I once Loved a Patriot

The last couple of weeks, I have witnessed a strange fever come upon people that of defining patriotism and by extension a patriot’s version of freedom of speech and expression. I am not going to undertake a naive attempt at defining patriotism; the writers of House, think that patriotism is love of real estate; I personally have no position on it. I used to feel patriotic while watching cricket, but ever since I outgrew cricket, I have never really felt patriotic.

While people have proceeded to define patriotism, I am still struggling with the definition of country? What is a country, what does it encompass – Land? Tectonic plates? The Sky Above? The Ocean Bed? A people? A diversity? A Constitution?  Or various permutations and combination of all of this? A country is an abstract idea. I may argue that country is a myth,  invoked to alienate subalterns. Are people victims of geography? No! People in the same geographical confines do not suffer the same things. However, people everywhere are victims of power concentration and country is a convenient way of hegemonising. Social and political structures within one’s country are lauded. Majoritarianism here is treated as a bad word, flung around as an insinuation; however, is not the concept of electorate democracy based on the very principle of majoritarinism?

Fear is the foundation, of the concept of country. Well it is the founding argument for organisation of any kind. People will not congregate unless scared; foreign power, alien, god all viable options. When I started writing, I didn’t see myself taking this direction. I have implicitly argued for a no border world. How naively and simplistically I renounced geopolitical, religious and security conundrums. 

Many, many years ago, as a C.B.S.E student of standard X, I had studied a short story as part of my literature course. I forget the details but the story was about a joint hindu family residing in a village. The youngest son goes to the city and marries. Following the death of the father, the city wife wants a division in the family property. She wants her husband to sell his part of the land, so that they could have a more comfortable life. The author was against this position; to him this was a sin. We as a people do not respond well to discussions on secession. 

As far as the extent of Freedom of Speech and Expression is concerned, I do not feel anyone is qualified to define it, not a Jury, not a Government, not God and it is dangerous to even attempt it. Without arguing whether it was indeed said or not; people who are lamenting the fact that our neighbours might view us, as weak, if we do not indict those that demand secession; I think that this just demonstrates how strong we are.

Memes that show students of the concerned university mourning the loss of Pakistan in yesterdays match have failed to comprehend the crux of the issue. Most students there might just dismiss cricket as colonial consumerist debauchery or all of sport for that matter. I might be exaggerating but vacuous rhetoric is the essence of our times and Parliament. People who feel strongly for nation and feel duty bound to vilify said student can channelize their love into not spitting and pissing on the asphalt of the land they love so much. It will be a win-win for all I guess.