Nationalism is
irrationalizable, undebatable and sacred even if lacking at times. It's a
whole religion by itself. Unlike working up to it, with reasons why it
must exist, it is blindly assumed and then dictates how you behave
towards it. See, I get it. This is nationalism - nation, people,
country, culture, roots and those who protect it and ensure it stays
intact. There's a sort of a natal attachment to it which even the most
reasoning naysayers can't deny. But, can it really allowed to flourish,
as freely as it does? Are all the ideas it entails paying the right
homage, even if not reasonable or completely open-eyed, to the core
concept?
When you're trying to explain something for better clarity, it's normal to take an example outside of the argument's purview to make your point, it being a comparison. Sometimes you hit a roadblock when someone tells you that"'it's not like that. You won't understand", which defeats the whole purpose. The entire goal is to try to understand it by relating the idea to something similar and hopefully find a similar paradigm and make better sense of it. Of course, people do have a right to abide by the ideas that they wish to, even if they don't add up.
It would seem that we need a new paradigm to understand it better. Let me suggest one. Home. If you're confused, don't worry. I'll have your attention soon enough. Home, like your home, or your house. Now, you grew up in your home, just the way you grew up in India, the cause of our nationalism. In either case, you belong, are from, and identify with nowhere else. It's your primary identity - where you're from. If it was revoked you'd be homeless with no other place that is home to you.
Being born in that place, you also make that place. As miniscule or large as it may be, the evolution of your home over the years is something that you, by default, build. The place is you and you are it, equally along with every other member. You were born in it. You will die in it. You will also take charge of it and lead it forward as it reflects the way you and its other members evolve. You own it, equally. You owe it no favours for any kind of privilege of calling home. It would be never be that very home, today, without you.
Ditto with your country. You have been born and bred an Indian by chance of it being your home. You were not "raised" by India. You weren't homeless and in the dumps when Bharat Mata 'gave' you a home you didn't even deserve to begin with, which you should be adversely grateful for. You are India and this is your home with all the rights that come along with it.
In your home, you are brought up in a particular tradition and culture when you are young, which becomes your primary experience. As you grow up and think for yourself, you ideally choose between various degrees of *honouring that tradition because it becomes your own honour, questioning it to align it relevantly with your growing identity as a person and the better principles of life as you discover them, or simply keeping it a religious distance and showed as much general respect as you can to your heritage. In case you aren't allowed one of these options in your home, **your mind hasn't been allowed to make itself up freely and you exercise an unfree mindset that you have not chosen and don't question for the better.
Ditto with your country. You could be bred in India but you don't have to agree with the way you were brought up. It's your India to change or keep and you don't need a majority vote on that. By making your choice and exercising the views and actions that come along with it, you do that everyday! The update happens real-time.
The nationalist view is best defined by *first or **fourth response to what we were taught and told. Those who hold it aren't open to an open mind about home and country and the gates of their ideas about it are shut. If country is indeed home, it gives us far more freedom that they'd like to think they and us should have: far more freedom that their closed minds can clearly handle.
Regardless of your choice, you never diss your home unless you are woke enough to address what you see is wrong about it. Saying what you think is wrong about it, just as equally as someone has the right to think otherwise, isn't dissing your home. You say what you say because you believe it needs to be woken up. The ones who disagree don't have to agree with you and it's your home, still. Even if you were, if it was a home given to you, it comes with all those rights. Once it's home to someone new who isn't born there too, those rights follow. Ditto with your country.
When you're trying to explain something for better clarity, it's normal to take an example outside of the argument's purview to make your point, it being a comparison. Sometimes you hit a roadblock when someone tells you that"'it's not like that. You won't understand", which defeats the whole purpose. The entire goal is to try to understand it by relating the idea to something similar and hopefully find a similar paradigm and make better sense of it. Of course, people do have a right to abide by the ideas that they wish to, even if they don't add up.
It would seem that we need a new paradigm to understand it better. Let me suggest one. Home. If you're confused, don't worry. I'll have your attention soon enough. Home, like your home, or your house. Now, you grew up in your home, just the way you grew up in India, the cause of our nationalism. In either case, you belong, are from, and identify with nowhere else. It's your primary identity - where you're from. If it was revoked you'd be homeless with no other place that is home to you.
Being born in that place, you also make that place. As miniscule or large as it may be, the evolution of your home over the years is something that you, by default, build. The place is you and you are it, equally along with every other member. You were born in it. You will die in it. You will also take charge of it and lead it forward as it reflects the way you and its other members evolve. You own it, equally. You owe it no favours for any kind of privilege of calling home. It would be never be that very home, today, without you.
Ditto with your country. You have been born and bred an Indian by chance of it being your home. You were not "raised" by India. You weren't homeless and in the dumps when Bharat Mata 'gave' you a home you didn't even deserve to begin with, which you should be adversely grateful for. You are India and this is your home with all the rights that come along with it.
In your home, you are brought up in a particular tradition and culture when you are young, which becomes your primary experience. As you grow up and think for yourself, you ideally choose between various degrees of *honouring that tradition because it becomes your own honour, questioning it to align it relevantly with your growing identity as a person and the better principles of life as you discover them, or simply keeping it a religious distance and showed as much general respect as you can to your heritage. In case you aren't allowed one of these options in your home, **your mind hasn't been allowed to make itself up freely and you exercise an unfree mindset that you have not chosen and don't question for the better.
Ditto with your country. You could be bred in India but you don't have to agree with the way you were brought up. It's your India to change or keep and you don't need a majority vote on that. By making your choice and exercising the views and actions that come along with it, you do that everyday! The update happens real-time.
The nationalist view is best defined by *first or **fourth response to what we were taught and told. Those who hold it aren't open to an open mind about home and country and the gates of their ideas about it are shut. If country is indeed home, it gives us far more freedom that they'd like to think they and us should have: far more freedom that their closed minds can clearly handle.
Regardless of your choice, you never diss your home unless you are woke enough to address what you see is wrong about it. Saying what you think is wrong about it, just as equally as someone has the right to think otherwise, isn't dissing your home. You say what you say because you believe it needs to be woken up. The ones who disagree don't have to agree with you and it's your home, still. Even if you were, if it was a home given to you, it comes with all those rights. Once it's home to someone new who isn't born there too, those rights follow. Ditto with your country.
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