> became a major faction of the Civil War This is a weird edge case. You don't need to know proximal cultures b/c one day they might come to rape and pillage y

> became a major faction of the Civil War This is a weird edge case. You don't need to know proximal cultures b/c one day they might come to rape and pillage you. That's not a sane way to structure your priorities. > A Korean or Uzbek doesn't decide our president. South Dakotan voters do You see how arbitrary that is? And.. I just don't care...? They have their own choice I have my own. I just respect they probably have different interesting and priorities and they can do their own thing. I don't structure what I spend my time on around presidents. Maybe the president isn't to my liking.. whatever. It has incredibly little impact on my daily life tbh. (the only time I've felt otherwise was during COVID) I have more important things to think about. > further incentivizes partisanism, and regional alienation. Again.. I don't care. I don't want to have a cultural convergence with people that are far away, who I never interact with and who have a near-zero impact on my life. People don't have obligations towards their nation-state. > The US has significant cultural and ethnic diversity, and assuming the culture in all 50 states is the same "American" culture is dumb I don't assume that. I just have zero interest in them. They do their own stuff, I do my own. I don't feel it's a good use of my time for me to know about them I get your overall point - but I just think in one's personal life, one has much much much more important things to focus on than some abstract duty to the unity of one's nation. If you like Bruce Lee and Bob Marley and don't give a shit about people in the next province over then there isn't anything wrong with that. It's not something to get all sad about and write blogs about. There in part the author is arguing that people never had the choice to learn about their neighbors - but the subtext seems to suggest people just wanted to enjoy Reggae