Pride of Place

There are few political creeds more enduring, powerful and ugly than nationalism.  That an accident of birth should instill someone with such misplaced pride and inform the political decision making process is plainly irrational. Yet despite being thoroughly discredited in two world wars, nationalism retains a powerful hold on modern political debate, eschewing universal principles in favour of chauvinism and creating unities amongst groups who really ought not to have that much in common.  In 2002, Gerhard Schroeder - Germany’s own “Tony Blair” - having failed to make much reformist headway in four years as Chancellor, fought the Federal Elections on anti-Iraq war, kind-of anti-American ticket and won himself another three years of ineffective rule.  George Bush wore a stars and stripes collar pin while cutting taxes for a relatively small section of the wealthiest Americans and got himself re-elected with the support of most of the poorest states in the union.  In Ireland we had nationalism real bad.  So pleased were we with winning independence from the British that we spent most of the first forty years or so of self-rule ignoring the socio-economic progress that was being made elsewhere in western Europe, so pleased with being a republic our political leaders had no difficulty allowing a foreign monarchy vet social legislation as long as it wasn’t the British.  Even when I was a kid, Charles Haughey was flogging nationalism every chance he could get to gain advantage over the liberal Garret Fitzgerald.  Historians continue to debate the relative merits of his premiership, but there’s no doubt that one of his main political planks was that he kind-of didn’t like the British , a policy which did exactly nothing for the hundreds of thousands of unemployed in the country who lived an impoverished lifestyle that his corruption had insulated him against.  He didn’t like the British and sometimes wore a fisherman’s hat; therefore he was a man of the people.  Nationalism says we are all of one tribe, we are all the same and in its ugliest form insists we all should think and act the same with any breaking of the ranks suspect at best, treasonous at worst. It’s simply not rational to invest pride, honour and meaning in the place you happen to be born in.  But then, if reason defines us humans, so too does our sometimes endearing, sometimes terrifying ability to abjure it.  Georges Clemenceau said a patriot loves his country, while a nationalist hates everyone else’s (to be fair Clemenceau spent most of his career hating the Germans). I think political nationalism with its flags, marches, drums and demagogues is often predicated on hating another place, but love of locality is much more of a simple fondness for home, less heralded but ultimately more keenly felt.  Loving your home town comes down to the mundane and banal everyday of life; the way people speak, the way people work, the way people insult.  It doesn’t depend on being the biggest or most beautiful place, just that it should have something unique only you truly recognize.  That uniqueness is usually formed by a combination of shared history and humour, and, from time to time, shared pain.  So when this everyday place you live in pulls off something extraordinary, when it does a good job, the most satisfying aspect is the opportunity to feel proud of something you take for granted a little bit too much.  To indulge in some of that more strident nationalistic pride in the place you love in a much quieter way every other day.  Waterford put on a great party last weekend, the oldest city in Ireland looked youthful, happy and optimistic, and all our visitors agreed - to which I always think “and they haven’t even seen the county yet!” It’s not important for me believe that Waterford is the greatest place on earth: you know, I’ve heard New York is pretty cool.  It just has to be the most Waterford place on earth but the weekend showed us just how great that can be.  I leave with the words of the great Kirk Douglas in Spartacus.  As the gladiators, resplendent in their homo-erotic shortened togas, and even more homo-erotic Brooklyn accents, debate where the best wine in the world comes from, Kirk interrupts and tells them that they’re all wrong: “the best wine in the world is from home, wherever home is!” The group then break into hearty laughing and back slapping, which is what Waterford should now do.