this post was submitted on 04 Jul 2025
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A long time ago I read some post that stuck with me.
It said that some people love their country the way a child loves their parent. They're perfect and smart and strong and can beat up your parent. They don't have any flaws, and can do no wrong. They're the best ever.
Other people love their country the way an adult loves a peer. They see the potential, the good, but also the flaws. They want what's best for both of them, even if it's uncomfortable and difficult. And ultimately, if the relationship becomes abusive, they won't just take it.
Conservatives often are the first one, but I think they are generally more immature. Fearful, tribal, angry.
Loving your country in the second way can be okay, I think. It can be a vehicle for improvement. People have wanted to improve their living spaces and communities for longer than we've had recorded history. It doesn't have to be toxic or zero-sum.
I wonder what you would define "country" as. If you want to say, "love thy neighbor" then I get you. But if you're saying "love your government" then it doesn't really make much sense. You're not supposed to love the government, that's not the point of it, that's not what it's here for.
That's where the analogy fails for me. You can't leave a state unless you enter a new state, a new abusive relationship.
I get when people are proud of their city or ethnicity or dialect group or religion or football club or what ever. There have always been imagined communities (communities where you don't know everyone but feel connected due to a shared identity) and that's what modern nation stated exploit. They creat a shared identity by lumping everything together, diminishing local differences to creat an artificial imagined community based on forced commonalities and destroy the plurality and diversity "home" could be.
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