Nationalism is Racism, So Why the Schizophrenia?

Racism is rightly denounced in American society. That’s not to say there isn’t racism, but when its not covert or closeted, it’s publicized as one of the most despicable beliefs a person could hold. Even when you pay millions of dollars to athletes of another color, as in the case of Donald Sterling of the Los Angeles Clippers, you become public enemy number one.

Nationalism, on the other hand, receives the opposite treatment, and in fact, when you behave anti-nationalistically, you are denounced as un-American or as hating the troops and passively aggressively encouraged to move to another country.

But in reality, nationalism is racism. Both are the belief that one group of people are superior to another because of something completely out of their control (skin color, where you’re born). Both create and promote that feeling of superiority over other human beings, and both lead to totally deplorable actions today and throughout history.

So why is everyone schizophrenically and illogically denouncing racism and promoting nationalism?

Save as PDFPrint

Written by 

Founder and editor of Everything-Voluntary.com and UnschoolingDads.com, Skyler is a husband and unschooling father of three beautiful children. His writings include the column series “One Voluntaryist’s Perspective” and “One Improved Unit,” and blog series “Two Cents“. Skyler also wrote the books No Hitting! and Toward a Free Society, and edited the books Everything Voluntary and Unschooling Dads. You can hear Skyler chatting away on his podcasts, Everything Voluntary and Thinking & Doing.