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Originally Posted by Theobald
I know many patriots, who truly loves their Nation and does not want it to disappear, but are being misleaded by so-called "conservative" parties and men like Sarkozy, Berlusconi, Aznar, ... who play the patriotic card and tell them what they want to hear but don't do it.
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Precisely. Here lays the danger with patriotism.
It is in principle a noble feeling and I agree with you that true nationalism cannot exist without patriotism (otherwise nationalism becomes a mere abstraction), but patriotism also has a tendency these days to degenerate into a merely formal loyalty towards the established order or, even less than that, just towards some ceremonies and symbols, like the flag.
So politicians who somehow, through clever marketing, manage to create perception among the citizenry that they are the representatives of "patriotic values", who somehow succeed in making most of the people associate the flag with their faces and appearances, they have the most success among the patriotic voters. Their patriotic rhetoric and gestures mislead the people.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Theobald
They actually make up a very large part of the population - and probably most of the traditional conservative electorate. That's precisely our task to educate them about politics and nationalism.
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It is an enormously demanding and difficult, but at the same time the most important task.