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ZorbaTHut  1yr ago (text post)   35361 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of September 26, 2022

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Therefore, in order for the free world to exist it must be possible to change your country at will. It’s easy to see that nationalism runs contrary to this goal. If you only ever can be accepted in one country, if you can only be permitted to run important businesses or organisations in the country of your birth; and doomed to be an irrelevant outsider in all others — well, then your government has you by the balls — you have no real negotiating position with the state.

Ok I guess I'll do my thing and ask the dumb question - how exactly do you have a free world when nobody is allowed to be a nationalist?

Of course you are allowed to be a nationalist, in fact I think you should be allowed to subscribe to any worldview, however wrong or extreme it might be. Freedom of speech and all that

It’s just that I won’t support you in doing so, and will back up people who work in opposition to these ideas.

Perhaps my self depreciating joke confused you, I apologise. I know I am not outlawed from being a nationalist now. I actually live on Earth too, if you can believe it. Trying again, you are saying you will back up people who work in opposition to the idea of freedom of speech and all that? For a free world?

In what way would your nationalist free utopia be free? You don't believe in freedom. You believe in suspending freedom to achieve and enforce your ideology, which is the long-winded way of saying you don't believe in freedom.

I think a less controversial way of saying this would be "exit rights are fundamental to any sort of free society", then going on to argue that nationalism and nativism in one country damages exit rights in all the others - leaving a crappy situation is great, but doesnt help if every scrap of land is occupied & no-one will let you immigrate an anything like fair terms.

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