None of these traits that you are ascribing are uniquely ' American.'
They absolutely are. American asylum seekers have a unique narrative. Nowhere else are you an American asylum seeker besides America. In no other country do immigrants relate to Ellis Island. It's a fundamentally different story. American English is distinct from Australian English and British English. Also unique. You not caring enough to notice does not preclude their uniqueness.
You keep talking about the country as if it were a person, it isn't. Any accomplishments were made by actual people, not this mythological entity.
...and a good many of those people happened to believe in that mythological entity, and were proud of it.
Because nationalism is fundamentally irrational, and socially corrosive, much like religion.
It's perfectly rational to feel pride by association. Why do you think people feel proud of their respective sports teams when they make progress?
Yes. Noam Chomsky; the Anarchist, the MIT professor, the scientist, the most cited living author, and eighth most cited author in recorded history.
Yep. That one.
You're right. It's a socialist dictatorship. Which is what I said. If you want to call it a communist dictatorship, go ahead. I don't particularly care to argue the difference right now. Also, when Raul announced a pay raise a few years back, he said it was to rewards those who "defended socialism." Hmm....
Cuba spends a significantly larger portion of it's GDP on foreign aid. In fact, comparing foreign aid to GDP, the United States consistently ranks near the bottom, behind all of Western Europe, Japan, Australia, China, etc., etc. Suffice to say, Cuba spends sa greater percentage of it's GDP on foreign aid than the United States. Cuba has also been outstanding in sending trained medical technicians to the most impoverished regions, Pakistan, Haiti, several African countries, etc. So, yes, the Cuban government is significantly more altruistic than the United States government.
Saying a nation is "more altruistic" for giving a larger percentage of its GDP is like saying the nation that lost a higher proportion of its population during a war was more in-the-right. We give much more in real terms. Besides, Cuban foreign aid is geared towards its Bolivarian allies, and what it terms "anti-colonialism." Aside from that, it's mostly their international medical brigades doing PR.
Many of the Cuban doctors sent abroad actually
defect. That should tell you something.
Then you hold all of them accountable, especially the United States. There are contemptible human rights abuses occurring in North Korea, China, Colombia, etc., but it takes absolutely zero moral courage to point that out. There's also nothing we can do about it. The real test is applying those standards to ourselves, which is heresy. Otherwise, you're a hypocrite.
Again, not sure how this precludes me from feeling pride.
There's no reason why I should be pursuaded by how being American makes you feel. It's simply not relevent.
I mean, the whole point is that I really don't understand how one could NOT be proud of America. Whether or not you feel pride by the end of this argument doesn't mean anything to me.
First; I'm an Atheist, among other things.
Second,; again, this is completely wrong. It is impossible to create rights, only to respect rights. The law has no inherent moral authority. The law can be just, or unjust, but justice precedes the law, and originates outside of it.
I'm sorry that having no innate rights in reality hurts your world view. Seems like you feel rather attached to something that doesn't exist. Maybe that's your substitute for religious faith, eh? ALL HAIL THE CHURCH OF ANARCHO-SOCIALISM! That's what you are, right?
In other words; 'Love it or leave it.' If I believed in such things, I'd say that was a fundamentally un-American, and anti-American attitude. I don't want to leave this country; I want to dismantle illegitimate institutions. I oppose these institutions not simply because I find them personally objectionable, but because of what they do to my fellow man.
...
First, I think it should be a fairly obvious truism that any despot can utter high-minded rhetoric about 'fairness', 'justice', 'freedom.' According to their propagandists, even the most brutal regimes were the picture of benevolence. What matters is what people do, whether or not they live up to the rhetoric. That's just fairly obvious.
The United States is absolutely the most prolific sponsor and perpetrator of state terrorism. Take the official US definition of Terrorism;
'premeditated, politically motivated violence perpetrated against noncombatant targets by subnational groups or clandestine agents, usually intended to influence an audience.'
There are numerous historical examples; Indonesia, Chile, Guatemala, Cuba, and Nicaragua, for which the United States was officially convicted by the International Court of Justice, in 1986.
As for the correlation between US military aid and human rights abuses, I would recommend the 1981 study by Lars Schoultz, There have been impeccable corroborating studies by Martha Huggins, and Edward S. Herman, which can be found fairly easily.
So let me get this straight...you live in a nation that, according to you, is not only the number one sponsor of state terrorism in the world, but fundamentally illegitimate...yet you persist in living here and paying taxes (which, to you, should be blood money)... and your excuse is that you want to butcher the cow you're milking? Take note --this is why people of your ilk are ridiculed. Actually, I feel pity towards you.
I've already stated that I'm well aware of America's shortcomings, including its interventionism. It doesn't preclude me from being proud of it. Just as you were not personally responsible for the good things in America's past, I was not responsible for, let's say...the murder of Mohammed Mossadiq. I just happen to believe that the ideological magnitude of America's beneficial actions outweigh those of the negative.