![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
elementof_riskIt's amazing the things that get done in the name of "patriotism" these days, isn't it? I suppose it always has been, though. The Nazi's called it patriotism when they rounded up the Jews. The Americans called it patriotism when they rounded up the Japanese. The Russians called it patriotism when Stalin went after his own people who did not agree with his regime. The United States Navy has a lovely inscription: Non Sibi Sed Patriae - Not Self but Country. Amazingly, the call to patriotism comes most in wartime. You must kill for your country. You must not give succor to the "enemy" -- even if they be women and children. They call it patriotism when they shoot a man and rape his wife. Patriotism when they bomb a village because it gives food to enemy soldiers. Patriotism when they lock people up for years without trial or counsel. It's wartime. Rights do not matter. How dare you question -- are you not a patriot? Do you not love your country? Are you a sympathizer with the enemy?
America is, at the moment, the worst offender, of course, stomping down it's own people in the name of patriotism. All sorts of names are called those who do not fully support the Commander in Chief--but the most vicious is the "unpatriotic." As if somehow questioning the morality of an action means that you do not love your country enough. Because, clearly, if you did love your country, you would support her no matter what. But for all that the Americans are those who have taken center stage with it this decade, it is not anything that is confined to them. No, it is global pandemic, a word thrown around to excuse the most heinous crimes and to silence the dissenters. It excuses innumerable wrongs, and only when one loses the war can one be called villain though the "enemy" is often just doing their "patriotic" duty even as the "good" guys are.
This is why I claim no country. I salute no flag. I stand for no anthem. None of it means anything and all of it is just a gilded cage on which the door slams shut come the first threat, locking in those who allow it. It is another trap, another way to exert control, to claim dominance, to own souls. And mine is my own. No "country" will take that from me. What I do, I do for my own reasons, and that is...so much more freedom than those I am aligned against.
America is, at the moment, the worst offender, of course, stomping down it's own people in the name of patriotism. All sorts of names are called those who do not fully support the Commander in Chief--but the most vicious is the "unpatriotic." As if somehow questioning the morality of an action means that you do not love your country enough. Because, clearly, if you did love your country, you would support her no matter what. But for all that the Americans are those who have taken center stage with it this decade, it is not anything that is confined to them. No, it is global pandemic, a word thrown around to excuse the most heinous crimes and to silence the dissenters. It excuses innumerable wrongs, and only when one loses the war can one be called villain though the "enemy" is often just doing their "patriotic" duty even as the "good" guys are.
This is why I claim no country. I salute no flag. I stand for no anthem. None of it means anything and all of it is just a gilded cage on which the door slams shut come the first threat, locking in those who allow it. It is another trap, another way to exert control, to claim dominance, to own souls. And mine is my own. No "country" will take that from me. What I do, I do for my own reasons, and that is...so much more freedom than those I am aligned against.
