Patriotism matters
Donald Trump declared his inauguration a “National Day of Patriotic Devotion.” Left-wing Twitter went into a frenzy about how creepily quasi-fascist this was. Right-wing Twitter went into a frenzy pointing out that Barack Obama had declared his own inauguration a “National Day of Renewal and Reconciliation.”
Left-wing Twitter angrily responded that those things are completely different, implying that if you couldn’t see the difference between a beautiful and healing day of renewal and reconciliation, and a disgusting celebration of ata- vistic nationalism, you might be something of a fascist.
And I thought, “Guys, this is why Red America hates us.”
It used to be a trope onthe right that the left thought patriotism was a bad word — a charge the left angrily denied. Now here wehave a surprisingly large number of people arguing that . . . patriotism is a bad word, and wildly inappropriate when issued from the Oval Office.
Now, I’m not saying you can’t be patriotic and also left-wing. (Try telling that to arch-jingoist Franklin Delano Roosevelt.) But left-wing political beliefs
cannot substitute for patriotism any more than a belief in tax cuts and smaller government can. Patriotism is the primal love of your country which pre-exists any particular notion about how its political affairs should be arranged.
Your patriotism may lead you to advocate various changes in the government, in the belief that this will make it a better place, just as your love of your spouse may cause you to urge them to give up their soul-sucking job in corporate law and pursue the nonprofit career they’ve always dreamed of. But your love of your spouse should not consist primarily of plans for their future or hopes for their improvement. Patriotism is similar. It can’t survive one half of the partnership declaring that they will only start loving their country after it has perfected itself.
But shouldn’t we scorn patriotism, which drives us to war and so many other awful things? No more than we should scorn the progressive ideals that have led to so much good social change, and also so much human suffering under various left-wing regimes. Ideals are dangerous things with a tendency to run amok, but no society can live without them. And I submit that no nation can live long without a healthy patriotism — a powerful symbolic identity that transcends the frictions which otherwise make it impossible to unite for any common purpose.