Julian Posted October 7, 2007 Report Share Posted October 7, 2007 (edited) The other day a kid in my school was asking people if they loved America. He thinks he does, even though he is a passive supporter of communism. Figures that only a tyrant would ask a question like this. I said I don't love my government, but I love freedom. I mean it seems pretty dangerous to me to love a government. Anyway, is it possible to say that you love your country without implying that you love your government? Is it even possible to love a non-living entity? Edited October 7, 2007 by Julian Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DragonMaci Posted October 7, 2007 Report Share Posted October 7, 2007 Anyway, is it possible to say that you love your country without implying that you love your government? Is it even possible to love a non-living entity? Yes, it is. People can say things like, "I love my car," or, "I love my computer." (Yeah right! Who is ever going to say the last one! ) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
redmartian89 Posted October 7, 2007 Report Share Posted October 7, 2007 The other day a kid in my school was asking people if they loved America. He thinks he does, even though he is a passive supporter of communism. Figures that only a tyrant would ask a question like this. I said I don't love my government, but I love freedom. I mean it seems pretty dangerous to me to love a government. Anyway, is it possible to say that you love your country without implying that you love your government? Is it even possible to love a non-living entity? I think the proper term here is admiration, not love. Love is such a messy word anyway. You can admire a nation without necessarily admiring its political system. You could admire Norway, but not in anyway like its socialistic state. You should ask your friend to elaborate on what he means. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tenure Posted October 7, 2007 Report Share Posted October 7, 2007 Well screw you Kane! Me and Mr Microstophles are running off to get married, and there's not a damn thing any of you can do to stop me! Seriously though, one can loves ones country without loving ones government. For example, one can love the arts and cuisine of ones country, or the way things are placed around oneself (hell, I love the way I'm always only 5 minutes from somewhere where I can buy 80% of the goods I need). Most of all, one can love what ones country is supposed to represent, and what it is capable of representing. I could not love Iran, if I were Iranian, because I could see no hope in there as it is - not without complete destabilization of the country. In America, on the otherhand, for all its problems, its still a relatively free country, where one can bring about a cultural change by ones words and actions (without getting violent). Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DavidOdden Posted October 7, 2007 Report Share Posted October 7, 2007 You can admire a nation without necessarily admiring its political system. You could admire Norway, but not in anyway like its socialistic state.And you can love Norway, without concluding that the location and the government are the same thing. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tenure Posted October 7, 2007 Report Share Posted October 7, 2007 And you can love Norway, without concluding that the location and the government are the same thing. I concur. Norway was actually an example I was more akin to use - it is a country of joy and beauty, even if you have to sacrifice a hideous amount of your money to live there. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Julian Posted October 7, 2007 Author Report Share Posted October 7, 2007 (edited) Yes, it is. People can say things like, "I love my car," or, "I love my computer."I thought Ayn Rand said that you can only love something because of its values though. I guess there are values in the Constitution, but what values are there in a car or computer? A side question... What's the opposite of love according to reason? Would it be hate? Edited October 7, 2007 by Julian Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
softwareNerd Posted October 8, 2007 Report Share Posted October 8, 2007 I thought Ayn Rand said that you can only love something because of its values though. I guess there are values in the Constitution, but what values are there in a car or computer?What do you mean by values? For instance, if food is a value, in the sense you're using the term, then why not a car? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
John McVey Posted October 8, 2007 Report Share Posted October 8, 2007 (Almost) Totally off the top of my head... When some tossers (eg liberals) say they love their country what they're saying is that they have in mind a particular vision they hold dear. That vision is of a large group of people within a given geographic boundary organised into a social system of the pseudo-lover's preference, a social organisation formed as and to be sacrificed to as an end in itself. This new social organisation bears no resemblance to how people conducted themselves before. It is not simply that the objectively bad parts are criticised and the good parts praised and extended, but that everything of substance that made the country what it was is gone and replaced in toto with the culture envisaged in the pseudo-lover's fever-dream. The only things that are the same are the extents of the geographical boundaries and the national nametag slapped on it. No rational debate and persuasion is intended to bring this to reality. What this social dreamer and pseudo-lover has in mind is creating the country through sly coercion and naked force. He "loves his country but hates the government" not because the government is doing bad things but because that government stands in the way of him implementing his dream. What he wants is dictatorial power to shape things exactly the way he intends. He will then love his creation - and expect it to love him back. Call it a God complex. If he rules government, naturally also set up the way he thinks it should be as an end in itself, then he will love that too. At that point LMC=LMG, so anyone who doesn't do the latter must be not doing the former, and hence is to be vilified or worse. He will genuinely believe that opposition to him is treason, because everything is integrated together in his totalitarian vision. That's when one starts seeing the beginnings of the sad irony of most revolutions, of activists claiming to be freedom while actively demanding the silencing and prosecution of those who don't share their visions. JJM Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Robert J. Kolker Posted October 8, 2007 Report Share Posted October 8, 2007 I thought Ayn Rand said that you can only love something because of its values though. I guess there are values in the Constitution, but what values are there in a car or computer? A side question... What's the opposite of love according to reason? Would it be hate? The opposite of live is NOT hate. It is indifference. Hate is a twisted form of love. It makes the hated one the center and focus of the feeling and thinking of the hater. Instead of saying I would do anything to protect you and cherish you, the hater says I would do anything to destroy you. Hate is love turned inside out and upside down, but it is not opposite. It has too much in common with love. Bob Kolker Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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