SUPPORT FOR THE SOCIALIST PARTY IS SUPPORT FOR WORLD SOCIALISM |
Before
the rise of class society, and even until comparatively modern times
before communications and transport broke down geographical barriers,
the workers did have an interest in the country of their birth. But
now that we have all become wage earners, the basis of patriotism has
gone. Still the sentiment persists and the master class who control
the forces and services of the State are able to identify their own
private interests with the patriotism of the class which has now no
stake in the country.
With
the weakening power of religion to keep the workers docile and
obedient, the cult of nationalism and patriotism is being exploited
to the full for the furtherance of the damnable policy of the
slave-holding class: to divide and rule. Like religion, patriotism
has its vestments, its ceremonies, its sacred emblems, its sacred
hymns and inspired music; all of which are called in aid of the class
interests of our masters. Patriotic
nationalism is nothing more or less than a convenient and potent
instrument of domination. Patriotism
is the handmaiden of class rule. The
nation they call “ours” is the result of a conquest over original
inhabitants, and over ourselves, by successive ruling classes.
We
possess no country. Patriotism
is a fraudulent thing. The “country” is that of the owning class
alone. Patriotism is not love of your country. Patriotism is love for
someone else’s country. You see, the UK and its resources are owned
by a few corporations and a handful of families - it is their country
and not ours.
What is
the fatherland and our motherland ? Our fathers and mothers came from
many different parts of the world. Rather
humankind
are my brethren, the world is my country.
Despite
the shameless attempts by the robber class, the great impulse to
human solidarity is by no means dead. In
the class struggle of the workers against the employers and
exploiters, of the socially useful against the socially pernicious,
in this struggle for the liberation of humanity from wage-slavery,
the great principle of human solidarity will come to full fruition.
That is our hope and aspiration. For us, all nationalism is
destructive of human values, simply pitting one section of the
working class against another with the sole aim of furthering the
capitalist cause. The people of the world are worth more than that,
much more. They are part of a world society which collectively could
choose to work for peace, justice and prosperity for all in our time,
putting aside the divisive issues of capitalism and recognising at
last that with socialism unity is strength.
Patriotism
festers politics like a weeping sore. It does not represent
progressive ideas Enormous damage has been done, throughout the
world, by the notion that one country and its people are superior to
the others. A truly progressive policy – socialism – recognises
the essential unity of the human race and the urgent need to
celebrate it by building society on that basis. Socialism would be
worldwide, with no nation states, no borders, and the common
ownership of the whole Earth by the whole of humanity. No one
would be an immigrant or emigrant in a socialist world without states
and therefore without boundaries. It’s like saying a person born
and raised in Hampshire or Surrey who then moves to Berkshire is
an immigrant. Socialists dont prescribe where people, let alone
“masses” of people, should live or move to in a socialist
world. It’s entirely up to them as free individuals in a free
society
The
nation state did not materalise out of thin air. Still
less did it always exist as some kind of looming
background presence or potentiality way back in the mists of time as
nationalist mythology would have it. Rather, it was an
almost deliberately crafted invention (see Benedict Anderson's book,
"Imagined Communities") the outcome of a complex
process of structural and spatial reorganisation coinciding the
emergence of capitalism. In Europe in 1500. for instance, there
were approximately 500 more or less autonomous political
units - an intricate patchwork ranging from Italian city states to
numerous principalities and duchies.
France
was not the natural expression of a pre-existing French nation. At
the revolution in 1789, half its residents did not speak French. In
1860, when Italy unified, only 2.5 per cent of residents regularly
spoke standard Italian. Its leaders spoke French to each other. One
famously said that, having created Italy, they now had to create
Italians.
Patriotism
is not supportable with fact and reason but by deception and
prejudice. That is why it is so quickly inflates into racism,
prejudice and discrimination. One of the strongest holds the
capitalists have over the minds of the workers is the workers' ready
acceptance of the dogmas of patriotism.
The
problem that belief in a nation has grown stronger and has become
more of an obstacle for achieving socialism. People have adopted a
belief that nations, even continents in respect to European
"civilisation". As for us, the Socialist Party, we have
discarded the flag and disowned the so many deeds of butchery
committed in our name. All over the world, in every capitalist state,
there are masses of people who depend for their living on the sale of
their labour power. Internationally, these people have a common
interest which is opposed to that of their ruling classes. This
has been true for as long as there has been a society of two classes
- for as long as capitalism has existed. In wars, for example, the
workers who were fighting and killing each other were doing so in
ignorance of their international common interests. Instead of firing
at each other, they should be extending the hand of fraternal
greeting and unity. The unity of socialism will unleash, for the
first time in history, the full powers of the human race. Socialism
will be established by a people who have seen through the divisive
cynicism of patriotism.
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