Originally posted by Muckster
I really don't understand this level of patriotic extremism... i really don't. It borders fanaticism and reinforces my belief that this type of patriotism is harmful.

My argument here is not who is right or wrong regarding the disputed islands... it's how people can feel this much anger and rage over a lump of rock in the middle of the sea that will never really affect any of their life’s?!?!

I just don't get it? Brainwashed?

I suggest you do some research into the Japanese occupation of China. I challenge you to repeat the above then.....

What does damaging property and rioting solve? Just breaking stuff for the sake of breaking stuff has always puzzled me. Why is the Chinese government remaining mute on the subject? They had a big stink with the Philippines over Scarborough Shoal, but silence about this? Something is amiss.

It appears Japan has more precedence in terms of ownership of the islands than that of China. The article stated that this island was made a Japanese possession in the 1890s. I realize China remains cautious and upset about the Japanese and what happened during WWII. However, raising the Japanese flag on a territorial possession of Japan is not a reason to turn over cars, damage property, and set cities alight. The people that raised the flags did so on their own, and are right wing nationalists. The island remains undeveloped by the Japanese government.

In all fairness, this is a hot button issue between Japan and China, because there is an ongoing dispute over ownership. Still, I think this is a blip on the radar, and certainly not a reason to run amok. Perhaps as the article points out, maybe China is ratcheting up this outrage to take pressure off of them over a particular political issue or a government policy?

This is all politics. Countries where freedom of action and thought is tightly controlled (such as in China and Iran) can "turn on" and "turn off" protests at a whim. I bet the state controlled media were in position to make sure every Chinese was able to share in the outrage.

It is in China's interests to keep this type of territorial dispute going and in Japan's case it is in China's interests to play the "remember what the nasty Japs did a few decades ago" card.

The fact is that China has territorial disputes with practically evey nation it borders and some it does not.

Regards

This is why patriotism aka nationalism is bad.

ATS needs to do something about this double post issue.

Originally posted by RealSpoke
This is why patriotism aka nationalism is bad.

Exactly...

I confined that particular sentiment to the scrapheap around the same time as my eyes opened.

Until we can get away from thinking of ourselves as little tribes defined by colour, race, nationality, political affiliation etc... Until we can start to recognise that we share the same planet and want and need the same fundamental things e.g. food, water, and clean air... then i'm affraid we will remain our own worst enemy.

Peace

Originally posted by Muckster
it's how people can feel this much anger and rage over a lump of rock in the middle of the sea that will never really affect any of their life’s?!?!

This lump of rock happens to have HUGE gas deposits around it under the Sea bed...

Might be why everyone is arguing over it. Same as many of the islands in that part of the world and is probably why China has claimed pretty much everything, everywhere as their own, hence all the disputes and rightly so, as China is starting to throw it's weight around and needs checking.

Originally posted by RealSpoke
This is why patriotism aka nationalism is bad.

And this is why anyone who is NOT a patriot cannot call himself a human beign.

Also, patriotism is NOT nationalism.But what to ask from someone who have little knowledge about the above two.

Patriotism = LOVE of your COUNTRY.
Nationalism = HATE anyone who is NOT the same nationality as you are.


Everyone MUST be a patriot.There is no other way, except NWO.

I myself, as a romanian, I will give my life for even 1 square feet of my country land.That is patriotism.
But I will not fight to kill 1,3 million hungarians and 2,4 million gipsy that live in Romania.


I uderstand BOTH japanese and chinese.Both people consider to be their land.Both of them are patriots.

Originally posted by Muckster

Originally posted by RealSpoke
This is why patriotism aka nationalism is bad.

Exactly...

I confined that particular sentiment to the scrapheap around the same time as my eyes opened.

Until we can get away from thinking of ourselves as little tribes defined by colour, race, nationality, political affiliation etc... Until we can start to recognise that we share the same planet and want and need the same fundamental things e.g. food, water, and clean air... then i'm affraid we will remain our own worst enemy.

Peace

Read the above post.

It seems that A LOT of people have no idea what is patriotism and what is nationalism.


Also, if you want to change the ESSENCE of nation...sorry, but this is the wrong planet.

If you scroll WAY down to the bottom of the BBC article, you'll see the incident that precipitated this - a flotilla of Chinese nationalists eluded the coast guard and planted a flag on the island last week. They were predictably arrested and deported, but not before the Chinese press could get the images.

also of note - and missing from most western press on this - is that this is actually a three way dispute. Taiwan also claims the islands, which makes all of this complicated to a point seemingly beyond mediation. China doesn't recognize Taiwan, let alone Taiwan's claims.

so the question is: why now? Why would the Chinese government suddenly go after this unresolvable issue?

Well, there was the guilty verdict on Sunday against Gu Kailai, wife of widely known and popular politician Bo Xilai. She murdered a British businessman named Neil Heywood. The case was cold until the chief of police (Wang Lijun) requested asylum at the US consulate - because he had evidence that the murder was being hushed up. He was denied, and they've got him slated for a treason trial next - despite the fact that he was right, and 4 cops were found guilty of trying to hush things up. For a lot of people this case encapsulates the ingrained corruption in Chinese politics and there's a lot of anger over it. This all comes at a time when the Chinese are in something akin to Election mode. Hu Jintao is expected to step down in November, as well as a number of other long standing politicians. Add a sagging economy to the mix.....

It's almost as though someone said "WE NEED A DISTRACTION AND WE NEED IT NOW!!!!!!"