2016 Apr 16
by WIMARSHANA
ONE DAY WHEN COUNTRIES ARE LONG DONE WITH (and it is surely going to happen) humans will look back on patriotism as many do today at racism—as misguided, dangerous and backward. You see, patriotism belongs to a distinct class of human irrationality which we can label in-group idiocy. Some other members of this group along with the aforementioned racism include, amongst many others, sports fandom, brand loyalty and schoolism. Now, obviously, some varieties of in-group idiocy have far more potential to harm than others. Yet, regardless of their potential to harm, they are all irrational—to be held in their power makes you an idiot.
A group is just a collective of people. No sooner a group is formed or when a collective of people is identified and labelled a group, there is a strong tendency to ascribe attributes to this group. This tendency exists both amongst members and non-members. Now here the rational mind must be careful. Firstly, it must establish if these attributes are actually shared by all or most of the members of the group. Secondly, it must establish whether these shared attributes are desirable attributes for the group’s members and society as a whole. Even if both these conditions are met, the rational mind cannot conclude forthwith that loyalty to this group on the part of its members is socially positive—a third condition must be met. It must be true that the existence of this group together with other similar such groups (this class of groups) benefits the members of these groups and/or society as a whole. If this third condition is not met, then both the members of these groups and/or society as a whole will be better served by disbanding this class of groups altogether.
These three essentials will make a lot more sense when applied to the aforementioned candidates for in-group idiocy. Let’s firstly take schools and schoolism. Many schools are famous for ascribing to themselves splendid attributes such as grit and bravery and leadership and refinement. Yet, if you have been to any of these schools, you will soon find not that these attributes are non-existent but they are, just like in the rest of the population, normally distributed. Some students are brave, while some are cowards. Some are smart, while some are morons. Some are refined, while some are louts. Some are fat, while some are thin. If the concentration of certain attributes ascribed to a given school is greater in that particular school compared to others it is primarily due to the social class from which these elite schools draw their student population.
Importantly, there is no evidence that these schools as compared to other schools seek to inculcate the attributes which they so proudly hold up as their own. Hence every school is just a saucepan scooping up water from the same river—each will have a similar array and distribution of fish. So if your loyalty to your school is because of some belief in these splendid attributes, the school in question better be Harvard or Oxford or the like. Why? Because, these schools clearly (with a few exceptions) select for intelligence or at least academic achievement, and your high school mostly does not.
Similarly, sports fandom often fails the test of rationally justified loyalty on the very first essential. Let us say you are a diehard Manchester United fan. You became so because of their entertaining and winning brand of football in their glory days (their desirable attributes). Now let us say that the current team is neither entertaining nor winning (they no longer possess desirable attributes). What rational reason do you have to be loyal to them given that some rival team is both entertaining and winning? Indeed, if you are also a fan of the game of football itself, this will just keep you from enjoying the best soccer—simply because it is being played by a bitter rival.
The case of brand loyalty too fails on the first essential. Apple is often ascribed the attribute of user-friendliness. If however a succession of Apple products fail to be user-friendly, is not remaining doggedly loyal to Apple irrational?
Patriotism fails on the second and third essential for rational group loyalty, and can fail on the first. Due to the power of culture, most people in a country are likely to possess, albeit in varying degrees, certain attributes. Yes, most Japanese are hardworking and most Sri-Lankans are lazy and so on. Yet, on certain other attributes such as intelligence great variation can and does exist within countries. However, even considering the attributes that are widely shared by nationals of a given country, satisfying the second essential becomes deeply problematic. For patriotism demands that you are loyal to your country regardless of whether the attributes of its people are positive or negative for themselves or others. It demands, as the saying goes, ‘my country, right or wrong!’
Let us say that you happen to be a national of a country where all the attributes (this must necessarily be a fictitious country) are positive. Nevertheless, regardless of how utopian your country is, the whole of humanity will still be better off if there were no such thing as countries whatsoever—that is, if the entire class was abolished altogether. Why, you may ask? The reasons are numerous but I will outline two major ones: economics and war. Without tariff and currency barriers, world economic growth will greatly increase and with it the overall material well-being of humanity. As vitally, many (though not all) the roots of conflict will be radically eliminated leading not to perfect peace but more peace.
Admittedly, abolishing countries might have some unintended negative consequences but this in no way weakens the argument against patriotism. For if we, hypothetically, assume that absolutely no negative consequences were to result from abolishing countries—that only immensely positive outcomes would result— still for all, diehard patriots would never allow it. For instinctive in-group loyalty in general and patriotism in particular have nothing to do with rationality, and everything to do with a primal evolutionary urge in-built within all of us. If in-group loyalty is so primal, so natural, you might question, why are we trying to remove it from ourselves? And whether we can ever hope to be successful in removing it? Well, as much as our animalistic instincts are natural to us human beings, unlike lower animals, it is just as natural for the human brain to seek ways to improve our evolutionary lot by revolutionizing our social organization for our own betterment beyond the state of nature. In other words, unlike animals, our nature is not static. In part at least, it is dynamic—and effecting this change is within our control, not evolutions. Everywhere around you, you will notice that humans have subdued (at least partially) our primal urges. For the most part, even without the likelihood of punishment, men do not force themselves sexually on women, people do not steal and are not habitually violent.
If you believe that we live in a global village, then you must accept that we need to create global citizens with global values to optimize the potential of this brave new world. Do not worry so much about your culture and your country—they will not disappear from the thoughtscape of humanity. The Sumerians, Egyptians, Romans and countless other civilizations disappeared many millennia before the advent of the internet. Yet we have substantial knowledge of their contributions to the richness of humanity. This same global village (or perhaps better put, global supercomputer) that is rapidly dismantling your country and your culture will preserve it for all posterity like no other successor could ever do in the past—for this its fundamental nature.
Man is a social animal. Thus being a part of groups satisfies a deep-seated yearning for belongingness that is immensely fulfilling. We need not forsake this fulfillment. Instead, what we need to do is ensure that we free ourselves from the grasp of malignant groups and join at the least benign groups and ideally useful groups. Patriotism is a primal urge that tugs us towards the malignant class of groups known as countries. And so, as we have done with so many other instincts, if we cannot completely vanquish it, we must strive to continually battle the primal patriotic urge. If you do not, well in laymen’s terms you are an idiot, and in evolutionary terms you are closer to an animal than those who have long since abandoned patriotism for globalism.
Whether you went to Royal or St. Thomas’s, St. Bridget’s or Ladies College, AIS or CIS, Ananda or Nalanda, your school was a set of buildings, a premises. It admitted people based on certain social criteria, and gave them a location to do what they would have done if they were put together in any other location. Do not confuse and conflate the experiences you had and what you learnt with the uniqueness of your school—these were the joys, ups and downs and learning experiences of any childhood. Most certainly, understand that even if your school tried to be special, it does not necessarily follow that you are special unless your school executed a determined policy of kicking out those who did not possess its desired specialness, like say the Sri-Lankan cricket team does to cricketers who are not up to international standard.
THERE IS NOTHING SPECIAL ABOUT YOUR SCHOOL. How could it be special when every meaningful element in it—teachers, parents, students and administrators—are all drawn from the exact same river (Sri-Lankan culture) that other schools draw from. But my school has a long history and cherished unique traditions, you say. You are right, but this just makes your school’s past different, not its present. And importantly, this history was created by people completely culturally different from you—namely the British. As for traditions, you unthinkingly reenact them. The cultural values that these traditions were meant to hold aloft and reaffirm are completely alien to you—to this extent you are dumb puppets acting out something you don’t understand. A real difference does exist between elite schools and the rest. Elite schools mostly let only upper classes through their hallowed gates, and hence reflect the subculture of these classes. This is a matter of social class—it has nothing to do with your particular school. Indeed, because there are several such elite schools, your particular elite school cannot be unique.
To have some affinity for your school and to support it can be harmless. As long as it is a light affection for good times and friends and not a mindless, slavish reverence to a building with imagined magical attributes.
THERE IS SOMETHING SPECIAL ABOUT SRI-LANKAN CULTURE—BUT IN A BAD WAY. As I have dissected in great depth in Colombo: A Critical Introspection, Sri-Lankan culture is the singular reason for Sri-Lanka being permanently mired in the Third World. This means that being patriotic to Sri-Lanka equates to being loyal to a backward, misery-inducing set of values. So I am not a Sri-Lankan; I am a human being.
THE CGTW IS ENTIRELY
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