Michael D Pendleton

9 June, 2019

Patriotism is Treason

- Human Identity in One World  

Introduction

           Patriotism is like racism and sexism. Like race and gender, patriotism is not a good reason to identify exclusively or semi exclusively with the group, in this case the nation, or to treat people of other nations differently. It’s just another 'ism', as morally wrong as racism and sexism. This piece  is  based on that simple truth.

The world is experiencing an outbreak of identity politics, for the most part nation, race, religion, gender, or socio-economic group based. This crisis of identity explains much of the rise of populism and the contemporary difficulty of governing in many democracies. This piece argues humanness trumps nation, race, religion, gender and socio-economic group. Humanity has a higher call on our allegiance than all these identities.

           If you’re looking for naive, bleary eyed internationalism you won't find it here. World federation, government or even UN Security Council minus the veto is decades, perhaps even a century away. What you will find is the case against patriotism and what can sensibly be done to move individual's  allegiance from country to world.

          Regrettably the threat of a nuclear exchange is back in the global psyche. The Bulletin of Atomic Scientist’s Doomsday Clock is now closer to midnight than at any time since 1953 when the United States developed the hydrogen bomb. Mutually assured destruction is no longer certain with new technology which has spawned the ability to shoot down nuke carrying missiles and new missiles which can evade dome protection. Nuclear war seems winnable again. A nuclear war might be motivated by ideology, perceived threats or strangely, that old chestnut, religion. But historically it's usually accompanied by declining economic fortunes, and it can only realistically occur under the flags of nations. Weaken the allegiance nationality commands and you correspondingly weaken the likelihood of nuclear Armageddon. Attempting to weaken national identity and move forward towards global identity in the interests of the survival of our species is the essence of this piece.

       The pages which follow do not merely brand the espousal of strident patriotism as treason against  humanity, rather they condemn as treason the patriotism that flows automatically from mere citizenship of a nation. Something we have no real choice about, at least initially, when born in a particular country. Passive nationality is as dangerous as the more virulent kind espoused in the Chinese school child singing patriotic hymns, the Russian child singing their equivalent or Americans of all ages reciting the pledge of allegiance (interestingly written by a French national).

At birth the vast majority of us become citizens of the country we are born in. We are bound by the rules of that country but all countries share in common the rule that our allegiance must be exclusively to it, not people in other countries, unless specifically allowed. One such permission is the acquisition of multiple nationality but the nation  always retains the right to revoke this permission. This book seeks to persuade that this exclusive allegiance to a country, just like racism or sexism, is not a good reason to discriminate between people. To discriminate between those to whom we are required to owe a high loyalty and those we don't. That high loyalty of allegiance may even require us to kill foreign nationals, it's not merely a preference for fellow nationals. That’s what makes nationalism or patriotism different to all other identities or claims on our allegiance. It requires us to kill or be killed for the nation. If this book fails to persuade the fault lies with the author, not the idea. There are few things I don’t have doubts about but one I have no doubts about  that patriotism will be universally condemned in the future.

Of course you as a person are free to a degree to treat all people equally, to lavish your time, affections, and wealth without discrimination. But as a citizen you are required to be loyal to the country of which you are a citizen. You can be required to be exclusively loyal to that country. You can be told what countries not to visit, who you must report to your national authorities, and who you must treat as an enemy. You may be required to lay down your life in armed struggle against those the country deems to be enemy combatants. It's not just that you are required to favour fellow citizens, rather you may be required to kill foreign nationals as a condition of your citizenship.We can choose to be racist or sexist but merely by being a citizen of a country you are by force of law required to stand for that country above all others.

Discrimination has become a much misunderstood idea. Reasoning of course begins with discrimination, rational discrimination, something often overlooked in a world which is ostensibly  and otherwise laudably anti discrimination. We discriminate between the like and the unlike. Genus and differentia is how we make sense of the world. Classification, models, theories, typologies, etc all use discrimination and are contrived  against the background of the convention that we must not contradict ourselves, a convention otherwise known as logic. Discrimination is a tool of rational reasoning.

Discrimination thus is of the essence of intelligent thought, we even talk of discriminating taste. Children are for most purposes not to be treated as adult, airline pilots as bus drivers, teachers as students, surgeons as mechanics, strangers as friends, etc, though many in fact do treat them as equal because of the pervasive over used sentiment of anti discrimination which, however otherwise praiseworthy, in this context is simply irrational. Discriminating between citizen and foreigner, however, is for most purposes based on no good reason.  Using nationality as a ground of discriminating amongst people is arbitrary and therefore unjust. Most citizens are born into a country in the same way as they are born into a particular race, combination of races, gender or combination of genders. It's an accident of birth. Citizenship is no different to racism and sexism.

There are of course different levels of abstraction amongst subjects of discrimination. These are dictated by different reasons for discrimination. If the abstraction level is maturity, skill, training, intelligence and intimacy then all the examples of discrimination in the paragraph above (child/ adult, airline pilots/bus drivers, teachers/students, surgeons/mechanics, strangers/friends), make sense. So perhaps do certain attributes of citizen and foreigner. But at the level of abstraction of respect as a person, or entitlements or deserts, the foreigner is denied too much, even his life if my country is at war with hers. Equally lethal, foreigners have no claim on your countries concern or surplus, it's natural resources and wealth however disproportionate to theirs, have merely a claim in charity.

That patriotism and nationalism, here defined to include passive citizenship, has had its day is another of those inconvenient truths. Like the need for economically painful, concerted international initiatives to ameliorate environmental degradation, most fair minded people, free of partisan short term self interest, would concede the demise of national allegiance once they have heard the arguments. The first part of this book is the argument. The second part is what can be done about it.

Like Hans Christian Anderson's tale the 'Emperors New Clothes' national allegiance is not really there except in the minds of his and it's subjects. Once national allegiance is subjected to scrutiny, just like the emperor it is naked, naked self interest. My country right or wrong and always the last refuge of the scoundrel.

This book is not an attack on patriots as people. It is a refutation of arguments in favour of patriotism, national allegiance and citizenship. Most loyal citizens are animated by a concern for others. There is no convincing argument against acting out of a concern for others (unless you trade egoism for ethics as some libertarian thinkers like Ayn Rand come dangerously close to). Concern for others, or altruism, is the highest of human motives. The argument here is for an extended notion of 'others', beyond fellow citizens to an equal concern for all fellow humans. Note that qualifier, equal. You can't be a loyal citizen and equally concerned for the welfare of citizens and non citizens.  That non citizens count less is a basic demand of national allegiance.

Without that extension to all peoples, national allegiance in the 21st Century is treason on humanity. It's betrays all humans in favour of a comparatively small group of fellow nationals. It is no different to racism. Not just is humanity betrayed by national allegiance to the agony of torn or burning flesh and the wrenching deaths of millions of loved ones in inevitable wars but its mentality of border control and homelands, citizens and aliens, makes more difficult the opportunity to strive for and attain a better, more diverse and geographically broader life. The Ancient Greek philosopher Terence's aphorism 'no human is alien to me' becomes 'no alien is human to me'.

Regrettably it's not a question of if there is another world war but when. I'm getting on and time is running out for me but nuclear world war, is inevitable if largely unqualified national allegiance persists. It will be a tragedy for your children, my children and all the non human inhabitants of this planet. It’s wonderful how environmental awareness has blossomed across the planet but  imagine if we ignored pollution for centuries. That could not have worse outcomes than a single limited nuclear exchange. Yet environmentalists rarely identify the dangers of war for the environment . The horror of nuclear war is the single strongest reason for me writing this book. War is very difficult if not impossible without national allegiance. Religion of course is a always there to jump into the breech but historically religious unity rarely survives the schisms of national and local tensions.

It's almost universally accepted today that the colour of a person's skin, or gender(s) is not a valid reason for that person to be treated differently. Sure we're living through a period of identity politics when taking that seriously is only now being worked out with Black Lives Matter, Me too, Brexit and anti refugee movements all symptoms of that process . Like racism and sexism,  many of us have suspected for quite some time that patriotism is also not justifiable but either dismissed it or failed to articulate it for fear of condemnation as unpatriotic. During periods when slavery was common many suspected, were even convinced that this was the case but rarely articulated let alone acted on it. To do so invited ostracism. But what is the difference between skin colour and (in most cases) the place where one is born? In other words why is racism unjustifiable but national allegiance, where we treat non nationals as less entitled than nationals, justifiable. As with those who knew slavery was wrong hundreds or perhaps even thousands of years ago, many today realise national allegiance is wrong but fear ostracism in saying so openly. The treasonous message of this book is that national allegiance is not justifiable. Humanity is the tie that binds, not some arbitrary lines on a map or proximate history. Patriotism is one of the last surviving powerful societal taboos.

I have little doubt that in the future this rejection of national allegiance will be as universal as the contemporary rejection of racism, tribalism or any other form of chauvinism. When you think about it with an open mind it is self evident. And it's certainly not a new idea. Even while nation states and the very concept of nationalism were being born, national allegiance was being condemned by many in a world of race based kingdoms. Count Leo Tolstoy, G.W.F. Hegel, Karl Marx and much earlier Paul of Tarsus and the Greek Stoic philosopher Terence are just a few examples. Sir Arthur C Clarke brings the condemnation up to date. Here's a sample of their prescient statements.

Count Leo Tolstoy, author of 'War and Peace' and Anna Karenina clearly articulated the idea of patriotism as war mongering when he wrote against the background of a possible war between Great Britain and The United States over which was to control Venezuela in 1896:

"Obviously, to avoid war, it is necessary, not to preach sermons and pray God for peace, not to adjure the English-speaking nations to live in peace together in order to domineer over other nations, not to make double and triple counter-alliances, not to intermarry princes and princesses, but to destroy the root of war. And that is, the exclusive desire for the well-being of one's own people; it is patriotism. Therefore, to destroy war, destroy patriotism." ^[1]

As noted above the Greek Stoic Philosopher Terence, much repeated by G.W.F. Hegel, Karl Marx and other Humanists, succinctly wrote:

"Nothing human is alien to me". ^[2]

     Professor Eugene Kamenka, 'Australia Made Me, But Which Australia is Mine'. ^[3]

“Nationalism, then, is a subordinate principle and a parasitic, ambiguous ideology, capable of producing a Mazzini and Palacki, or an SS thug. ...Nationalism is best left to drop off into little more than a mildly patriotic sentiment".

The author of '2001 - a Space Odyssey', Sir Arthur Clarke puts it cryptically for the age of space exploration:

“There is hopeful symbolism in the fact that flags do not wave in a vacuum.” ^[4]

   Setting out one justification for a common human essence Paul the Apostle states:

"There can be neither Jew nor Greek, there can be neither slave nor freeman, there can be neither male nor female -- for you are all one in Christ Jesus."^[5]

        There are similar ecumenical visions in the writings of other spokespersons for many of the worlds great religions and ethical systems.

In a post patriotic world, self sacrifice and altruism remain the high water mark of morality. Those who sacrificed themselves in war for their nation in the past are not diminished. But they are remembered with an awareness of the arbitrariness of the nation as the main beneficiary or boundary of altruism alongside the heroism of those who pursue the best interests of people everywhere. I am sure my grandfather who fought in both world wars and who I loved very much would be the first to acknowledge this. Perhaps he even suggested it to me.

In a similar vein, those who conspire to cause violence, harm or terror against others should always be regarded as criminals. The difference to traditional treason is that's causing violence, harm or terror is not confined to ones nation or community. Ironically, in a post patriotic world the ambit of treason, treason against humanity, would be extended.

What we do about the fact that national allegiance is unjustifiable is a separate question. This is not a tract on naive internationalism or the lunatic cant of anarchism. There are many positive results short of world government or even aspiring to it that flow from a rejection of national allegiance. Simply not being patriotic will of itself change much. The acquisition of multiple nationalities or permanent residences force governments to compete for citizens, though of late their has been a push back by nations against multiple nationality and residences. The interdependence created by global trade makes war less likely. The need, real or perceived, for strategic reserves and being self contained (vital national interests - energy, food, etc) often drives wars. The legitimacy of projecting military power beyond national borders in the name of self and collective self defence should be questioned and curtailed. Finally, the inescapability of global solutions to everything from the environment, asteroid hits, super volcanoes through to finance will profit immensely from a populist scepticism towards national allegiance.

Perhaps a populist scepticism to national allegiance is the most valuable step forward. It's also worth considering whether standing for national anthems is a simple courtesy or pandering to patriotism. If the latter perhaps it's time not to stand for any national flag. The American Pledge of Allegiance (despite Bellamy's original intention that it be used by any nation) is, when you analyse it, of a very similar ilk to ultranationalist parts of Shinto creeds. Both imply in essence that the perfected human is American or Japanese respectively, or worse that God is American or Japanese. Both need to go as does the rediscovered conception in the Middle Kingdom that the world consists of Chinese and the rest of us, barbarians or clever monkeys. Too many nations share their own version of these sentiments to list here.

However, it's important to acknowledge we all live within a hierarchy of allegiances, allegiances which define us. Our family, friends, ethnicity, customs, sports team, city, province and even aspects of country are legitimate objects of our loyalty. But none of these allegiances require what national allegiance demands, namely that we pledge our life in what is purported to be the defence of the nation when called upon by the ruling polity of the nation. The demands of national allegiance are different in kind to other forms of allegiance. That's what makes patriotism so pernicious and dangerous.

When we ask ourselves how our world view was formed, it is probably inevitable we asked ourselves a multiplicity of questions including what action, rule or opinion will promote the greatest good of the greatest number. What we may not have explicitly addressed is the greatest number of who: family, significant others; fellow nationals; or fellow humans. That's an important oversight.

More so than any time in the past we are cognisant of fundamental individual rights. What began as natural rights became human rights, increasingly enforceable rather than mere political  mantras. Yet, I would suggest, we have yet to carry that concern to its logical end and examine the tension between the rights of fellow nationals and everyone's rights, i.e., universal human rights.

We are, it is suggested, forced to disregard rejecting our nationality outright though we can and should make known our objections to the status of a nation as a sovereign state. To reject nationality outright would allow widespread chaos and civil disobedience which many would all be tempted to take advantage of. One might refuse to pay their tax because it is being used to pay subsidies to logging companies, mining companies or to pay for abortion clinics. You might refuse to sit on a jury because you think the legal system is corrupt. The end result is a dangerous creeping anarchy and remember we, or at least the writer, have dismissed anarchy as a naive rejection of the fact that we humans are constantly tempted to take advantage of one another.

But no one asked us whether we wanted to be a citizen and denying our citizenship is not a real option. The avoidance of quasi anarchy requires that we continue to accept our nationality in the same way as I believe we are forced to accept market economies. However, accepting market economies does not stop us advocating mitigating its excesses by the creation of an adequate safety net usually in the form of welfare. In the same way, nationality should not stop us from advocating the evolution of nationalism to orderly internationalism. One way to do this is through the development of international law with the ultimate objective of whittling away at sovereignty till it becomes vestigial.

Future chapters will proceed as follows. First, why patriotism is morally indefensible. Second, what can be realistically be done about it both at institutional and personal levels.