The myth of patriotism.

[Livemike]

In "Iraq: a decade of hell" Stef made a great case against the war.  But at one stage he blamed "patriotism" for it.  In this his views are less solidly based.

There is a great effort to convince you to be "patriotic", that is to put your country above your own interest.  This is not the same as jingoism, the automatic cheerleading of whatever imposition of force your State promotes or appears to want to indulge in.  Being "patriotic" is presented as an absolute moral good and a normal thing to do.  While nobody believes that everyone puts their country first most people will say that at least a significant proportion of your nation do this fairly regularly.  Most people believe more patriotism would be a good thing.  If you feel bad about the fact that you usually don't put your country first in your dealings, I am here to deliver that most precious of things, more precious than "gold or honour", an excuse.  It's the old one, "Everyone else is doing it.".  Everyone else is putting their own interests, the interests of their family, community, workplace, and class ahead of their country.  

The most obvious sign of this is government trade and industrial policy and who supports which parts of it.  Any individual will either seek to advance that policy that is best for the country as a whole, or the policy that is best for them and their group.  If they seek to advance the policy that is best for the country then they could be wrong.  However such a mistake would not tend to lead them to support the policy that is good for them.  Take for instance a worker/entrepeneur in an uncompetitive industry whose lobbyists seek tariff protection.  If this suceeds then  he will continue to be employed/not go bankrupt and perhaps get a raise/more profits.  His own interest is clear.  If he knows nothing about economics then it will not be clear to him what is best for the country.  Many people believe tariff protections are good for the country in general.  However anyone really concerned with finding the best policy for the country and supporting it will encounter views on both sides.  Having encountered both sets of arguments someone truly seeking the best policy will have the same probability of supporting tariffs whether or not their own interest is affected.  Only if interested parties put their interest before that of the country are they more likely to support tariffs.  Yet politicians from affected areas, businessmen and union leaders in the industry will all support them.  There are virtually no cases of people in an industry benefitted by a government policy arguing against that policy.  Try to find a real estate developer who argues against loose monetary policy, or a plumber who argues against licensing or well, fill in the blank.  While substantial underrepresentation of views which go against a group's interest can be expected in a group, what we see is practically NO representatio of such views. 

It could be argued that of course plumbers are in favor of licensing plumbers, they mostly talk to other plumbers who believe in it.  But surely know that the policy favors these people and thus that they are biased.  Anyone genuinely interested in discovering and supporting the policy best for the nation would talk to people who don't have a conflict of interest.  Plumbers wouldn't talk to only car makers in order to judge whether car tariffs are a good idea.  Nor would car makers talk only  to real estate developers talk about monetary policy.  No, patriotism demands an actual investigation into what is good for the country.  You can't claim to love something and then make no effort to find out what in it's interest.  Nor can you claim to love something, find out what is in it's interest and then keep silent for fear of offending those you love less.  It's just not credible.  

So maybe the car makers, real estate speculators developers, and union leaders are all unpatriotic scum.  Maybe the patriots are all in that temple to patriotism the military.  Surely the "Semper Fi" crowd are just brimming with patriotism?  Well not so much.  Consider the "Kill Team" scandal.  A group of soldiers started killing civilians and making it look like they defended themselves against insurgent attacks.  This does not proves nothing about the patriotism of the military, you can't judge by the worst of an organisation.  What you can judge by is the oirganisation's response to the worst amoungst it.  From the start their commanding officer suspected, yet nothing was done until one of those involved spilled the beans.  Even though apparently the rumours of civilian murders went right thought the unit, nobody thought to call for help in determining whether they were true.  Nobody called the military version of CSI to determine if what the soldiers said about those deaths were true.  That's perhaps because they weren't told their number.  Nobody in the chain of command was trained to detect whether their troops were committing war crimes or knew the procedure for contacting those were.  Yet the US military has known for DECADES that war crimes against unarmed civilians are strategically a bad idea.  The whole "hearts and minds" thing isn't exactly new.  The idea that atrocities are the best recruiting agent for the enemy goes back to Vietnam AT LEAST.  So the miltiary knew that atrocities might happen, knew that said atrocities would act against the interests of their country, and yet did literally nothing.  Not even a paragraph in the manual saying "If you suspect a war crime by your own troops this is how you contact a special section of the MPs".  

Nor is this an isolated incident.  Consider the purchase of the F-35.  It's been clear for YEARS that this is disasterous for the US state, yet there have been no protests about it from serving members of the military, let alone resignations.  Instead various military officers have cheerlead for this useless and expensive vechicle in hopes of a fat contractor/lobbyist job later on.  A less patriotic occurance could not be conceived.  Oh wait it could, that would be the V-22 Osprey.  The F-35 at least hasn't killed anyone yet.  The Pentagon hasn't been audited for years despite clear indications that there is massive waste.  Clearly massive damage in the billions (or trillions, I don't know) of dollars is happening to the US, yet the military is doing nothing about this.  Stef managed to issue audited accounts for his business every year it was in operation*, yet the "patriots" in the US military couldn't manage to do it even once in the last decade.  One accountant attempting to chase down $300 million was asked why he cared so much about it.  The obvious answer is "it's $300 million" but the patriotic answer is "because that money is supposed to be for the good of the country".  But that's only a factor if there is a scintilla of patriotism in the military, and there isn't.  

 

If anyone can think of an area of society where people act patriotically in general, please reply.  Business, "public service", banking, even charity work.  Please prove me wrong.  

 

 

* I know because he's not in JAIL.

[David L]

Here's a question I'll throw into this thread, that may add some perspective on the topic...

What's more essential to you, your country or your humanity?

[Livemike]

 

Here's a question I'll throw into this thread, that may add some perspective on the topic...

What's more essential to you, your country or your humanity?

 

Well clearly in most cases it's neither.  When someone decides that the benefit of their particular group within a country (occupational, social, racial or any other type) trumps the interests of all over groups they clearly care neither for their country or the vast majority of the rest of humanity.  I would estimate this happens upwards of 99% of the time.