Is patriotism by its nature inherently anti-intellectual?

Question

To the second poster: Well, I'm from America, not that it matters. But when you start off your sentence like "Not sure what country you are from," it doesn't sound intellectual, because it doesn't matter here, and yet you bring it up like it means something.

Answer 1

"Patriotism is a virtue of the vicious"  at least according to Oscar Wilde.

Patriotism is  not necessarily anti-intellectual, though American patriotism is an interesting study as the determination as to who is patriotic, and what acts are considered patriotic or otherwise are determined by a relative few and often with a very hardline approach.  Britain suffered this too until quite recently -though it did manifest differently.

I guess where I would make a case for it being anti-intellectual is where it is used as a weapon to villify someone who disagrees with another's point of view.  Sen. Joe McCarthy was a classic user of this technique, and many dictatorships use it too.  Pres. Kennedy's famous "ask not what your country can do for you...." speech was, to many non- Americans, a manipulation of patriotic feeling, undermining an intellectual basis for patriotism.

I also consider that the traditional reserve for determining patriotism: the armed forces, is generaslly jingoistic and in denial of intellect at many turns.  The very arrogant idea that military service is the truest expression of patriotism is my case in point.  I have served with the armed forces in my home country, and soon found that attitude very tiring.

My two cents:  I love my country (Australia), I honour the nation of my birth (Wales), but I bear in mind that patriotism is truly a form of zealotry if you check a good dictionary meaning, and has been narrowed to mainly include militaristic expressions to the exclusion of other measures of a nation's worth or measure.

I also will add that there have been many intellectual patriots of many nations, and that they explored their love for their respective nations with utmost intellectual rigor.

Answer 2

Patriotism is like rooting for your favorite sports team. It doesn't really matter how good your team is, you're going to keep rooting for them, and you're gonna expect them to win every night. You will defend them, should someone else walk up and say "so and so team sucks".

So technically patriotism is without reason, which makes it technically anti-intellectual. Patriotism is pure emotion my friend.

Answer 3

Love of one's country or homeland is hardly anti-intellectual.  To say so would be to believe that some of the greatest founders of the nations of world were not intellectuals.  Not sure what country you are from, but to insinuate that Jefferson, or even more so Madison or Adams or a slew of other founders of the US were not intellectuals would be folly.

Although there may be many who based their beliefs of patriotism on shallow bases, I don't think you can generalize that to patriotism as a concept and believe it is in and of itself anti-intellectual. It is those who don't really understand or know where their patriotism comes from or what it means who espouse cheap or shallow expressions of it who make some people believe it is anti-intellectual.  Patriotism is as deep as the person who thinks it, feels it, or expresses it.

Answer 4

Yeah, I totally understand. Look at me, I'm nerdy and ghetto at the same time. It doesn't mean that being nerdy is being ghetto, or being ghetto is nerdy. They're two different things.

Answer 5

I think I see what you mean. But like the last guy said, patriotism can be incited by very anti-intellectual methods, such as the government and pop culture's urge for blind nationalism during wartime. And unfortunately, that seems to be the stimulus for most Americans' patriotism. But that doesn't make patriotism itself *inherently* anti-intellectual.

For example, there are some famous theories of Emile Durkheim predicting America's shift from tradition to rationalization. He thought as people became more intellectual, religion would gradually be replaced by patriotism/nationalism. In fact, in Durkheim's eyes, all cultures were literally worshiping their own society when they worshiped their "God". So he saw patriotism as a very intellectual movement away from religion. In layman's terms, intellectuals would "cut out the middle man" of religion.

By the way: you don't get much more intellectual than Durkheim, and he was hugely patriotic for France. The basis for his nationalism was that his son fought and died in WWI.

Answer 6

No. Jingoism is.