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Nationalism allows people to replace part of their self-image with that of their nation. This permits them to be personal failures, while still having self worth. It also allows them to justify acts as "in the national interest" which they would otherwise find unjustifiable.
If you yourself are dehumanized as a mere instrument of the grand state, viewing those who you kill/oppress/exploit as less than yourself effectively removes most of the ethical problems involved. They are either against the state (in which case, it is morally required that you destroy them), or they are poor tools of the state (failing to support it), and should be corrected and/or amputated.
It is an effective meme for a number of reasons. It centralizes power, so people who seek to have large amounts of power will encourage it. While half of the population is below average (and, if their goal is success along a mutually agreed upon measure, means that half will be failures), everyone can be a success if the success of the state as a whole is your souce of pride. It lines up with "other-fear", or the fear of strangeness, that most people seem to have. And, unlike many other simular isms, it isn't denegrated that much by modern society, so most people haven't been immunized against it.
And, like most large-scale memes, it has it's benefits.
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Last edited by JHVH : 10-29-4004 BC at 09:00 PM. Reason: Time for a rest.
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