" Actually it's not. You just have to look it up in a dictionary to see that. For instance:"
Actually it is. I just told you what nationalism actually is. Unfortunately, the term has been used as a smear by ignorant people or ideologues, imparting a meaning to the word that hide the reality of the ideology behind it.
"That is - nationalism does imply an attitude of superiority."
No, it doesn't. You have a caricature of nationalism in your mind that has no connection to actual nationalists.
"First of all there's not some multiculturalist ideology or doctrine - that's just a bogeyman the far-right have created to define what they see as the enemy.
Multiculturalism is just a name for the natural result of different cultures blending."
Multiculturalism is an ideology, it's even an officially recognized policy in Canada, Pierre Elliott Trudeau shoved it into the constitution when he repatriated it in 1982. It's a bit like secularism applied to culture and identity. Whereas secularism is an ideology that says that the State must be religiously neutral, multiculturalism says the State must be culturally neutral and not promoting any single national identity, to allow the emergence of many identities and achieve greater cultural diversity.
Cultures blending is the exact opposite of multiculturalism. Blending cultures is the melting pot, a model that multiculturalism expressly opposes. In Canada, the go-to formula is "the US is a melting pot, Canada is a cultural mosaic".
There's a confusion in semantics because "multiculturalism" is also used to denote the objective reality of many cultures existing in a single State, a confusion that multiculturalists love to cultivate (it's hard to criticize something if you don't have a word for it). Whether you call it globalism, cosmopolitanism, multiculturalism, it's an ideology, it's real, and it's very influential. It's not a conspiracy or whatnot, it's just like any other ideology, a way of seeing the world and an idea about what society should strive towards, shared by a lot of people. You can easily spot these people because they spout things like "I'm a citizen of the world", "Our country is a country of immigrants", "nobody chooses where they're born, it's stupid to be proud of your country", etc...
"It's happened all throughout history where several distinct cultures have shared a small geographical space - like in Europe. Nationalists don't like to admit that, instead pretending that a "pure" nation and culture can be defined (by them of course) - but that's just nonsense."
It's ironic you claim that multiculturalism is a "bogeyman" when in fact the image you have of nationalists is the REAL bogeyman. What you say may apply to a small minority of nationalists, but not to most.
I note that you talk about "geographic space", a term that denies the important reality of political borders and States. Yes, there were many cultures in Europe, but most had their own States, which is important because it allows cultures to dominate a political space, inspiring the laws and social norms that rule public life in that space, minimizing tensions between different cultures who may have different ideals of living and norms, allowing them to live in separate legal and political spaces even if they are geographically close.
"The EU is a neoliberal economical project that seeks to benefit trade and an economic agenda that suits big business. That certainly hurts ordinary workers in some ways, but the goal is to make money - not to destroy nations or mix races or deny anyone self-determination or anything else the far-right believes."
The leaders of the EU project have been clear that they see borders as the "worst invention in the history of the world", and they also have claimed things like "there can be no democratic choice against European treaties". As to the neoliberal agenda, it's debatable. The harmonization of economic rules to create a federal EU, the "United States of Europe", may look like neoliberalism sometimes, but actual free marketers point out that the EU is far from a free trade entity, it favors free trade internally, but has no qualms about controlling trade with countries outside the EU.
The goal of federalists in Europe is to destroy the nation-State, viewed as the cause of war. It's so blatant that pro-EU people will often parrot the claim that the EU is the only reason there hasn't been a new World War originating in Europe.
"But without that common enemy and put into a situation where their interests would conflict they'd be at each others throats in no time."
They would both defend their own nation's interests foremost, but they would not support dominating the other, and support the other's right to exist. It's the equivalent of defending the freedom of speech of someone else you may disagree with.
Oh, and Québec, Scottish and Catalan nationalist movements have collaborated for decades, way before multiculturalism became so ascendant.
30
@Nisse_Hult
" Actually it's not. You just have to look it up in a dictionary to see that. For instance:"
Actually it is. I just told you what nationalism actually is. Unfortunately, the term has been used as a smear by ignorant people or ideologues, imparting a meaning to the word that hide the reality of the ideology behind it.
"That is - nationalism does imply an attitude of superiority."
No, it doesn't. You have a caricature of nationalism in your mind that has no connection to actual nationalists.
"First of all there's not some multiculturalist ideology or doctrine - that's just a bogeyman the far-right have created to define what they see as the enemy.
Multiculturalism is just a name for the natural result of different cultures blending."
Multiculturalism is an ideology, it's even an officially recognized policy in Canada, Pierre Elliott Trudeau shoved it into the constitution when he repatriated it in 1982. It's a bit like secularism applied to culture and identity. Whereas secularism is an ideology that says that the State must be religiously neutral, multiculturalism says the State must be culturally neutral and not promoting any single national identity, to allow the emergence of many identities and achieve greater cultural diversity.
Cultures blending is the exact opposite of multiculturalism. Blending cultures is the melting pot, a model that multiculturalism expressly opposes. In Canada, the go-to formula is "the US is a melting pot, Canada is a cultural mosaic".
There's a confusion in semantics because "multiculturalism" is also used to denote the objective reality of many cultures existing in a single State, a confusion that multiculturalists love to cultivate (it's hard to criticize something if you don't have a word for it). Whether you call it globalism, cosmopolitanism, multiculturalism, it's an ideology, it's real, and it's very influential. It's not a conspiracy or whatnot, it's just like any other ideology, a way of seeing the world and an idea about what society should strive towards, shared by a lot of people. You can easily spot these people because they spout things like "I'm a citizen of the world", "Our country is a country of immigrants", "nobody chooses where they're born, it's stupid to be proud of your country", etc...
"It's happened all throughout history where several distinct cultures have shared a small geographical space - like in Europe. Nationalists don't like to admit that, instead pretending that a "pure" nation and culture can be defined (by them of course) - but that's just nonsense."
It's ironic you claim that multiculturalism is a "bogeyman" when in fact the image you have of nationalists is the REAL bogeyman. What you say may apply to a small minority of nationalists, but not to most.
I note that you talk about "geographic space", a term that denies the important reality of political borders and States. Yes, there were many cultures in Europe, but most had their own States, which is important because it allows cultures to dominate a political space, inspiring the laws and social norms that rule public life in that space, minimizing tensions between different cultures who may have different ideals of living and norms, allowing them to live in separate legal and political spaces even if they are geographically close.
"The EU is a neoliberal economical project that seeks to benefit trade and an economic agenda that suits big business. That certainly hurts ordinary workers in some ways, but the goal is to make money - not to destroy nations or mix races or deny anyone self-determination or anything else the far-right believes."
The leaders of the EU project have been clear that they see borders as the "worst invention in the history of the world", and they also have claimed things like "there can be no democratic choice against European treaties". As to the neoliberal agenda, it's debatable. The harmonization of economic rules to create a federal EU, the "United States of Europe", may look like neoliberalism sometimes, but actual free marketers point out that the EU is far from a free trade entity, it favors free trade internally, but has no qualms about controlling trade with countries outside the EU.
The goal of federalists in Europe is to destroy the nation-State, viewed as the cause of war. It's so blatant that pro-EU people will often parrot the claim that the EU is the only reason there hasn't been a new World War originating in Europe.
"But without that common enemy and put into a situation where their interests would conflict they'd be at each others throats in no time."
They would both defend their own nation's interests foremost, but they would not support dominating the other, and support the other's right to exist. It's the equivalent of defending the freedom of speech of someone else you may disagree with.
Oh, and Québec, Scottish and Catalan nationalist movements have collaborated for decades, way before multiculturalism became so ascendant.