Gennifer Flowers.

[hollodero]

(10-10-2016, 10:13 PM)michaelsean Wrote: Yeah I wasn't discounting listening to others viewpoints on any given topic.  I have no issue withthat at all.

And I have no problem with a citizen of any country thinking they live in the greatest country ever.  In our case we happen to be right,  but I have no problem with others believing it about their country. If you tell me Austria is the greatest country ever, I don't think you are arrogant.  You just really love your country.

Oh, sure you are. On the scale of greatness you apply you always reach the perfect score. I don't know what this scale is and what can objectively be called "great", but I figure you do just because you're that great.

But well. It's really not about arrogance. It's about what defines a reasonable claim, really. Here's a difference, as I see it. There's loving one's country. We Austrians more or less all do, just as we love all kinds of things and persons that are far from perfect. - But you don't leave it at that, you actually say your country is better. I would never ever say that about Austria (for good reason and not because I have no love for it). And I think it is in any case a dangerous conviction. That is a) really based on what indicators? b) seems like you have reached some kind of eternal peak ("ever"?) and c) might make you blind for some things that indeed are not great in any sense of the word (and there are some). 

But I certainly don't want to offer too much criticism; I just have a different perspective of that, and that's certainly because I'm from a small nation. It's how I grew up, and it's how you grew up. I believe these three points to be valid. I believe it would serve you better if you left it at "The USA is a great country". It seems like the more accurate description. Going farther than that is what we would call nationalism. And I still would believe it's not the kind of thinking people of all nations should lean towards in the future. Now you might call it "being patriotic" instead and I certainly meant no offence - it's just what nationalism means to me in the pure sense of the word. And btw. it's how I - and many many others - see Americans, as overly nationalistic. Do you need to care? Probably not.

But nope, only few of us are as... let's say as patriotic. Let me tell you that Austria is indeed not the greatest country ever. There's plenty of proof.