died, like 5 thousand or something
Do you realise, on a global scale that is fuck all? In 1994 approximately a million people were killed in mass genocide in Rwanda, who still talks about this?
According to http://www.starvation.net/ about 30'000 people a day die from starvation... WHAT THE FUCK. You hear people complaining about how much they hear about dying African children, how much have I had to endure about September the 11th?
Really I suppose, an American life does matter more than an African life in this world at this time. If you don't think this is the way things should be, then you need to take a stance a long way from the mainstream. But it is still the predominant view among the people with power to change things.
I am of the belief (like Kyk, Psychoblast, etc.) that you can't take pride in your country for the reason that you have effectively nothing to do with where it is today.
So also I don't really think you can feel ashamed of your country, you have no reason to. You can think it is doing awful things but it is not your fault.
But let's say you do think you should be able to feel pride or shame in your country. Any person that feels pride rather than shame in America either does not realise the scale of things, or really does put an American life as being more valuable than say an African life (and has fairly dispicable moral standards. Think about other people that put one race as being more important than another).
THE_WOOD (who was trying to piss people off, and certainly succeeded in this case) seems happy with all the luxuries that an American can get in one household. In your thread, it seems that your attitude is that you actually take pride that America has sucseeded in making the world a less equal place, and making just it's own citizens more wealthy. Do you realise just how low a standard you set for you morals if you believe in what you wrote? And do you still believe what your wrote?
Posted by the wood:
"Yes I totally disagree with the USA's global domination policies, however I believe its just a phaze" -
Tell me... How do you know what is a phase and what is not? Do you have any good reasons for believing this is a phase? Surely everything is a phase if you look at things over a long enough period. So what?
For each luxury that is made, energy that could go into helping people dying, is just going into helping rich people make their lives slightly better.
For anyone who has done economics, it is clear the rich are getting far less Marginal Utility from each unit of energy expendeed on them by now than any 3rd world citizens would, but still the energy is being used on the rich.
Look I realise this post is quite extreme for a moderator. Unfortunatelly my views on this topic are fairly extreme, and some of the people I am replying to have been fairly extreme. Respond to this post in anyway you like, as long as you are attacking a point rather than me I am happy.
Sorry for the length, for the mudledness of the ideas presented, and some of the incompletness.
[ 20 November 2002: Message edited by: Setarcos ]

 

[Void]

Isn't pride one of the seven deadly sins?
The direction of the thread reminds me of a doco i saw a few years back on some country that was ruined by americans bombing and various wars. It was actually a pretty advanced country, dont remember which one. But the main complaint they had is that they were voiceless, unable to say anything about being bombed day and night + the other atrocities commited. America did a lot of bad shit there directly and/or indirectly, yet at the same time they were astounded that Americans didnt say anything about it. I remembered it coz the lady talking on it had an unelxploded bomb fall into a room where she kept her baby in a crib. She talked about the general feeling in the community, and said they felt that americans where the only ones with a chance of speaking up, of complaining, and of stopping the bloodshed; but they didnt. Not sure why not. Maybe it wasnt on the news. But i think more likely americans either feel powerless, or they trust their government which is insanity. In a democratic you shouldnt have to just have blind fairth inyour government, the whole point of a democracy is information sharing. You should know whats going on. Few people do. Sad thing is that if they ask for information you are called anti-patriotic. Well, i guess that worked for the Nazi's. Do you realise that even after WW2 there was German citizens who either didnt realise what their government was doing, or had heard rumours about it and didnt believe it.
Though with the ecological/environmental destruction America has created worldwide, it could lead to a collapse in the global ecosystem and a drastic change to the health of all people around the world. And to say its a good thing to exploit other countries, since it makes a handful of americans wealthy, i dont agree. The long term repucussions far outweight the wealth gained.
In the end I think its good to have pride in other people, culture's, social group's etc. But pride in a country, which is just a politically correct way of saying political model, I dont think you should. Not unless you know everything that is occuring, which 99% of americans dont.
...But then again what do i know?

 

[*kell*]

I am a New Zealander living in the USA. I was born in Australia, moved to NZ when I was 3 & lived back to Australia when I was 21 for a year.
Moving out of my home country (New Zealand) has made me so thankful that I have such a wonderful country to live in.
Some of the reasons I have pride in my country:
NZers have a strong nuclear free stance & most of the country take this very seriously , we in general are very enviromentaly aware.
We have a beautiful conurty, beaches, mountains, wild bush & very modern cosmapolitan cities all wihin a 4/5 hour drive. After spending time in NYC I can honestly say that we have a nightlife & parties that in general have a mellower more relaxed vibe, our clubs go until it's light, something I have yet to see in NYC, I dont mean after parties, I mean international DJs comming over & going ALL night & well into the morning.
We have a unique style our fashion designers always get praise in London fashion week for our inovation.
Both the leaders of the main parties are women, we have openly gay polititions & even a transexual, a polititian that is open about the fact that he smokes pot, goes to parties, is a huge hemp advocate, these people all have respect & are not rediculed for their lifestlye choices.
New Zealand was the first country to give women the vote.
We have our scandals, we have rednecks, we fucked over the indigionus (sp?) peoples much like America did the Native Indians, we have racism, but I dont see segregation there like I have witnessed here or in Australia.
Religion is very free, I dont know many relgious people (they are out there) but our Prime minister never mentiones god in her speeches.You are not seen as lacking in morals if you choose to be atheist. She also calls the student radio station weekly & answers quetions candidly & doesnt try to sidetrack the issues presented to her, she can relate to our generation. I have respect for her, honestly I have not come accross a polition in the US that I have an ounce of respect for.
We have healthy music scene for such a small country (population 4 million), We have radio stations that dont edit songs, On our TV network sations they can say 'fuck' after 10pm, they even had an episode of sex in the city that had 'cunt' in it! This was on the equivilent of NBC at 10m I think. We have a 'jackass' style show, pretty much uncut on a network sation which they also funded. Friends of mine made it, they had to go through the usual shit, but the end result was pretty much how they envisioned it.
Our news is I'm sure biased to some degree but NOTHING compared to the USA, we get WORLD news, something hard to find on the network stations In the US.
Basicly I love the openmindedness of the average New Zealander, we are by nature adventurous & tend to travel & be open to meeting new people & having a good time.
I'm going home in a week & cant wait, We have AWESOME cafes there with GREAT coffee, I think GOOD coffe is one of the things I miss the most, oh & FOOD! Mmmm out vegetable have SO much more flavour & our cheese isnt bright yellow/orange, that shit scares me!
Yup, I guess I'm a patriot!