EPTYou didn't choose to be born in your country? Well you didn't choose your family either, but you still love them (unless they were horrible abusive drug addicts).
Patriotism and Racism - Page 7
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Pyskee
United States620 Posts
You didn't choose to be born in your country? Well you didn't choose your family either, but you still love them (unless they were horrible abusive drug addicts). | ||
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RavenLoud
Canada1100 Posts
On November 24 2011 04:15 Odal wrote: + Show Spoiler + On November 24 2011 04:02 BronzeKnee wrote: Welcome. Let the Tao (http://www.edepot.com/tao4.html) be your teacher, it has taught me more than 12 years of school and college education could: 18 When the great Tao is forgotten, goodness and piety appear. When the body's intelligence declines, cleverness and knowledge step forth. When there is no peace in the family, filial piety begins. When the country falls into chaos, patriotism is born. What does this mean? I honestly can't explain it as well as the Tao: 2 When people see some things as beautiful, other things become ugly. When people see some things as good, other things become bad. Being and non-being create each other. Difficult and easy support each other. Long and short define each other. High and low depend on each other. Before and after follow each other. Therefore the Master acts without doing anything and teaches without saying anything. Things arise and she lets them come; things disappear and she lets them go. She has but doesn't possess, acts but doesn't expect. When her work is done, she forgets it. That is why it lasts forever. 38 The Master doesn't try to be powerful: thus he is truly powerful. The ordinary man keeps reaching for power; thus he never has enough. The Master does nothing, yet he leaves nothing undone. The ordinary man is always doing things, yet many more are left to be done. The kind man does something, yet something remains undone. The just man does something, and leaves many things to be done. The moral man does something, and when no one responds he rolls up his sleeves and uses force. When the Tao is lost, there is goodness. When goodness is lost, there is morality. When morality is lost, there is ritual. Ritual is the husk of true faith, the beginning of chaos. Therefore the Master concerns himself with the depths and not the surface, with the fruit and not the flower. He has no will of his own. He dwells in reality, and lets all illusions go. Thus you can't define people as patriots without defining those who are not patriots. You can't define a group of people as "good" without defining some other group as bad. So you might now imagine how warfare was started, and how racism and sexism have developed. You might understand now that the English language itself is sexist. And now we are at the beginning, this a deep rabbit hole. 1 The tao that can be told is not the eternal Tao The name that can be named is not the eternal Name. The unnamable is the eternally real. Naming is the origin of all particular things. Free from desire, you realize the mystery. Caught in desire, you see only the manifestations. Yet mystery and manifestations arise from the same source. This source is called darkness. Darkness within darkness. The gateway to all understanding. It took me years to understand the text and I still have not mastered it. Don't bother with those claiming that Taoism is a religion because it isn't, just learn from Lao Tzu. To quote Sun Tzu from the book "The Art of War" "Those skilled in war cultivate the Tao and preserve the laws and are therefore able to formulate victorious policies." Enjoy. You don't need ridiculous metaphors and obnoxious teachings to learn things and have common sense to understand how things work. I hardly think it is obnoxious, actually its a lot of valuable observations and experiences from the extremely archaic world of China before Qin Shi Huan came along, imo the greatest times of Chinese history. I find it to be quite elegantly put, and sums up a lot of things in very few words (a common thing to see in ancient chinese writings, which often took scholars years of study to understand.). Sounds to me like you hated it because it seems different than how you expect straight talk to be.  Ah, I can only imagine what other insights the Hundreds School of Thoughts from the Warring States era had before so many of the books were lost, burned and forgotten after unification  a terrible loss. | ||
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ixi.genocide
United States981 Posts
One warped sense of patriotism is the worship of sports teams. Most people that worship a sports team do so because that team is from their area, A person from Seattle doesn't choose to worship the mariners because they are the best baseball team, they choose them because they live there. It's like a survival mechanism and like all survival mechanisms it is becoming less and less important as our civilization advances. | ||
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JinDesu
United States3990 Posts
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Grettin
42417 Posts
On November 24 2011 01:06 Icapica wrote: While I understand that patriotism and racism aren't the same thing, I despise patriotism anyway. I just can't understand the thoughts behind it and I consider it a harmful idea. Anyway, I don't blame people who call themselves patriots for anything and I don't try to change their minds. Live and let live. Exactly my words and what i think. I don't give a shit if someone is patriotic or not. Personally, i'm not and i will most likely never be. On November 24 2011 05:55 JinDesu wrote: I always thought Patriot meant you would serve your country when called for. It's part of it, isn't it? | ||
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DeepElemBlues
United States5080 Posts
Real patriotism is not harmful to anyone, it's not triumphalist or my country must come out on top at the expense of yours or anything like that. | ||
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MangoTango
United States3670 Posts
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JinDesu
United States3990 Posts
On November 24 2011 05:57 Grettin wrote: Exactly my words and what i think. I don't give a shit if someone is patriotic or not. Personally, i'm not and i will most likely never be. It's part of it, isn't it? Sorry, it's missing "just" in there. "I thought Patriot just meant you would serve your country when called for." | ||
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perestain
Germany308 Posts
On November 24 2011 05:47 ixi.genocide wrote: One warped sense of patriotism is the worship of sports teams. Most people that worship a sports team do so because that team is from their area, A person from Seattle doesn't choose to worship the mariners because they are the best baseball team, they choose them because they live there. It's like a survival mechanism and like all survival mechanisms it is becoming less and less important as our civilization advances. That does not differentiate the genuine emotion from racism though. Racism can be explained as a survival mechanism as well. But you seem to have a different idea of patritism obviously, since the claim that you lose it automatically if you dislike others does not describe the emotion itself but a more abstract concept or title built around it. | ||
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Celadan
Norway471 Posts
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Shiragaku
Hong Kong4308 Posts
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Velr
Switzerland10979 Posts
On November 24 2011 06:06 JinDesu wrote: Sorry, it's missing "just" in there. "I thought Patriot just meant you would serve your country when called for." I would say that has like nothing to do with it? | ||
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blackone
Germany1314 Posts
On November 24 2011 05:47 ixi.genocide wrote: One warped sense of patriotism is the worship of sports teams. Most people that worship a sports team do so because that team is from their area, A person from Seattle doesn't choose to worship the mariners because they are the best baseball team, they choose them because they live there. It's like a survival mechanism and like all survival mechanisms it is becoming less and less important as our civilization advances. I think you're wrong. Somebody from Seattle most likely didn't "choose" the Mariners. It's the only Baseball team he can see playing, because all the other ones are hundreds or thousands of miles away. And even if he only watches them on TV, he can see all mariners games and only some of the other games. Plus everyone else is a Mariners fan around him. (Almost) nobody honestly think that their local sports team is superior because they are from his town, whereas shit tons of people think that their country is better than everyone elses. | ||
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Nus5
Germany46 Posts
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Half
United States2554 Posts
One warped sense of patriotism is the worship of sports teams. Most people that worship a sports team do so because that team is from their area, A person from Seattle doesn't choose to worship the mariners because they are the best baseball team, they choose them because they live there. It's like a survival mechanism and like all survival mechanisms it is becoming less and less important as our civilization advances. wut O.o. No, they do it because its a cool way to unify there local community. | ||
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ixi.genocide
United States981 Posts
On November 24 2011 06:08 perestain wrote: That does not differentiate the genuine emotion from racism though. Racism can be explained as a survival mechanism as well. But you seem to have a different idea of patritism obviously, since the claim that you lose it automatically if you dislike others does not describe the emotion itself but a more abstract concept or title built around it. The genuine emotion of love for ones country and allegiance to said country is fine, the problem is that you shouldn't consider people that are racist or against other countries patriots or any other general group. here's an example- The american tea party movement has been called racist and sexist and bigots and such which is incorrect. The way you differentiate between a tea party person and a racist is to make it clear that a racist is not part of the tea party. To make sure you can differentiate between a patriot and a nationalist/sensationalist/anti-<insert country> person is to make it clear that that person is not known as a patriot. (I am not making a connection between the tea party and patriots, just an example group). The problem with labeling people as 1 group is that a racist can be patriotic, But I don't think the term patriot should be attached to someone that has beliefs unbecoming of that ideal. And yes, the title of patriot is what we are really talking about, simply because life is based off of perception and in the 30's one person might perceive Hitler as a patriot while most see him as a racist (among other things). | ||
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Euronyme
Sweden3804 Posts
On November 24 2011 06:06 JinDesu wrote: Sorry, it's missing "just" in there. "I thought Patriot just meant you would serve your country when called for." From wikipedia "A patriot is someone who feels a strong support for his or her country." I think the situation is a bit different in America than in most European countries, as there's a even larger cultural mix there, and there's a lot of segregation. You'd have to have something to rally everyone behind to create a united identity. I mean America is a giant mix of all countries in the world, whereas most European countries have ~2-3 primary immigration nationalities, and one primary culturegroup or whatever you wanna call it at about 75%-80%. In my country you generally try to make immigrants a part of our society, wheras it seems fairly common that they create their own in the US (Chinatown etc). This is where the need of patriotism comes in. Just my two cents on the subject. | ||
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henkel
Netherlands146 Posts
Compare it to being friendly, helping a elderly woman pick up the groceries she dropped or picking up the poor misguided burglars crowbar when he drops it. (maybe not the best example but i hope the point is taken) love for your country is a good thing but i believe a fairly emotional way of looking at topics and you should be aware of that. Nothing wrong with making some choices/form opinions based on patriotism but realize that patriotism is your motivation, not reason or logic OP question, if you use that definition of patriotism, supporting your local player/club/company could be considered patriotism. | ||
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Euronyme
Sweden3804 Posts
On November 24 2011 06:28 henkel wrote: mmm i thought patriotism meant love for your country or certain aspects of it. And i believe no-one in their right mind can argue that up to a certain amount patriotism is a bad thing. I do believe that it can turn in a form of hate/disliking of anything foreign. Compare it to being friendly, helping a elderly woman pick up the groceries she dropped or picking up the poor misguided burglars crowbar when he drops it. (maybe not the best example but i hope the point is taken) love for your country is a good thing but i believe a fairly emotional way of looking at topics and you should be aware of that. Nothing wrong with making some choices/form opinions based on patriotism but realize that patriotism is your motivation, not reason or logic OP question, if you use that definition of patriotism, supporting your local player/club/company could be considered patriotism. Well support based on proximity isn't exactly rational. | ||
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kota
Denmark84 Posts
In Denmark we're not very patriotic so to speak, but some people still feel the need to love their country more than more valuable things. Regarding the rooting for a player from your own country isnt patriotism in my opinion. It might be differient in the US, but in Denmark where good players are so few and far apart, most Danes will root for them to show their support, rather than root for them out of someone sort of twisted view on patriotism. Thats my 5 cents. | ||
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