Because I can't leave well enough alone...
Wed, Jun. 22nd, 2005 09:33 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
oyceterAnyhow, a recent post on LJ and associated comments got me to thinking. I'm not posting this as a comment in there because I figure it will be fairly idiosyncratic on my end, very long and rambling, as per usual, and also because I don't feel up to making an argument or being rational or anything. So to keep in mind: these are some gut feelings of mine, some of which I have thought about for some time and some of which I haven't quite puzzled out yet.
I don't quite get the visceral response to the flag that I am getting that some people do. I'm not quite sure if it was because I spent half of my life in Taiwan, because I seem to not glom onto other symbols much or what. I suppose I just never quite wrapped my brain around the thought that flag=country, despite the parade with flags at the Olympics or the encyclopedia article with numerous flags or flag pins and everything, or a childhood spent listening obsessively to "Wee Sing America" and singing very loudly about the red, white and blue.
I can't tell if this is a response-to-America-the-nation thing, which on my end is extremely complicated, or a simple me-no-get-symbols thing. I'm not sure. I've never seen anyone desecrating a cross, so I don't know if I would have a gut reaction to that. I have more of a gut reaction to national anthems, probably because I sing them and that connects me to them emotionally. I feel an extreme gut reaction if I think about someone burning down my house and all my things, or a library, or ripping books apart. I think this may be because those things, while physical, are still things -- they represent something to me, but they don't represent something to everyone. They represent my memories, or the potential of knowledge or something like that.
Also, I find that I am rather wary of symbols. I guess I am ambivalent toward any concept that can be boiled down into a symbol, be it flag or family crest or whatnot. Symbols in fiction I grok; symbols in real life are a bit iffier for me. I think this is because I tend to be hesitant to adopt a symbol, because I feel that so many different people believing so fervently in one symbol probably means that there are many different interpretations for said symbol, so that when two people say that they fight for the flag/cross/keychain/who knows, they may be fighting for completely different things, depending on what they believe on, but they are projecting their different ideologies onto a single item.
I'm still trying to dig around for symbolic objects that I find meaningful that are also meaningful to a large group of people (aka, people who are not just me and my group of friends), but I think the last one I really stood behind was... er... our senior class flag from high school (don't mock me!). And now, thinking back on it, I suspect a large part of that was because my class was so small (17 some people) and that I had known them for so long. It was intensely personal for me, and the fact that 16 other people shared it didn't matter quite so much. When I went to college, the whole college mascot and team and colors thing never quite clicked with me. First off, we had ugly colors. Haha, right, I suppose that's not supposed to matter, but honestly, I didn't want to walk around everywhere with college paraphernelia on. I don't think it's because I don't want to be associated with my college, but that I don't feel all that personally involved with it. Hrm. Come to think of it, I probably wouldn't wear a Taiwan flag or an American flag.
I think I am just tired of politics. I am tired of political parties and how polarizing they are -- in Taiwan my parents and most of their friends are for one political party, and my friends are mostly for another, and each side keeps accusing the other of things, and I know people on both sides, and while I should be more involved, I'm not, so both sides just end up looking silly. In America, well, I do identify more with one party than another, but I'm just so sick of people going around saying "blah blah conservatives do this blah blah liberals do that blah blah." I know, I should practise what I preach. And also, patriotism/nationalism frightens me. I use the term patriotism/nationalism mostly because I have a sneaking suspicion that if you (generalized) do it, it's "patriotism," but if "they" do it, it's "nationalism." And I dislike the grouping of people into left and right, or top and bottom, or any such simple categories, because the cultural studies part of my brain mostly just wants to squiggle about on the floor and yell, "But it's all so complicated!"
I guess my general opinion is that I don't particularly believe in nations.
*waits for everyone to drop dead of horror and start flaming me*
(sorry, I've said stuff like this before to people back in college and gotten some fairly boggled looks and gotten into quite a few arguments)
What do I believe in? I'm not sure. I believe in people. I believe that most people in most places, regardless of nationality or race or gender, get hungry and are tired, enjoy being happy and dislike being sad. I believe that a lot of what we consider to be nationality are actually bits and pieces of historical cause and effect that go way back. I believe that history affects people, and that history is what builds that fragile notion of culture and nationality, and historical aftermath is what keeps much of it in place. And while I believe the notion of nation has a place, especially in uniting people, I am more wary of people united than people being individual people. This is probably because I tend to feel that I can understand people being people, but people acting under a big flag or political party or army begin to frighten me because of how ideals can take over. And yes, often these are good ideals, but I feel that the group mentality can often overtake the notion of the individual person and render the "other side" faceless and impersonal.
And I am still debating how to live nationless, because while I love America, I know that I am a creature who is more local than national. I love my city and my downtown street and my apartment, and I love the multiethnicity of the area I live in, but I know that my city and my street and my area are not America-the-nation, only a part. I don't know America-the-nation. I haven't gone everywhere there. I deeply love some things about it that I have experienced, but I find other parts problematic. Same with Taiwan. I feel this is not a contradiction, although I suppose a great deal of people must. I feel like I can live in different countries and love it there all the same, to enjoy the good things about a country while wanting the bad things to be made better, and I feel that I can do this for anywhere I choose to live. Also, it is fairly difficult to identify myself solely with one country and one nationality when I have lived in two, and that's just the two I have lived in. I want to live in more. I personally do not feel like this is a bad thing that brings down the nation I currently choose to live in, but as I said, I probably feel like this because it's me I'm talking about.
Anyhow, I am not quite sure what I mean to express in this post, except possibly a deep sense of ambivalence in symbols and in nations that I am still trying to understand.
ETA: Addendum
I don't quite get the visceral response to the flag that I am getting that some people do. I'm not quite sure if it was because I spent half of my life in Taiwan, because I seem to not glom onto other symbols much or what. I suppose I just never quite wrapped my brain around the thought that flag=country, despite the parade with flags at the Olympics or the encyclopedia article with numerous flags or flag pins and everything, or a childhood spent listening obsessively to "Wee Sing America" and singing very loudly about the red, white and blue.
I can't tell if this is a response-to-America-the-nation thing, which on my end is extremely complicated, or a simple me-no-get-symbols thing. I'm not sure. I've never seen anyone desecrating a cross, so I don't know if I would have a gut reaction to that. I have more of a gut reaction to national anthems, probably because I sing them and that connects me to them emotionally. I feel an extreme gut reaction if I think about someone burning down my house and all my things, or a library, or ripping books apart. I think this may be because those things, while physical, are still things -- they represent something to me, but they don't represent something to everyone. They represent my memories, or the potential of knowledge or something like that.
Also, I find that I am rather wary of symbols. I guess I am ambivalent toward any concept that can be boiled down into a symbol, be it flag or family crest or whatnot. Symbols in fiction I grok; symbols in real life are a bit iffier for me. I think this is because I tend to be hesitant to adopt a symbol, because I feel that so many different people believing so fervently in one symbol probably means that there are many different interpretations for said symbol, so that when two people say that they fight for the flag/cross/keychain/who knows, they may be fighting for completely different things, depending on what they believe on, but they are projecting their different ideologies onto a single item.
I'm still trying to dig around for symbolic objects that I find meaningful that are also meaningful to a large group of people (aka, people who are not just me and my group of friends), but I think the last one I really stood behind was... er... our senior class flag from high school (don't mock me!). And now, thinking back on it, I suspect a large part of that was because my class was so small (17 some people) and that I had known them for so long. It was intensely personal for me, and the fact that 16 other people shared it didn't matter quite so much. When I went to college, the whole college mascot and team and colors thing never quite clicked with me. First off, we had ugly colors. Haha, right, I suppose that's not supposed to matter, but honestly, I didn't want to walk around everywhere with college paraphernelia on. I don't think it's because I don't want to be associated with my college, but that I don't feel all that personally involved with it. Hrm. Come to think of it, I probably wouldn't wear a Taiwan flag or an American flag.
I think I am just tired of politics. I am tired of political parties and how polarizing they are -- in Taiwan my parents and most of their friends are for one political party, and my friends are mostly for another, and each side keeps accusing the other of things, and I know people on both sides, and while I should be more involved, I'm not, so both sides just end up looking silly. In America, well, I do identify more with one party than another, but I'm just so sick of people going around saying "blah blah conservatives do this blah blah liberals do that blah blah." I know, I should practise what I preach. And also, patriotism/nationalism frightens me. I use the term patriotism/nationalism mostly because I have a sneaking suspicion that if you (generalized) do it, it's "patriotism," but if "they" do it, it's "nationalism." And I dislike the grouping of people into left and right, or top and bottom, or any such simple categories, because the cultural studies part of my brain mostly just wants to squiggle about on the floor and yell, "But it's all so complicated!"
I guess my general opinion is that I don't particularly believe in nations.
*waits for everyone to drop dead of horror and start flaming me*
(sorry, I've said stuff like this before to people back in college and gotten some fairly boggled looks and gotten into quite a few arguments)
What do I believe in? I'm not sure. I believe in people. I believe that most people in most places, regardless of nationality or race or gender, get hungry and are tired, enjoy being happy and dislike being sad. I believe that a lot of what we consider to be nationality are actually bits and pieces of historical cause and effect that go way back. I believe that history affects people, and that history is what builds that fragile notion of culture and nationality, and historical aftermath is what keeps much of it in place. And while I believe the notion of nation has a place, especially in uniting people, I am more wary of people united than people being individual people. This is probably because I tend to feel that I can understand people being people, but people acting under a big flag or political party or army begin to frighten me because of how ideals can take over. And yes, often these are good ideals, but I feel that the group mentality can often overtake the notion of the individual person and render the "other side" faceless and impersonal.
And I am still debating how to live nationless, because while I love America, I know that I am a creature who is more local than national. I love my city and my downtown street and my apartment, and I love the multiethnicity of the area I live in, but I know that my city and my street and my area are not America-the-nation, only a part. I don't know America-the-nation. I haven't gone everywhere there. I deeply love some things about it that I have experienced, but I find other parts problematic. Same with Taiwan. I feel this is not a contradiction, although I suppose a great deal of people must. I feel like I can live in different countries and love it there all the same, to enjoy the good things about a country while wanting the bad things to be made better, and I feel that I can do this for anywhere I choose to live. Also, it is fairly difficult to identify myself solely with one country and one nationality when I have lived in two, and that's just the two I have lived in. I want to live in more. I personally do not feel like this is a bad thing that brings down the nation I currently choose to live in, but as I said, I probably feel like this because it's me I'm talking about.
Anyhow, I am not quite sure what I mean to express in this post, except possibly a deep sense of ambivalence in symbols and in nations that I am still trying to understand.
ETA: Addendum
(no subject)
Thu, Jun. 23rd, 2005 10:28 am (UTC)Btw, I'm so sorry for linking to your post! I completely didn't realize it was flocked! Will take down link.
(no subject)
Thu, Jun. 23rd, 2005 11:09 am (UTC)