What Do You Owe Your Country? What Do You Give Back?

I feel I owe:
Learning policies and histories of candidates and voting
Community service
Taxes
recycling
Involvement in schools, when my kids attend
Assistance to law enforcement when I witness a crime...

These come to mind first.

to follow the examples of those who have pointed the way and honor what they sacrificed and taught us.

http://www.jfklancer.com/Address.html


"But let us begin.

"In your hands, my fellow citizens, more than mine, will rest the final success or failure of our course. Since this country was founded, each generation of Americans has been summoned to give testimony to its national loyalty. The graves of young Americans who answered the call to service surround the globe.

'Now the trumpet summons us again--not as a call to bear arms, though arms we need,--not as a call to battle, though embattled we are--but a call to bear the burden of a long twilight struggle, year in and year out, "rejoicing in hope, patient in tribulation"--a struggle against the common enemies of man: tyranny, poverty, disease, and war itself.

"Can we forge against these enemies a grand and global alliance, North and South, East and West, that can assure a more fruitful life for all mankind? Will you join in that historic effort?

"In the long history of the world, only a few generations have been granted the role of defending freedom in its hour of maximum danger. I do not shrink from this responsibility--I welcome it. I do not believe that any of us would exchange places with any other people or any other generation. The energy, the faith, the devotion which we bring to this endeavor will light our country and all who serve it--and the glow from that fire can truly light the world.

"And so, my fellow Americans: ask not what your country can do for you --ask what you can do for your country."

http://www.jfklink.com/speeches/jfk/sept60/jfk140960_ny04.html

"Government is an art and a precious obligation; and when it has a job to do, I believe it should do it. And this requires not only great ends but that we propose concrete means of achieving them.

"Our responsibility is not discharged by an announcement of virtuous ends. Our responsibility is to achieve these objectives with social invention, with political skill, and executive vigor. I believe for these reasons, that liberalism is our best and our only hope in the world today. For the liberal society is a free society, and it is at the same time and for that reason a strong society. Its strength is drawn from the will of free people committed to great ends and peacefully striving to meet them. Only liberalism, in short, can repair our national power, restore our national purpose, and liberate our national energies."

imagine george bush giving those speeches?

I found it hard to empathize with the axiom of this poll: I don't think in countries, I think in planets. Countries are virtual constructions that divide us. In reality, we share a common planetary life and fate.

Hmm - I think country is, nonetheless, a reasonable thing to ask questions about, Wolf - thought i take your point.

I feel as though I owe my community.

My comfort and opportunities rest on the backs of the Aboriginal people who had their land taken, the early settlers, who worked and died in a tough land, the working people who struggled for decent wages and conditions, the business people who invested here, the early feminists who secured the vote and the right to be a citizen, the people who fought for equal pay, for my right to keep my job even if I married (until the early seventies, women were forced to resign from many public sector jobs, if they married), the people who established and fostered educational institutions, and made them accessible - I could go on and on and on - I guess I already did!

What do I owe? Hmm - at a basic minimum, to pay taxes and such - to give back to the commmunity in some way, (time, effort, money, thought, political action etc) to try to make things better, in however small a way - ( that effort is sort of focussed through my work, at present) - at a minimum, to do no harm!

The "planet" does not provide the social construct which allows you the security, comfort and affluence necessary to have purchased the computer which you have used to post that statement. It's a nice position in the ideal; in the practical, we all owe much to each other in that concept of "nation" which sustains us. I might find your observation more useful, had i the necessary confidence in the rest of the human race that a workable social contract could be effectuated with equity and honesty--but i haven't that confidence.

I volunteered and served three years in the United States Army. I consider that this discharges my public debt to the social contract. I try, not always successfully, but usually, to extend to others that courtesy and consideration which i hope to find myself. As to the rest of humanity, i think we can all best serve the future of the population of the planet by makin our own polity just and democratic, and extending our aid to those who will not abuse it. The United States has far too long a history of supporting whoever serves what a small group of mostly Ivy League white males consider the national interest. I believe we can best serve the entire human race by rectifying that situation first, before considering what we might do for others. I don't mean we should end foreign aid, but that we must apply new standards, and sweep our own stoop first.

I am El Capitan Bitchfist, and I pay genuflection to none

I not only agree with what Wolf said -- I also agree with what dlowan said in reply.

If I have any major obligations -- they are to everything that exists on the planet -- and to the planet itself.

I guess I have some minor obligations to my country and my community also.

I've served in military service -- 4 years in the Air Force.

I am an informed voter -- and I vote each election.

Up until very recently, I attended the local township council meetings every week; I spoke up during time allocated to public comments; I write letters to the editor and op ed pieces giving my take on issues; I was a very active, hands-on member of three township commissions and was chairman of two of them.

Nancy and I often take walks in our neighborhood -- and I have been know to take along a plastic bag so I can police the area of bits of paper or other debris that manages to invade our streets.

And I share my views in Internet forums.

I could have made my way up in any society and bought a computer. I owe something to technology in this -- not to a national state. That technology is American (Intel), European (Philips), and the back of my keyboard says Made in China. And there is a constant cross-fertilization between them all. I have as much to thank to the U.S. as to the country where I happen to be born. Nations, again, have become virtually irrelevant in face of the international consensus. There are much more parallels between nations than differences.

Which brings us to your second quote:



That's where you and I differ. There is no reason to sketch other cultures as being terminally irreconcilable to ours. Work hard for peace, and you will get it. Educate people, and they will work with you. Attack them, disrespect them, colonize them, and you will reap the consequences.

The Roman empire was once great. Look where it got Italy. Nations are nothing.

Which is something else than to say that communities are nothing. I'm sure when you do civil service, or invest in local communities, it's eventually intended to better human relationships towards each other and the environment in general -- we are helping humans, basta.

When we take care of our communities, we act locally but think globally. Even when we don't know it.

What if you have never spent any significant time in your country, and have never used the educational or health facilities of your country?

I don't feel like I owe my country a damn thing. It's a line in the sand and has not helped or hurt me. If I should feel a debt to my country I should then be indebted to a whole slew of them.

This poll is missing the option of "not a damn thing".

I guess I see this country as being a benevolent elder in my family. And, like amongst my family, the debts go on and on and on such that they cease to be debts. Does that make sense?

Littlek--

It makes sense to me. I think that's a nice sentiment.

Craven--

Maybe the country people feel some type of reciprocal relationship with is the one they have lived in longer. I think the 'relationship' is what is at point here-- You haven't really established a 'giving or recieving' relationship with America, yet, it seems. How 'bout Brazil?

Wolf presumes that i disparage other cultures--i do not, i disparage the governments of other nations. Whether or not Wolf thinks there ought to be nations, there are, and nationalism is a very strong force in the lives of a great deal of the planet's population--without reference to the ideals to which Wolf aspires. Wolf also assumes that it is pretty much indifferent a matter in which society s/he might find her/himself, s/he'd still get a job, working to a position which would afford the security and affluence to participate here. This is an incredible naivete about how the societies and economies of the world work. I'm not slamming the people of other cultures--i am stating that the continued supremecy of tribal values in this and other nations assures the continuance of nationalism, which is why i have no confidence that a global social contract based on honesty and equity, can currently be established. Repeating a trite phrase such as think globally and act locally is no refutation, nor even a differing, with what i wrote above about working at home to assure the democratic honesty of our institutions, before attempting to assure that elsewhere.

It would help if you don't think in slogans.

Setanta, you have demonstrated your view on the world by again adressing me in an arrogant way, where I have only quoted you. You project your own social fears upon the world that surrounds you, biting at it like an upset doggy.

I have another slogan for you which I hold sacred: the world is what you make of it. You have mentally divided the world, you have projected the other side of that big ocean that surrounds you to be populated with enemies. You suffer from that typical post-patriotic paranoid alienation towards the rest of the planet that your 'Ivy League white males' suffer from.

There are no enemies, my friend, unless you invent them -- which is what your commanders-in-chief have been doing for too long. All the enemies that the US is currently fighting, were created by those arrogant males you are correctly referring to. Leave the club.

No, and no for the other 8 countries as well. All I owe any community is to coexist peacefully with them, pay my dues, and live my life.

Just out of curiosity do you feel like you owe your state something?

Setanta said--

Precisely the point of the question. I feel a great debt to those like Setanta, dys and the many others who sacrificed and availed themselves to service to my country. And agree with dlowan's sentiment. I can never match the contributions of some that went before me, but I can do my part.
Wolf said--

I think this was a little glib. Think about the realities of life in some other countries. In many, you wouldn't have made it to age two. Are you somehow superior to the masses born in destitute, barren countries? Is there no good reason they are suffering and failing? Your big brain may not have developed to such a startling extreme, had your mother not been able to feed you every day.

I can respond to you by quotes, if that is what you prefer. The "upset doggy" nonsense is just that--nonsense, a gratuitous attempt at an insult. Not a very effective attempt, however. I have arrogated nothing--arrogant means assuming rights or privileges to which one is not entitled. I have a perfect right in this forum to comment on how you respond to what i've posted. It is absurd to contend that addressing you in any way constitutes a characterization of my "view on the world." It is simply a response to an individual, not a comment upon the aggregate of the human race.



I haven't mentally divided the world, i'm just making my best effort to apply realpolitik when veiwing it. I haven't created nation-states, nor are they a figment of my imagination. When Iraqis attack the Jordanian embassy, that is an expression of their nationalism, and their preception of Jordan as a separate entity, against whom they may cherish a grudge. To fail to recognize such conditions, simply because they are not consonant with one's desire for a "one world" society, is simply naive. I do not see the world as populated by enemies--once again, you have projected onto what i've written your own resentments towards those who have failed your standard of thinking globally. I have no illusions about how other governments are organized and their aspirations. I have no illusions about the desire of millions upon millions of other people in this world to organize things to their own liking, as opposed to working for a compromise which would give us all a global social contract with which we could live, and under which we could prosper. I suggest that either you've travelled little, or understood little of what lesson you might have gotten from travel. I would also suggest that you've either read and understood little history, or have been blinded in your reading by notions which you sought to reaffirm, rather than learning anything. Post patriotic paranoid alienation . . . OMG, i laughed my ass off at that one.



I am not your friend, of that you may be assured. You are the one who has posited enemies, not i. My commanders-in-chief? How is that they would be mine, but not yours? I'm no member of any club, having joined the Army, something which i do not regret, i have joined no organization since then. You have been very busy here projecting your prejudices onto me. You have also displayed a breathtakingly childish view of the world, and one which is as extreme in its foolish trusting as is the paranoia of which you wrongly accuse me.

State taxes, and community service--as my state mostly deals with me on a community level. The state benefits from my volunteering and involvement in the school system, the Mental Health system and with elderly programs. Yes. I feel where I derive benefits, I do owe a level of participation and service. If they hadn't just finally done a sweet paving of my street, they'd owe me!

I serve my community and my state benefits. I do vote locally for state representatives, and make myself aware of issues on a state level.

If they picked a fight with Alabama; however, I would not take up arms. :wink:

Alabama's all wrapped up in their "Ten Commandments" brouhaha right now, so you can strike them off your list of others to be resented and mistrusted. You ain't in Tejas, by chance, air ye?