Quote:
Originally Posted by Plechazunga
Nationalists often talk about how we don't take enough pride in our history and values. But if you're going to have national pride, then surely you need to feel national shame too?
I can understand people not feeling either - it's a reasonable position not to feel pride in or remorse for something that you yourself haven't done.
But in my book if you're proud of, say, the Battle of Trafalgar, if you feel some of the glory rubs off on you, then you should feel shame for, say, the various massacres that took place in India under the British. If you're proud of Britain for being among the first to outlaw slavery, it makes no sense not to feel shame for her large part in developing and perpetuating slavery too.
Discuss it spasmos
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I wouldn't go leaving context out of it. For me, an act of a state deserving of a value judgement (good or bad) is one that steps out of the moral context of its time. These are the acts truly deserving of our pride vs. shame.
An example of this sort of historical landmark would be as you mentioned, England's early abolition of slavery, setting a trend towards a universal emancipation. By beating the rest of the west to the ideal of abolition, they rose above and beyond the moral norms.
Contrast that with the English contribution to the propogation of slavery which was, to an extent, just more an application of scale. An unfortunate application of efficient administration, crossed with an existing massive transport infrastructure. This would be similar in nature to the British contribution to the tale of empire (also in this thread), bringing it to a larger, captive audience. If anything, the unique British contribution to the tale of empire was SCALE, not say the ruthlessness of it's conquest or maybe the callousness of its administration. To choose but a few, Portugese, Belgian, Aztec, Mongol, Zulu etc. imperial policies by most measures were worse than the British. The fact that other empires failed to reach the scope of the British was not through an ethics based decision on their part (ie. "OK, that's enough empire for us. Let's not be like those Brits and take any more as that would just be mean..."), but rather an inability to reproduce the British success.
Anyway, I don't know where that leaves me. It doesn't seem to make logical sense to feel pride or shame for another's actions, but I do. I don't feel like German kids should have to feel bad about the '40s, but I do feel a pride if I ascribe the ideal of an English 'pluck' to the sailors at Trafalgar, and I feel that everyone should be proud of going to the moon and back, not just the Americans. I can't quite connect it.