Yet to be born
The country’s political and economic leaders today are neither nationalists nor patriots
IT’S painful and humbling to admit but it was not until French President Emmanuel Macron’s speech on the 100th anniversary of the Armistice (that ended World War I) that I became fully aware of the critical difference between nationalism and patriotism.
Google Search gave me this unmistakably straightforward take-off: “The difference between patriotism and nationalism is that the patriot is proud of his country for what it does, and the nationalist is proud of his country no matter what it does...”
President Macron was referencing Trump’s nationalist policy of “America First” which he feared could lead to animosity, even war, between the U.S. and countries that would be crushed under the latter’s arrogant policy, a nationalist posture American patriots should not be proud of.
For my part, I tried fitting Filipinos (both economic, political leaders and the ordinary often poor and obscure folks they lord over) into this template to see who was nationalist and who was patriot. The reader could do the same and come up with a different result, but for whatever it is worth this is what I came up with.
Our political and economic leaders today, all of them rich and powerful without exception, are neither nationalists nor patriots. Like the members of Emilio Aguinaldo’s Cabinet in “Heneral Luna,” they have no sense of nation and are guided solely by political and economic expediency that allows them to offer as sacrifice to the Baal of self-interest the greater good of the bigger number.
They have no use for patriots, the likes of Andres Bonifacio or General Luna, whose love of freedom and justice menaces the walls of their economic and political castles.
Unfortunately they are able to do this because, on the other side of the political and economic divide, the ordinary Filipino is himself/herself neither nationalist nor patriot. Her/his loyalty stops with her/his family, at best with his/her tribe. He/she is not a Filipino but a Cebuano, Ilocano, Tagalog, Ilonggo, Waray, etc. Like his/her leaders he/she has no sense of a Filipino nation he would be a patriot of.
To cite instances that immediately come to mind, Ilocanos love the Marcoses who improved their tribe’s welfare by plundering the Filipino nation. Cebuanos extol Lapulapu as the first Filipino patriot but there was no Filipino nation yet at the battle of Mactan. Lapulapu was just a local chieftain (of Bornean descent I am told) protecting his island kingdom from invaders.
Until now, Filipino leaders lack a sense of nation as they sacrifice national interest to self-interest. Nor have Filipino followers a sense of belonging to a nation as their loyalty stops with their family or tribe. The Filipino nation is yet to be born.