The Case
Against Patriotism
By Nick Kreitman
Since the attack on 9/11 our leaders have commenced a
constant campaign of arousing the concept of patriotism
to the American nation. There has also been a correlating
campaign of denouncing those who are "anti-American".
The question immediately surface to any analytical individual
would be is pledging allegiance to the concept of the
American state, or any state for that matter, worthwhile.
The statement that throughout the history of man the
purpose of the nation-state has been to benefit those
of the ruling class is a truism. Regardless of whether
the government says it is "for by and of the people",
or whether it declares it is the "Democratic People's
Republic". Regardless of whatever rhetorical facade
the government attempts to justify itself with, the cold
truth is that governments are tools of the ruling class.
So if patriotism is not associating oneself with the government,
what is it? Some claim it to be associating themselves
with the history of the people united. Alright, let's
investigate whether American history is something to be
proud of, and we can investigate whether it has been dominated
by the ruling classes of the respective time periods.
Contrary to patriotic opinion, America is no different.
James Madison, the founder of the American Federalist
system stated that the purpose of the revolutionary government
was to "protect the minority of the opulent".
Has the Madisonian idealistic been realized by our government
that is supposedly "for by and of the people"?
Again this is another truism. The American Revolution
transferred power from the landed aristocracy ruling class
in the British parliament to the landed aristocracy ruling
class in America, who were soon usurped by the industrial-capitalist.
Immediately the government "for by and of the people",
continued one of the most brutal campaigns of ethnic cleansing
of the native people on the North American Continent.
The concept of white superiority over the "Red Man"
succeeded where Nazi Germany failed and managed to annihilate
an entire culture and assimilate the survivors into the
mainstream society.
Liberty was an alien concept to millions of slaves that
were deemed property by the government "for by and
of the people". Madison's "minority of the opulent"
was the vast majority of slave masters, the vast majority
of Americans did not have any stake in enslaving human
beings but the government upheld the statues regardless.
It was not through the efforts of the abstract organ of
enslavement, the American government, that the Africans
won their freedom but through the compassion of abolitionists.
Defenders of partiotism connect the beliefs of liberty
and justice to the American government. The thesis that
the values of American government are liberty and justice
can be tested to see if it holds water. Obviously it did
not mean liberty an justice for the American Indians.
It has never meant liberty and justice for the laboring
classes of America. They continue to be exploited to this
day. It did not mean justice to the victims of the Mexican
war, or the Spanish-American war where the lust for wealth
and power weren't even attempted to be concealed. In these
times, all that was needed was the concept of manifest
destiny and you could slaughter as many as you wanted.
This is even before the "modern corruption of morals"
so oft repeated in the media. THen the genocide of the
Fillipino's was initated, because our country needed a
"Sphere of influence in Asia". Did the farmer
need a sphere of influence in Asia? No but the Capitalist
who sent the farmer's children under the pretext of patriotism
certainly needed sphere of influence.
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