Posted on 02/08/2015 6:04:26 PM PST by 2ndDivisionVet
Governments never fail to call on their flocks to "love their country," and make any sacrifice on its behalf, "sacrifice" being defined by politicians.
"Forward, the Light Brigade!" Was there a man dismay'd? Not tho' the soldier knew Someone had blunder'd: Theirs not to make reply, Theirs not to reason why, Theirs but to do and die: Into the valley of Death Rode the six hundred
~"The Charge of the Light Brigade," Alfred, Lord Tennyson
The reason for the venom directed at those of us who question American sniper Chris Kyle's status as a hero can be put into one word: nationalism.
Nationalism is a poison. It attacks the mind, short-circuits thinking, and makes self-destruction look appealing. Nationalism sows the seeds of hate and war. It makes the title warrior an honorific instead of the pejorative it ought to be.
We see naked ugly nationalism in many defenses of Kyle. Defenders appear to have but one operating principle: If Kyle was an American military man and the people he killed were not American, then he was a hero. Full stop. No other facts are relevant. It matters not that Kyle was a cog in an imperial military machine that waged a war of aggression on behalf of the ruling elite's geopolitical and economic interests, that he did his killing on foreign soil, and that no Iraqi had come to the United States seeking to harm him or other Americans. (Contrary to what Kyle defenders seem to believe, not one Iraqi was among the 19 hijackers on 9/11, although had that been otherwise, the murder of millions of other Iraqis and the displacement of millions more would not have been justified.) All that apparently matters to many Kyle fans is that this man was born in America, joined the American military, and faithfully obeyed orders to kill people he called savages.
That is what nationalism does to a human being.
The ugliness of nationalism is often perceptible even by those who harbor it and commit terrible acts as a result. So they rationalize. They don't openly cheer the killing of Iraqis because they are Iraqis (or Arabs or Muslims); rather they plead self-defense: if we don't kill them, they will kill us. Kyle and his comrades were defending America and Americans' freedom, his defenders say.
But if you've seen American Sniper, the movie based on Kyle's book, you heard Kyle's wife, Taya, reject that claim. I'm surprised that this bit of dialogue has been ignored (to my knowledge) in the voluminous writing about the movie. As Kyle gets ready for yet another tour in Iraq, his unhappy wife asks why he is going back. "For you," he says, and by extension, America.
"No you're not," she fires back.
He also invokes the welfare of the Iraqis, telling his wife that being away from home for another long stretch would not be a problem because their family could spare the time and the Iraqis could not. She didn't buy that line either. She is deeply disturbed that her husband would rather try to fix Iraq (as though he and his comrades could do that through military force) than look after his family.
It's curious that Taya Kyle (if this scene actually took place) had a clearer picture of the world than Kyle's vitriolic nationalist defenders, who praise the sniper for following orders without question. (One even approvingly alluded to Tennyson's poem.)
If not for nationalism, such contortions — the conjuring of imaginary threats, the conceit in aspiring to save a society one knows absolutely nothing about, the twisting of the warrior's ways into virtues — would be unnecessary. Things could be called what they are. Someone who swears an oath that in practical terms obliges him to kill whomever the current White House occupant tells him to kill, "asking nothing about the justice of [the] cause," would be called a cold-blooded contract killer rather than a hero.
Nationalism, to judge by how nationalists conduct themselves, is an unswerving religious-like devotion to the nation, construed as a quasi-mystical entity — "America" — that cannot be wrong and so has the authority to command reverence and obedience. The nation transcends particular political officeholders, but the government, or state, is integral to the entity. The nation (country) cannot be imagined without the state. It would not be the same thing. When an American nationalist thinks of his country, he thinks not merely of a land mass with distinctive features, the people (a diverse group indeed), and its history (a mixed bag) because that list does not fully capture what they mean by America.
Government represents and expresses the will and sentiment of the nation. (To be sure, a nationalist can think that the people have erred in picking their "leaders," in which case the nation is misrepresented and has to be "taken back.") The power of compartmentalization allows some people who think of themselves as individualists while seeing the nation in these corporate terms.
Let's remember that this quasi-mystical entity is what it is only because of countless contingent events effected by flawed human beings. The United States did not begin with 50 states, of course. Had events gone differently, it might have included some or all of Canada and none of what was once part of Mexico. It might have been without the Florida territory and the 828,000 square miles that constituted the Louisiana Purchase. The current boundaries were the result of (often bloody) human action but not entirely of human design. So it was with other nations. At one time, there were no nations as we think of them today.
"Forgetting, I would even go so far as to say historical error, is a crucial factor in the creation of a nation," Ernest Renan said in his famous 1882 lecture, "What Is a Nation?," "which is why progress in historical studies often constitutes a danger for [the principle of] nationality. Indeed, historical enquiry brings to light deeds of violence which took place at the origin of all political formations…. Unity is always effected by means of brutality." (Ludwig von Mises praised Renan and his lecture in Omnipotent Government.)
This integral relationship between nation and state is why nationalists reject claims that one can love one's country while despising the government. That's impossible by their definition of country. To oppose the government is to oppose the country. You may oppose a particular president, but don't dare oppose the military. Now, you can try to redefine country to make it something properly lovable, but you won't persuade a nationalist.
It's no accident that governments never fail to call on their flocks to "love their country," by which they mean: be willing to make any sacrifice on its behalf, with "sacrifice" defined by politicians. Instilling nationalism is always the primary mission of government and its schools because, as Ernst Gellner wrote in Nations and Nationalism, "It is nationalism which engenders nations, and not the other way round."
That mission is behind the near-compulsory recitations of the Pledge of Allegiance (written by an avowed collectivist), salutes to "the troops" for "their service" on any and every occasion, and the playing of the national anthem and other nationalist songs at sporting events. It's what's behind the repeated, compulsive assurances that "America is the greatest country on earth." The ruling elite understands that love of country will inevitably find its application in fealty to the government, no matter what dissenters may say.
Some of us wish to distinguish nationalism from patriotism, but I don't think this works. Patriothas a lineage that includes the Greek words for "fatherland," patris; "of one's fathers," patrios; and "father," pater. This indicates the country's parental relationship to the citizen. It can't simply mean "land of one's fathers" because people believe they should feel patriotic about lands their fathers never set foot in. We're back to that quasi-mystical entity, America. Hence my definition of patriot: one who, no matter the difficulties, places power above party.
I understand the love of the place one knew as a child. I understand the love of home, of family, of community, of neighbors, and of people with whom one has shared experiences and beliefs. I understand the love of virtuous principles as expressed in historical documents (such as the Declaration of Independence). That kind of love does not ignite hate for the Other or create admiration for the warrior who enjoys killing the Other on order. That takes the poison of nationalism and an obsession with the nation it creates.
Liberty can only exist under the protection of a strong nation.
They are usually not this crazy, yet Reason seems to have gone ‘round the bend of late. Some libertarians seem to have latched on to the same moral equivalence expressed by Party Secretary Obama at the National Prayer Breakfast. Have even the small l libertarians been lately coopted by the Left?
This dude sounds like a leftist. Who but lefties use phrases like "the Other"?
He should be encouraged to leave!
This duckweed doesn’t get it! We love fight for and love our country because of our love for God, our Constitution, our people and liberty. Our oath is to defend the Constitution, not politicians!
Indeed, nationalism is toxic and tends to cause wars, but so is its opposite, internationalism, which has motivated quite a lot of wars and murder in several of its guises down the years.
As in all things in the fallen world, striking the right balance and falling off the royal road neither on the left nor on the right is tricky.
Concur. The author thinks himself a great thinker..
Weird how the Progressives take issue with one’s sense of duty and sacrifice to protect and defend, yet demand duty and sacrifice to provide for common good.
It’s getting to the point where they are not worthy of any sense of duty and sacrifice for their cause. They will not know how to provide for themselves. Pity
"Breathes there a man with soul so dead
Who never to himself hath said:
'This is my own, my native land'?
Whose heart hath ne'er within him burned
As home his footsteps he hath turned,
From wandering on a foreign strand?
If such there breathe, go mark him well;
For him no minstrel raptures swell;
High though his titles, proud his name,
Boundless his wealth as wish can claim;
Despite those titles, power and pelf,
The wretch concentred all in self,
Living, shall forfeit fair renown,
And, doubly dying, shall go down
To the vile dust from whence he sprung,
Yet another parasite crapping on our nation and those who defend us.
All right, douche. You hate your country. You hate the men and women who stand their watches on the wall and defend your pathetic ass. That’s OK. You’re free to do that. But a lot of us — millions, judging by the success of the movie — don’t. And just as you’re free to hate it and run it down, we’re free to stand and salute it.
So shut your whiny, sniveling, chickensh-t blowhole and let us go about our business. Or risk getting a fist pushed down your throat when you shoot your mouth off to the wrong guy at the wrong time.
Lets see how nationalistic the author is when the enemy is at the gates? lets see how patriotic this clown is when IS is on American soil?
Nationalism *may* indeed be a poison, but internationalism is decay and death itself.
Nations exist for reasons. Internationalism is unnatural, and is forced on people to their detriment. Internationalists are scoundrels and tyrants who hate the very idea of nations.
I saw American Sniper last night. What a fantastic movie! It was about strong families, love of God, love of country, strong fathers mentoring and loving thier wives and children. It also showed dads hunting with thier kids and exhibiting loving disclipline. It showed strong self-sacrifice for others. In other words, it was everything libs hate about us. Clint Eastwood did a fantastic job!
“Liberty can only exist under the protection of a strong nation.”
You mean like China? What exactly is a “strong nation?” Sounds distinctly totalitarian to me.
The only threat to anyone’s liberty is government, especially a, “strong,” one.
The writer is a self described “left-libertarian”:
http://sheldonfreeassociation.blogspot.com/2006/07/why-left-libertarian.html
These guys are an especially far out and conflicted breed of libertarian. Other notable left-libertarians include Noam Chomsky. So yes, this is unusually crazy stuff.
BTW, something that’s not spoken of very often but that’s important for understanding libertarianism is that it has a left and a right wing.
There have always been plenty of left-libertarians. They share the distaste for Christian mores that you find on the left. Ayn Rand demonstrated it in her writings and especially in how she ran her little Manhattan cult.
But Murray Rothbard was a right-libertarian, and while Rothbard was still alive Lew Rockwell was one as well.
There are many interpretations of the topic even in Enlightenment times, Locke to Hegel, but it was no secret to the ancients. Dulce et decorum est pro patria mori, for example, Horace's summation that was bitterly mocked by Wilfred Owen (before he did end up dying for his country), was a notation of a widely-held Roman ideal. Certain of the Greek demagogues invoked something like it with respect to the city/state. It defeated Marx - his insistence that class solidarity across the international proletariat would trump nationalistic identifications was crushed during the first World War, when German and Russian working classes slaughtered one another instead of rising up against their ruling class masters. Ironically - the author would deny it furiously - we get more of a whiff of Marx in this incoherent bit:
Kyle was a cog in an imperial military machine that waged a war of aggression on behalf of the ruling elite's geopolitical and economic interests...
Ruling elite, check. Only within the space of two sentences we have:
Someone who swears an oath that in practical terms obliges him to kill whomever the current White House occupant tells him to kill, "asking nothing about the justice of [the] cause," would be called a cold-blooded contract killer rather than a hero.
That oath was, in fact, to protect and defend the Constitution, not to blindly obey an office-holder, and suddenly the author spins 180 degrees:
Nationalism, to judge by how nationalists conduct themselves, is an unswerving religious-like devotion to the nation, construed as a quasi-mystical entity — "America" — that cannot be wrong and so has the authority to command reverence and obedience. The nation transcends particular political officeholders...
You really can't have it both ways. Kyle can't simultaneously be a cold-blooded contract killer working for Bush II and a devotee to a quasi-mystical entity whose authority sanctions killing. He could, of course, be a very confused fellow but I would gently suggest that it's much more likely that the author is.
The real difficulty is that the author can't make up his mind which abstraction really applies: an "imperialist" war is not a "nationalist" one, there were no colonies, no imperium, the United States' stake in the thing bore no national advantage at all and was a very expensive commitment to another abstraction named collective security, and, on the other end of the philosophical scale, cold-blooded contract killers are the opposite of nationalists, whatever definition he's using at the moment. Perhaps if the author suspended his attempts to intellectualize the matter and bothered actually to meet a few military members to discover what motivates them, he might spare us and himself such nonsense.
Ayn Rand wasn’t a left-libertarian. Her outlook was too self-centered and egoistic. Left-libertarians are collectivistic bleeding hearts who have improbably latched onto anarcho-capitalism as a way of fighting their great enemy, the corporations. They would be standard statist-collectivists like the rest of their lefty comrades except they believe the state has been hopelessly corrupted by the corporations and exists only to serve corporate interests. So they’re stuck trying to implement their leftist utopia without a state. It’s weird stuff but it’s not Ayn Rand.
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