Nationalism is immoral, wrong and dangerous!

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I HATE nationalists. They are the sole cause of 100 % of all wars.

Nationalists also tend to impose their nationalism on others, and force people to be, say, conscripts.

Nationalism also create the "us and them" group identity and conformity, which is EVIL!

Therefore, we should ban nationalism!

Your opinion?

There are many healtier forms of it, it doens't always have to do with waging wars and being racists.

Oh, yeah, banning things ALWAYS stops it!!

Your "morals" aside, in a world of nationalists, you have to be at least a little nationalist yourself to survive, or you just get picked apart by the vultures. Of all the things Trump talks about, he is absolutely right about China and many other countries taking the US for a ride. China has been operating a "China First" policy since forever, paying lip service to free trade for export advantage, stealing secrets and technology all while effectively closing its internal market to outsiders, through government intervention and unfair competition. The answer to this sort of behaviour is economic nationalism, not "bend over further".

Balderdash. The answer is to agree a free trade deal that requires the Chinese to end their nationalistic protectionist policies. At the same time, the US could relax its anticompetitive intellectual property laws, which I don't think the Chinese are entirely wrong to challenge (although I disagree with their manner of doing so, which is also anticompetitive).

Economic nationalism only creates losers; economic liberalism creates winners.

Oh look, the Thought Police is at it again...

They already did that, on paper we have as much access to their market as they do to ours, in practice we don't. International agreements don't mean much to the Chinese. How are you going to force them to behave? It's nice to imagine we can turn the other cheek Jesus style, but the world is not like that. Do we continue until there is literally nothing left of our economies?

I don't think it's evil but I am baffled by it. It always feels like a personality replacement to me.

Being proud of the bit of floor you happened by chance to be born on? wtf!?

The floor and its location relative to other floors is immaterial, but how about being proud of the society built by those before you on said floor, and being proud to be a part of shaping that society towards being slightly better for those that will come after?

if it is pride in something you yourself have worked hard to achieve then I fully understand it, but pride in someone else's hard work? pride by proxy?

Not that different from a parent being proud of their progeny's hard work and accomplishments. Not the same sort of pride, arguably, but still pride. "People before me built a good thing and left it to me" comes with a sense of duty and responsibility, and living up to that can be a valid source of pride.

As fellow aspie Albert Einstein said - "Nationalism is an infantile disease. It is the measles of mankind."

It's important to note nationalism isn't patriotism. Patriotism is common normal pride. Nationalism is being spiteful as well as dangerously ignorant, such as to believe that one is "the best" even if that isn't logically accurate.

The 'Washington Post' further talks about the differences between the two:

https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions ... 089a109c51

Actually, that's more patriotism.

Nationalism would be - "My child is the best and literally better than everyone else! My child has no weaknesses and everything bad that happens to him is due to others since my child is infallible!"

Patriotism: "I'm proud to have a nice home that was built for me."

Nationalism: "This is my house! It is the best house and already has all of the greatest people! Stay out!"

Patriotism is pride. Whereas nationalism is a dangerous level of narcissism which leads to arrogance.

This cartoon puts it in a very easy way to understand:

https://cdn-images-1.medium.com/max/160 ... h-mheg.png

Last edited by Spooky_Mulder on 19 Jun 2018, 3:06 pm, edited 2 times in total.

Patriotism: "My Country, Right or Wrong!"

Nationalism: "My Country, Love It or Leave It!"

Sure, nationalism should be banned. Every child should be loved and cherished. No one should be judged by their skin color. All that and more should be so, but sadly isn't.

Huh. I always thought the two were basically synonyms with patriotism being the slightly more rabid version. Mayhaps I was mistaken.


Either way, OP is a would-be dictator with no degree of self-reflection whatsoever, looking to sell "benevolent" tyranny wrapped in a thin veneer of kindness.