Retribution

August 4, 2006

Retribution

I’ll comment on this news article later:

I’m tired.  I’m tired of trying to ask people to stop using violence to defend themselves, their ideologies and their nations.  I would think that the evidence over the centuries would show the futility of it all.

I would affirm with a friend that there is a difference between patriotism and nationalism.  Unfortunately, I don’t really involve myself in either one.  He defines nationalism and patriotism as follows:

Blindly believing one’s country is always right, supreme, etc, etc is nationalism. That is clearly wrong. Being patriotic is different. It’s having pride in the accomplishments of one’s country, not boastful pride however. It’s respect for the sacrifices that have been made for the country. It is not viewing the country as infallible. It is trying to change the country for the better by doing what one can.

I would argue that much “patriotism” we see in America is only an outward representation of nationalism.  Particularly when the questioning comes from outside our own borders.  Take a look at the ridiculous “Freedom Fries” incident or other more serious situations like the current debate about immigration.  Most of the concern comes from a desire to not let “them” affect (or infect) “us”.

I’m not sure what the value is of being proud of our accomplishments and the sacrifice others have made.  Should we be equally proud of the theft of land and killing of innocents that allowed this country to form?  Shouldn’t we be realistic about our history?  The problem comes in when people don’t want to remember that we did all of those terrible things…and that America is just perfect.

Certainly you could take my argument all the way out and ask why should we cheer for football teams or hope our state continues to be a good source of education and jobs.  But we all know this national identity thing is a different bird.  The fact that people gte so furious when national allegiance is questioned is a good indication that to some degree we’ve made an idol of our country.

Why all this talk of nationalism in regard to the news story?  It’s all pretty related actually.  We fail to again see our own hypocrisy when it comes to our actions.  Sure, Columbus stumbled upon the West Indies.  But he did so after scandanavians had visited North America, after migrant movement north from central america helped populate the midwest, and shortly before he enslaved and killed most of the population there.  But to us, Columbus is a hero.

Our current leaders, our current foreign policy, has been called heroic, mostly by those within this country and our few staunch allies.  I’m sure there was a lot of back slapping and hand shaking while the food and medicine and other assistance was lined up for the lebanese.  Good job guys, way to help out.

But it becomes reality when you see that we are the ones providing all of the resources to create this misery.  Not only is most of Israel’s military capability supplied by our fair flag, but we continue to provide it, even as we try to help sustain life for those getting bombed to hell.

This doesn’t even begin to address the issue of using violence to solve violence.  I think you are all pretty aware of how I feel about it.  It seems particularly startling to see it in this situation.  Haven’t we learned, at least from the middle east situation, that violence will never cause a lasting solution?

This is far too long already and I’m sure discussion would be better than lecture.

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