I am proud of my nation and its progressive, socialist nature, yet I am fully, and painfully so, aware of it’s shortcomings and problems.
But despite the problems, it’s extremely hard for me not to feel pride for the way we handle things within and without, especially in comparison to the rest of the world. We’ve been consistently at the top of the most socially progressive charts of the world, having also been denoted the worlds happiest country for over 5 years in row, and so on.
I do have my own prides, things I’m not ashamed to claim being very good at, and I do have a lot of very loud criticism against my nation too. But I remain overall proud just because we dare to be, against most odds, progressive and socialist.
I would defend my country, even picking up arms, because the chances are, the invader will simply be worse. Lead to worse overall situation here. Anyone surpassing us on either social or progressive counts, would be almost certainly not invading anyone, let alone us.
Maybe I am the fool the quote talks about, the good-at-nothing simpleton falling back to national pride for lack of any of my own. But I do not feel like one and I certainly have a lot more, explicitly outside the concept of a nation and this specific nation too, prides and accomplishments to be proud of.
I don’t think national pride is all that bad. I think it can be reasonable if the nation is best at its class on things most important and dear to you. Of course most national pride around the world is rooted on shitty stuff, and most nationally pride people usually being neo-nazi assholes, yet I still remain steadfast in my opinion that it need not be so.
The difference between you and the described “fool” is, that you are not inherently proud of your nation, but more like what you as a nation have accomplished (at least that’s what I interpreted from your words). The patriotic fool on the other hand is proud of much more stupid things he had nothing to do with. He takes pride in his language, the culture, his own town simply because he was born into it. The fool wants to stop all influences from outside, that may change the thing he takes pride in. He sees the world as a constant static structure that evolved and that should not be changed, ignoring that constant change just made things like culture the way they are.
You on the other hand said, that you take pride for your nation having a high standard of living, a good social system and such stuff. All of these have been earned through constant fight and you can be proud of winning this fight. You are also able to see flaws in the current system and want stuff to change.
I am proud of my nation and its progressive, socialist nature, yet I am fully, and painfully so, aware of it’s shortcomings and problems.
But despite the problems, it’s extremely hard for me not to feel pride for the way we handle things within and without, especially in comparison to the rest of the world. We’ve been consistently at the top of the most socially progressive charts of the world, having also been denoted the worlds happiest country for over 5 years in row, and so on.
I do have my own prides, things I’m not ashamed to claim being very good at, and I do have a lot of very loud criticism against my nation too. But I remain overall proud just because we dare to be, against most odds, progressive and socialist.
I would defend my country, even picking up arms, because the chances are, the invader will simply be worse. Lead to worse overall situation here. Anyone surpassing us on either social or progressive counts, would be almost certainly not invading anyone, let alone us.
Maybe I am the fool the quote talks about, the good-at-nothing simpleton falling back to national pride for lack of any of my own. But I do not feel like one and I certainly have a lot more, explicitly outside the concept of a nation and this specific nation too, prides and accomplishments to be proud of.
I don’t think national pride is all that bad. I think it can be reasonable if the nation is best at its class on things most important and dear to you. Of course most national pride around the world is rooted on shitty stuff, and most nationally pride people usually being neo-nazi assholes, yet I still remain steadfast in my opinion that it need not be so.
It can be fine. I am sure of that.
The difference between you and the described “fool” is, that you are not inherently proud of your nation, but more like what you as a nation have accomplished (at least that’s what I interpreted from your words). The patriotic fool on the other hand is proud of much more stupid things he had nothing to do with. He takes pride in his language, the culture, his own town simply because he was born into it. The fool wants to stop all influences from outside, that may change the thing he takes pride in. He sees the world as a constant static structure that evolved and that should not be changed, ignoring that constant change just made things like culture the way they are.
You on the other hand said, that you take pride for your nation having a high standard of living, a good social system and such stuff. All of these have been earned through constant fight and you can be proud of winning this fight. You are also able to see flaws in the current system and want stuff to change.