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“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 happy

“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 happy to defend all its faults and follies tooth and nail, thus reimbursing himself for his own inferiority.” ― Arthur Schopenhauer edit: it's easy to read this pridefully yourself ("i have other things to be proud of and therefore i'm immune from such petty things"). i think the most significant part of the quotation is the last part - you can derive pride in direct proportion to how invested you are. most people (those that aren't nihilists) have such things that function for them in exactly the same way. it's ultimately a sublimation urge -- we prove ourselves insofar as we sacrifice. if nationalism vexes you then i challenge you to reflect on your own loyalties/commitments.

deleted 7y ago
[deleted]
danans 7y ago
> if nationalism vexes you then i challenge you to reflect on your own loyalties/commitments. I agree, but just because the psychological mechanisms that give rise to both humanism and nationalism are related, doesn't mean that we can't make reasonable judgments about which is better than the other, especially when the nationalism is of an ethnic or racial variety.
- throwlaplace 7y ago
  >doesn't mean that we can't make reasonable judgments about which is better than the other i'm not advocating for reserving judgment. i'm simply saying that being proud of yourself for not being nationalist is pointless and if you want to understand nationalists (to whatever end -- even eradication of nationalism) then study yourself in analogy as a proxy for the other.
  - acephal 7y ago
    Or simply, be self-critical, which is the number one trait disappearing from public conversation, if not for the fact that being self-critical is seen as weakness, perhaps the reason you're reiterating yourself
mistermann 7y ago
"Perception is reality." - Lee Atwater "One has not only an ability to perceive the world but an ability to alter one's perception of it; more simply, one can change things by the manner in which one looks at them." - Tom Robbins "One may reasonably ask: Why do people cling to the values and practices of the past, when they so obviously no longer work? Long-standing thought patterns are hard to overcome because they often appear to serve the interests of the individual, and old ways of thinking are simpler and easier to handle. In a two-valued way of thinking, as in good and bad, right and wrong, love and hate, cause and effect, very little logical analysis is involved." - Jacque Fresco

deleted 7y ago

[deleted]

danans 7y ago

> if nationalism vexes you then i challenge you to reflect on your own loyalties/commitments. I agree, but just because the psychological mechanisms that give rise to both humanism and nationalism are related, doesn't mean that we can't make reasonable judgments about which is better than the other, especially when the nationalism is of an ethnic or racial variety.

throwlaplace 7y ago
>doesn't mean that we can't make reasonable judgments about which is better than the other i'm not advocating for reserving judgment. i'm simply saying that being proud of yourself for not being nationalist is pointless and if you want to understand nationalists (to whatever end -- even eradication of nationalism) then study yourself in analogy as a proxy for the other.
- acephal 7y ago
  Or simply, be self-critical, which is the number one trait disappearing from public conversation, if not for the fact that being self-critical is seen as weakness, perhaps the reason you're reiterating yourself

mistermann 7y ago

"Perception is reality." - Lee Atwater "One has not only an ability to perceive the world but an ability to alter one's perception of it; more simply, one can change things by the manner in which one looks at them." - Tom Robbins "One may reasonably ask: Why do people cling to the values and practices of the past, when they so obviously no longer work? Long-standing thought patterns are hard to overcome because they often appear to serve the interests of the individual, and old ways of thinking are simpler and easier to handle. In a two-valued way of thinking, as in good and bad, right and wrong, love and hate, cause and effect, very little logical analysis is involved." - Jacque Fresco