I don't really feel that that's the same point.

For example, I live in Vienna. Public transport here is amazing. Housing is pretty great. Education is free and good. Public healthcare is free and really good. I'm going to keep voting and contributing to keep these things good. If things turn bad, the wrong people get into power, and these things will sour, that's sad. But then I can still move somewhere else.

And no matter what happens with my city, it will not change who I am and/or how good/valuable I am.

And also, it really doesn't matter how other places are doing. That's why I really, really disagree with the "patriotism" in the comic. "I'm going to work on my house because it's the best house" is a pretty stupid thing to say. Does that mean if your house isn't the best, there's no point to work on your house? Does that mean you think all other houses suck?

What even is the point of having the "because it's the best house" in there at all?

I improve my house because I live there, that's the right reasoning.

Idk, I feel like one failure of governments is not sharing the successes

That's often the case, that's correct. But that shouldn't be done for the purpose of "because we have the best country/city/...".

Be proud of the things you accomplish, not about where you accomplish them at.

I sure am glad they went back to butt jokes after that comic.

Nice way to put it!

It's a very common thing really. The better a country works and the less the country has to compensate for, the less patriotism there is. And of course vice versa.

Yeah, that's a fair generalization.

And for the click-averse:

The cheapest sort of pride is national pride; for if a man is proud of his own nation, it argues that he has no qualities of his own of which he can be proud; otherwise he would not have recourse to those which he shares with so many millions of his fellowmen. The man who is endowed with important personal qualities will be only too ready to see clearly in what respects his own nation falls short, since their failings will be constantly before his eyes. But every miserable fool who has nothing at all of which he can be proud adopts, as a last resource, pride in the nation to which he belongs; he is ready and glad to defend all its faults and follies tooth and nail, thus reimbursing himself for his own inferiority.

-Credited to Arthur Schopenhauer

Turns out, Schopenhauer is more eloquent than me :)

(The correctly used double negative was confusing for me at first, btw.)

You make a very interesting point I haven't ever thought about before.

While I have always considered myself a patriot to a mild degree, I never associated it with tribalism directly. Even with the many faults of all countries, it's OK to be proud of where you are from. (It does make perfect sense that tribalism is the end goal of state sponsored patriotism though.)

In my mind, the fine line after patriotism was usually nationalism where tribalism runs deep and hate-based rhetoric becomes extremely effective. The definition of a patriot is somewhat twisted at that point. (ie: unless you believe [insert something random], you aren't actually a patriot and therefore an enemy of the state.)

I am not agreeing or disagreeing with you, btw. Your perspective is something interesting to think about, s'all. (I am leaning on the agreement side, FWIW.)

(For the people reading this that may not realize that I am using the word "nationalism" in a negative context, I am. If that chaps your hide still, replace it with 'christian nationalism' or 'white nationalism' and fuck off. Everyone else, sorry for the disclaimer.)

Bread and games to distract from actual problems. To create loyalty for things that don't deserve loyalty and to push tribalism and "us-vs-them".

No, patriotism isn't harmless fun.