I find patriotism to be weird because it's so arbitrary - patriotic immigrants get a pass, but natural born citizens didn't ever make an active choice or put in the effort to become a citizen. I also fail to see why people in one country should be inherently given benefits that people in another country lack... Patriotism to me boils down to a weird form of elitism.
Such an odd sentiment. It's not elitism in the conventional sense. It's an investment in the System passed down to you by your forebearers, and faith in it being something of value to maintain and eventually pass down to your descendants.
>I also fail to see why people in one country should be inherently given benefits that people in another country lack...
Do you understand the underlying driving concept behind the concept of a country's sovereignty? It's an understanding that the people of a certain geographical region are free to establish their own political systems of governance to get stuff done. It's kind of complicated now, because of the whole corpus of International recognition and that whole jazz, but the fundamentals remain the same.
If you don't connect how patriotism comes out as a natural extension of investment with regards to the resulting structure that allows for the flexing of the country in question's capabilities to become greater than the sum of its parts...well... I can understand it to a point, but it strikes me as folding ones arms, sitting on a fence, and declaring everywhere is terrible.
Which is okay too I suppose. Though, it likely won't ingratiate you to anyone. Especially considering it demonstrates an unwillingness to make any type of fundamental value judgement or to accept a particular corpus or ideal of government as being the yard stick you measure with.
I.e. as an American, I measure other non-U.S. countries vs. how well their system guarantees freedoms enshrined in the national Bill of Rights . Heck, I judge my own country, and the various States that compose it at different time periods via how well it stays true to it's Constitutional intent, and the ideal of a government as laid out in the Declaration of Independence. Common Law divergence from Constitutional statute all have an impact, but I believe the system is about as good as it's going to get.
Anyway. Not sure if I've done anything to clear it up. Just... Didn't want to scroll by without leaving something in response to such a solitary viewpoint.
