Nationalist Mentality

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Clarissa

August 18, 2016

The nation-state mentality is not quitting without a fight. Right now on TV there started a discussion about bullying and cruelty on social media. Within seconds, though, the conversation was dead because the participants became obsessed with affirming that Americans are crueler on social media than anybody else.

Twitter, Instagram, and Co obviously know no national borders. It’s impossible to categorize participants according to nationality. I mean, who do I count for? American, Ukrainian, Canadian? What about reader Cliff Arroyo? Or reader Stringer Bell?

As a result of the obsession with proving that Americans are the most whatever, the discussion of online cruelty failed.

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7 responses to “Nationalist Mentality”

J. Otto Pohl

August 18, 2016

Depends on how are you using the word nationality. In English speaking countries it tends to be a synomyn for citizenship. The Russian word natsional’nost’ really translates as primordial and essentialized ethnic category and hence has a very different meaning. One that really doesn’t apply to most Americans. When I got married in Kyrgyzstan I had the line for my natsional’nost’ left blank.

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1. cliff arroyo
  
  August 18, 2016
  
  I agree on the meaning of nationality in English. To me, “a Swedish national” means someone with Swedish citizenship and not necessarily an ethnic Swede (however that gets defined).
  
  I do think of Americans as a distinct linguistic and cultural group (with some sub-groupings) but it doesn’t fit in well with Old World concepts of nations as groups of people.
  
  Nation (in the US at least) usually refers to countries and not peoples. Argentina is a nation, but I’m not sure if Argentinians are… (I think they probably are close enough for government work but it’s a tricky area and based more on language and culture than pure genetics).
  
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2. Clarissa
  
  August 18, 2016
  
  I had to learn to use it the American way to refer to citizenship. Otherwise, things get too confusing.
  
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el

August 18, 2016

The destruction of jobs continues – where will Uber drivers you’ve seen go? Look:

SAN FRANCISCO – Uber passengers in Pittsburgh will be able to summon rides in self-driving cars with the touch of a smartphone button in the next several weeks. Uber also announced that it is acquiring a self-driving startup called Otto, co-founded by Israeli Lior Ron, that has developed technology allowing big rigs to drive themselves.
http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-4843442,00.html

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1. Clarissa
  
  August 18, 2016
  
  The Uber drivers I met all have other jobs.
  
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el

August 18, 2016

Btw, do you agree with “car ownership goes away” prediction? Here:

\the future of all transportation—is driverless [ ] “When there’s no other dude in the car, the cost of taking an Uber anywhere becomes cheaper than owning a vehicle. So the magic there is, you basically bring the cost below the cost of ownership for everybody, and then car ownership goes away,” [Uber’s CEO] said at the Code Conference in 2014, shortly after Google unveiled its self-driving car prototype.

I do not see how Americans in every suburb will all use Uber to go to work, instead of their cars. Or Americans living in less populated areas with woods, etc. May be less people in large cities will have cars, but it’s already so in Europe.

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1. Clarissa
  
  August 18, 2016
  
  Exactly. We have one guy doing Uber in our cluster of small towns. When he is otherwise occupied, there is no Uber. So what you’ve got to do is text him a few days in advance and ask him to be available. Which turns from Uber into asking a neighbor for a favor.
  
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