h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Hi,

I find it really interesting that you feel the need to defend patriotism, almost as though it is obvious that patriotism is a good thing. Why love your country when you disagree with so many things that it is doing and stands for?

Shouldn't you be asking, "Why don't we give up on the whole concept of government altogether?"

Corruption, wanton bureaucracy and hypocrisy are not things that the USA invented. They're found in every government in the world and throughout history. There are necessarily unfortunate byproducts of an enormous governing body, but they aren't reasons enough to give up on one's government/people.

A country and the population it serves are the same thing. People speak about the government like it is some entity that is separated from the people; almost as if everyone were to disappear from the Earth, there would somehow still be a government - independent of humans.

I think patriotism is a good thing, though I don't feel the need to defend it. If you read the article, you'll notice it isn't in defense, it is a simple attempt to define patriotism as something more than blind conformity and paying lip service to an ideal, but doing nothing to follow through. Shouted convictions and flag waving are not patriotism.

Secondly, you are lumping together two things that are wholly separated in the article: What a country is doing, and what it stands for. I love the ideals of my country, but hate the perversions that are preformed, touted under the benevolent flag of the constitution. If the logic stating what something is doing and what it stands for as being equal were applied universally, there should be a lot less Catholics in the world. By inference, I could claim that the Catholic church supports pedophilia, simply because a few sick priests have taken it upon themselves to act that way. It may go in the face of the bible, but that apparently makes no difference when the foundations of an institution are judged against the negative actions of a few. Most should have converted to Buddhism by now. I wonder why they haven't.

Blind patriotism is not the answer to these dilemmas. People should not dive under the tracks of tanks to protect their leaders, but certainly turning violent or giving up on the government isn't the right answer either. Hard work is involved when trying to correct long standing issues, sadly most Americans would rather run the flag up a pole and hope everything turns out all right.

Well I agree that that there should be a lot less religion in the world, I personally do not belive that any religion 'stands for' anything of any real value, the corruption you mention is absolutely inherent in the nature of religion.

And I still question the concept of patriotism be that belief in what your country stands for or the flag waving variety. What are the ideals that your/my/our countries stand for? Largely the right of the wealthy to control the poor and for people of western european descent to lord it over everyone else.

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my country is the United States of America... and Lampadas has, in his entry heading, Patriotism in the Wake of September 11th, this to say about what the United States of America stands for.

"The United States is based on certain fundamentals, which have been beautifully articulated in the constitution. Among these fundamental concepts are separation of church and state, freedom of speech, and freedom from discrimination. These fundamentals are necessary to insure the welfare of our country. The framers of the constitution figured that the old rules of discrimination, aristocratic rule, and repression of new ideas was a bad thing. Their masterpiece, the constitution, reflects this."

he clearly states that a governmental body is not its constitution. And that, sometimes, for a patriot to ensure the welfare of his/her country, he or she may have to question the behaviour of the current government in order to maintain or reinstate the ideals which that country was founded upon. i agree.


>>>...Largely the right of the wealthy to control the poor and for people of western european descent to lord it over everyone else.<<<

this is not what the United States stands for... this is what it's governmental policy has been. i think this is partly because Americans were caught sleeping. i agree with Lampadas that we need to be an informed populace and i do not think we are. But i think we are starting to wake up. i myself am afraid it may be too late... but what is it they say in that movie? aha! Galaxy Quest "never give up! never surrender!

i am concerned that the monster has gotten too big... has grown outside the US perimeters... and unless we as a world populace figure out what to do.... will actually gain world dominance. If the US government upheld it's constitution that might be okay.... but it's not. What is the most glaring indicator of this? We no longer have one person - one vote in the US. The definition of a democracy is a political system in which the supreme power lies in a body of citizens who can elect people to represent them. i am pretty sure the majority of American citizens do not feel represented by those who now hold positions in government that are designated as elective.