Quotes About Patriotism

Remember this, take this to heart, live by it, die for it if necessary: that our patriotism is medieval, outworn, obsolete; that the modern patriotism, the true patriotism, the only rational patriotism, is loyalty to the Nation ALL the time, loyalty to the Government when it deserves it.

Why is patriotism thought to be blind loyalty to the government and the politicians who run it, rather than loyalty to the principles of liberty and support for the people? Real patriotism is a willingness to challenge the government when it's wrong.

I have formed a very clear conception of patriotism. I have generally found it thrust into the foreground by some fellow who has something to hide in the background. I have seen a great deal of patriotism; and I have generally found it the last refuge of the scoundrel.

Patriotism does not mean giving blind loyalty and a blank check to George W. Bush.

In the wars against Revolutionary and Napoleonic France, as in so many later conflicts, British women seem to have been no more markedly pacifist than men. Instead, and exactly like so many of their male countrymen, some women found ways of combining support for the national interest with a measure of self-promotion. By assisting the war effort, women demonstrated that their concerns were by no means confined to the domestic sphere. Under cover of a patriotism that was often genuine and profound, they carved out for themselves a real if precarious place in the public sphere.

Patriotism ... is a superstition artificially created and maintained through a network of lies and falsehoods; a superstition that robs man of his self-respect and dignity, and increases his arrogance and conceit.

My own duty as a teacher...is not so much to interpret Beethoven, Wagner, or other masters of the past, but to give what encouragement I can to the young musicians of America. I...hope that just as this nation has already surpassed so many others in marvelous inventions and feats of engineering and commerce, and has made an honorable place for itself in literature in one short century, so it must assert itself on the...art of music...To bring about this result, we must trust the very youthful enthusiasm and patriotism of this country.

Not only is patriotism disdained, the very basis for pride in one's country and culture is systematically undermined in our educational institutions at all levels. The achievements of western civilization are buried in histories that portray every human sin found here as if they were peculiarities of the west.

Pop stars exist in a different space, one not necessarily tied to a patriotism. So Rihanna is everyone's. She doesn't just belong to America, even though she's a creation of America.

America is a new country, and maybe patriotism helps Americans create unity, since it is a melting pot. But nationalism in Europe has a strong history, as you may know.

Patriotism has served, at different times, as widely different ends as a razor, which ought to be used in keeping your face clean and yet may be used to cut your own throat or that of an innocent person.

The vanquished know war. They see through the empty jingoism of those who use the abstract words of glory, honor, and patriotism to mask the cries of the wounded, the senseless killing, war profiteering, and chest-pounding grief.

Patriotism is an indispensable weapon in the defense of civilization against barbarism.

Every act of energy conservation... is more than just common sense: I tell you it is an act of patriotism.

I have the consolation to believe, that, while choice and prudence invite me to quit the political scene, patriotism does not forbid it.

I hope all of you will inherit and carry forward the fine traditions of China's religious circle in patriotism and religious piety and in upholding peace.

Patriotism. I'm uncomfortable with any word that starts with a pat, ends in an ism and has a riot in the middle.

They say that patriotism is the last refuge to which a scoundrel clings steal a little and they throw you in jail. Steal a lot and then they make you king.

My position is that it isn't government's job to mandate patriotism. To me, mandating a pledge of allegiance to a government is something Saddam Hussein would do.

The difference between treason and patriotism is only a matter of dates.

We need a type of patriotism that recognizes the virtues of those who are opposed to us.

Patriotism means loving our country, not the government.

The original American patriots were those individuals brave enough to resist with force the oppressive power of King George... Patriotism is more closely linked to dissent than it is to conformity and a blind desire for safety and security.

I'm an advocate of the great Dr. Johnson, the English man of letters who said that patriotism was the last refuge of the scoundrel.

I find it difficult to believe that I belong to such an idiotic, rotten species - the species that actually boasts of its freedom of will, heroism on command, senseless violence, and all of the loathsome nonsense that goes by the name of patriotism.

... where the Greeks had modesty, we have cant; where they had poetry, we have cant; where they had patriotism, we have cant; where they had anything that exalts, delights, or adorns humanity, we have nothing but cant, cant, cant.

I distinguish, between nationalism and patriotism.

War was ... the chief or maybe the only source of patriotism, and many a politician, from prehistory up to this morning, unified a discontented citizenry by pointing out a national danger and declaring war on it.

Patriotism is strong nationalistic feeling for a country whose borders and whose legitimacy and whose ethnic composition is taken for granted.

Patriotism is considered to be an emotion a person ought to feel. But why? Why is it nobler to love your own country than to love someone else's?

It's not always clear where a healthy patriotism shades into a dangerous nationalism.

There are seasons in every country when noise and impudence pass current for worth; and in popular commotions especially, the clamors of interested and factious men are often mistaken for patriotism.

Commerce diminishes the spirit, both of patriotism and military defence.

My patriotism and my conscience required me to support it and to engage in the debate over whether and how to fight it.

There was a time in South Africa that people would put flaming tires around peoples' necks if they dis-sented. And in some ways the fear is that you will be necklaced here, you will have a flaming tire of lack of patriotism put around your neck. Now it is that fear that keeps journalists from asking the toughest of the tough questions... And again, I am humbled to say, I do not except myself from this criticism.

We need a type of patriotism that recognizes the virtues of those who are opposed to us..... The old "manifest destiny" idea ought to be modified so that each nation has the manifest destiny to do the best it can - and that without cant, without the assumption of self-righteousness and with a desire to learn to the uttermost from other nations.

Here's how I see obesity: as a symptom. The larger problem is over-consumption. In a society that identifies consumption with patriotism, valorizes 'growth' above all else and assigns status according to how much you consume, we compete with each other to see who can consume the most.

Should we not begin to redefine patriotism? We need to expand it beyond that narrow nationalism which has caused so much death and suffering. If national boundaries should not be obstacles to trade-we call it globalization-should they also not be obstacles to compassion and generosity?

That sense – the only true patriotism – comes slowly and springs from the heart: it is founded upon respect for the family and love for the soil. Premature ‘liberty’ of this kind would have been a disaster: we should have been torn to pieces by petty squabbles before we had ever reached political maturity, which, as things were, as made possible by the long quiet years under monarchical government; for it was that government which, as it were, nursed our strength and enabled us ultimately to produce sound fruit from liberty, as only a politically adult nation can.

The aspects of patriotism that hush dissent, encourage going along, and sanction comfortable distancing and compliance with what is indecent and unacceptable... those aspects are too fundamental to ignore or gloss over.

Each nation feels superior to other nations. That breeds patriotism - and wars.

Patriotism requires less and less of making the eagle scream, but more and more of making him think.

Part of the problem with extreme patriotism is that it makes the support of one's country and its policies unconditional. Moderate patriots, on the other hand, see that taking morality seriously requires that our commitment to our country be conditional in two ways. First, the actions or policies of a government must be worthy of support or, at least, must not be serious violations of morality. When nations behave immorally, patriots need not support them.

What I’m talking about is more than recompense for past injustices—more than a handout, a payoff, hush money, or a reluctant bribe. What I’m talking about is a national reckoning that would lead to spiritual renewal. Reparations would mean the end of scarfing hot dogs on the Fourth of July while denying the facts of our heritage. Reparations would mean the end of yelling “patriotism” while waving a Confederate flag. Reparations would mean a revolution of the American consciousness, a reconciling of our self-image as the great democratizer with the facts of our history.

Patriotism is the intelligent appreciation that one's own welfare is inseparably connected with the general welfare and that to prosper personally one must intelligently do his utmost to maintain the general prosperity.

I have my fears. Yet, notwithstanding the complicated difficulties that rise before us, there is no receding; and I should blush if in any instance the weak passions of my sex should damp the fortitude, the patriotism, and the manly resolution of yours. May nothing ever check that glorious spirit of freedom which inspires the patriot in the cabinet, and the hero in the field, with courage to maintain their righteous cause, and to endeavor to transmit the claim to posterity, even if they must seal the rich conveyance to their children with their own blood.

We suffer from a terrible poverty of civic discourse in this country. Surely, it is outside of America's best traditions to send the signal that patriotism is mindless emotion, that leadership is avoiding saying tough things, that citizenship is toeing the line. But such is the result of a lack of openness, our nervousness with debate.

I've been working with Pat Robertson on Africa debt-relief, and we disagree on virtually everything except certain very specific, inalienable rights, and the truth is that morality and patriotism come in all shapes and sizes.