Sonntag, 7. Juni 2015

Patriotism

Patriotism is the meme of identifying yourself with your country.
Some degree of patriotism is needed to wage (conventional) war, since soldiers risk their lives for the good of the country.
The USA is a very patriotic country. In many of its states, pupils have to pledge allegiance to the US every morning in school. Many people see their country as exceptional.
This is a great danger to world peace. At any point in time since the year Y the USA has been fighting at least 1 war. (Y to be determined as an exercise.)
It has been killing people steadily. (It also owns the killing speed world record, having used atomic bombs in 1945.)
Before 1945, Germany was also heavily infected by patriotism (as well as racism), resulting in a death count of several millions. But after WW2, the meme of patriotism was almost extinguished in Germany, and after that, the country was quite peaceful. This lasted until the country's reunification. (The readyness for war was reestablished in 1999 by invoking a humanitarian need for bombing Serbia. Using pity, of all things, as a reason for war, was quite innovative.)

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