For better or worse, a country is in large part its government. Thus for most people, loving one’s country means, among other things, feeling a sense of loyalty to and even reverence for its government. That doesn’t mean that people never criticize “their” government. But for the person who thinks of himself as patriotic, the criticism never reaches down to the core; it’s usually directed at specific politicians...
In the United States, the idea of self-government is reinforced by state schooling and the news media, which plant the message that if one doesn’t like the government, one has only oneself to blame...
Yet the word “patriotism” doesn’t really get at what underlies the suspicion we’ve seen expressed. “Nationalism” better captures the phenomenon, because it connotes something like a religious attitude toward the nation, as though it were a transcendent mystical entity, an object of worship, with the government its material representative. That explains why the flag is treated as something sacred. Why else would people force their kids to pledge allegiance to it (with a Nazi-style salute in the early 20th century), fear its touching the ground, or want a constitutional amendment forbidding the burning of it?
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This highlights one of the contradictions in conservatism. Most conservatives pay lip service to free people, free markets, and small government while simultaneously singing the praises of government activism in foreign policy...
An earlier generation of conservatives, who really were skeptical of state power, opposed foreign intervention...
For the current crop of conservatives, nothing provides the opportunity for “America” to show its greatness and leadership as do foreign policy and, most especially, war. In reality, what they actually provide is an opportunity for self-serving, ambitious presidents to create legacies and funnel citizens’ wealth to government contractors — Eisenhower’s military-industrial complex...
Worship of the nation and its government is in fact inconsistent with America’s founding ideals. Thomas Jefferson said the appropriate attitude of a free people toward the government is “jealousy” not “confidence,” much less adoration. He spoke of the need to keep it caged. He was right, but if he were around today, conservatives might accuse him of not loving his country. Stripped of its incidental characteristics, government is nothing but physical force. So government, even under the best of circumstances, must always be eyed with suspicion. No Jeffersonian can be comfortable with government activism in foreign affairs. Appeals to security are to be met with high skepticism, for it’s too easy a cover for political intrigue...
That conservatives relish almost any foreign activism shows how un-Jeffersonian they are. They are nationalists and state-worshipers. For them, to love America is to love the government...
There certainly are things about America to love. The philosophy expressed in the Declaration of Independence tops the list... Any dedication to liberty and resistance to tyranny are worthy of admiration...
But for that very reason, so much about “America” deserves not love or pride but contempt. From the start, people in power have sought to nullify the ideals that distinguished America from other countries. The record of U.S. interventionist foreign policy, which has required coercion of the American people and others, is a record of shame. American presidents have supported and even installed dictators to advance the U.S. government’s imperial agenda. Their military policy has regarded civilian lives as expendable in the pursuit of an international regime amenable to the American ruling elite’s mercantile interests. Of course, that was justified as spreading freedom and democracy, a charade that fooled far more Americans than foreigners...
Capitalism in practice has meant a system of mercantilist privilege for wealthy interests, with harmful consequences at home and abroad. That is not something to be proud of. It is something to be condemned...
To neutralize dissent, the government and its “private sector” clients have inculcated an ethic extolling “service to our country,” especially military “service.” We are asked to believe that every American soldier sent to intervene in a foreign land was “defending our freedom.” A largely uncritical populace accepts this view, and even when people grow tired of a military operation, they rarely entertain the thought that the politicians and military personnel responsible for it are guilty of crimes...
Insisting on the alleged virtue of loving one’s country mainly serves to give those in power a blank check. The alternative, though, is not to hate one’s country, for that would merely be the other side of the same fallacy. A country per se should be an object neither of love nor of hatred.
How Can You Love a Country?
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