Nationalism

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I wasn't actually talking about geographic location. I was talking about social identity, or nationalism

I think part of the reason why there isn't as strict of a standard for national identity in the US than in UK is because the US is a much bigger country. There is a lot more emphasis on local identity in the US because of its size.

Local historical buildings, tourist attractions, places of interest, and businesses are symbols of local identity. If they decided to tear all of those places down and replace them with nationwide franchises, then that would be a symbol of national identity. The sale of anything symbolic of a town, state, or region is also symbolic of local identity. If all of those things were banned from being sold and replaced with things that are symbolic of the nation as a whole, then that would be a symbol of national identity. Some of the foods that are sold at restaurants are based on local culture, so they're symbols of local identity. If they established a national standard for restaurant menus that banned all local foods, and made the foods served at restaurants in all parts of the country completely generic, then that would be a symbol of national identity.

Once all of these local 'distractions', that would hinder people's sense of loyalty to the union, were removed, there would be a greater sense of nationalism because people would be more similar on a national level. We're not doing this in the US though, because it's not right and it sounds like something the PRC would do. One of the most important foundations of Americanism seems to be that national identity isn't considered that important. Having local and individual identity seems to be considered more American overall. Those are the things that seem to contribute the most to people's sense of patriotism.

America's cultural identity is that of individualism, nationalism is collectivist and doesn't lend itself to being an open society.

That's also the nationalist version of events, actually. Otherwise, there'd be concrete talk of a referendum (unless my eyes were closed)

Given a choice, I'd rather have a united Ireland, but it's not really a big deal and very little would change if it was that way.

Should also say that I'd agree to hold a border poll any time. The only thing I'd worry about is republican violence and intimidation.

Identifying oneself by geographic region (or by anything else that you, yourself, did not accomplish) is illogical. It's tribalism, a way of thinking that had its roots from history when people banded together to ensure the survival of their group (as flawed as this thinking was, it worked, but it could have worked even better with individualism). People still subscribe to tribalism today because people are generally not rigorous with their beliefs; fitting in is more important than discovering truth. It's intellectual apathy reinforced by other other people spoon feeding them what to think and believe.

I think it's true that nationism or tribalism is indeed illogical when you think about it. The reason that it still persists is that most people are governed by their emotions as much as their thoughts and logic is overridden.
Perhaps nationalism is a slightly bigger issue in Europe than in US as there are so many countries close to each other that have been involved in wars and border disputes over the centuries.
It's a big issue here in Scotland with a referendum on independence due next year. The way I see it the Scottish National Party
are concentrating on emotions to persuade voters to say 'Yes' but so far the majority of voters are using their heads and see that it doesn't make sense in practical terms to break up the UK. I certainly wouldn't want to lose British citizenship and being interested in
history I realise there are too many strong connections between Scots,English,Welsh and Northern Irish to break it all up.
One of the subtle ways the SNP try to influence emotions is by introducing bilingual signs or leaflets in English/Gaelic. The fact is,as another poster pointed out,in reality there are now more Polish speakers in Scotland than Gaelic ones !

I will vote whichever way looks to give the freest outcome for migration and international movement and bonds, and keeping countries tied together as a community.

I don't trust Salmond, with all his silly compromises, like even keeping a currency union that England won't have any obligation to cooperate with. He plays to the tabloid agenda just as much as the British parties do, and there is still plenty of time for him to blow it by compromising with the racist vote. The smaller Yes parties, Green and SSP, feel this about him. I'm nervous of what will be in his white paper next month, and no way would be reckless enough to declare as a Yes voter before it comes out.

But at present I'm leaning towards Yes and would go that way if voting today. despite all the fears of racism I have heard from many unionist aspies, when I look at politics I see it going horribly racist at British level, the hostile signs you see towards foreign visitors along the airport corridor when you reenter the country are chilling and disgusting, while the independence campaign is more liberal on immigration and saying Scotland needs new folks and should take a stand to welcome them. There is the fear of Britain soon leaving the EU. It's the wrong way round that the vote on that will be later than the Scottish vote, it means we have to vote not knowing which way Britain is going to go. This way, voting Yes would be about keeping our Polish speakers safe and welcome.

Salmond has compromised too far saying we will stay in the British Isles common travel area. how are we supposed to do that without compromising with the incompatible policy England will be following? We should not want to actively ourselves put on a border barrier with England and the Irish Rep, but we should be willing to pursue a moral liberal open doors policy despite it causing those countries to put a border barrier onto us. Including, I want us to belong to the Schengen EU travel area, so long as it does not make us have tighter controls than we want towards outside the EU. This will make an English racist closed doors policy more isolated in Europe and smaller in its extent, while for us it will remove barriers with 26 countries at the price of 2 countries putting barriers on. That is still progress.

I has nothing to do with political culture, and everything to do with the fact that "American" is an artificial construct.

Australia, Canada, New Zealand and the United States are all settler nations. And Canada and the United States were settled by more than one European power. When a new migrant comes to one of these four countries, there are a new participant in a pattern of growth that has existed for a few hundred years, and they are as American, or Canadian, or Australian as any settler who has come before them. (Meanwhile the aboriginals that the settlers displaced never identified as American, or Canadian, or Australian, or New Zealander).

That you choose England as your comparator is interesting, because England (and London in particular) has always been one of the most cosmopolitan places in Europe. The English have long recognized their reliance on trade, and the trading advantages that come from multiculturalism.

It has always been curiously difficult to try draw a map of nations, for the Native Americans, all over the US and Canada. In the mid continent, the plains, the map is fairly easy to put together, there were quite large area nations, but in the east it gets very fuzzy. The Britannica and most books on the subject don't try to draw nations inside definite boundary lines but just put names of ethnic groups here on thee on the map, sometimes runing into each other, as a jumble. In one book that did try better than this in its first nations map, I even saw an area around Kentucky marked as "poorly understood".

The places in the US where an American nation can exist as a valid concept are the places where there is no clearly known indigenous nation preexisting it. That there are such places could be an explanation for how the feeling for an American nation came to stck in the first place - in the east in first 2 centuries of settlement before the US became an empire.

In Australia they have the concept of "first Australians". The Uluru Rock has a national status of importance for aboriginals, but is this felt across the continent or only locally near it? The aboriginal population was small for dividing up into lots of smaller countries: continent population 3/4 million a the Europeans' arrival. Arnhem Land, peninsula on the north coast, seems to be a distinct aboriginal land with a local indentity. Western Australia has something of a separate identity to the rest, because it is kinda cut off by a lot of empty outback, including the Gibson desert, from the continent's community further east. There is said to be a border land feeling about entering Western Australia at Eucla. It considered independence in the 30s. But is this identity only among the European-desent population, or was that desert a geographcal divider for the aboriginals too? Don't know, never been there.