I woke up this morning to hearing that Great Britain had voted for leaving the EU. Lots of speculations about what happens next is going on everywhere, but I won’t go into that.
My thoughts drifted along to wondering why people voted the way they did (both for and against). I figure it’s not much to do with reason or logic, but mostly emotions. Indeed, studies indicate humans tend to make decisions mostly based on emotions, and then find suitable reasoning based on those emotions to justify their decisions.
In this case, as well as with related recent events in Europe (and elsewhere), I think it’s all down to the philosophical question of what it is to be human these days on planet earth. As a human being, what kinds of groups you identify with, and whether you as a self-perceived member of a group favour integration or separation with other kinds of groups.
Personally I ‘ve always felt* being a citizen of the Planet Earth rather than a citizen of Finland or any other arbitrary splinter group. Such groups by definition seem too exclusive and restrictive to identify with.
(* See? This, too, is rooted in emotion and rationalised with the the kind of logic I find suitable.)
Nationalism was a project that, like all projects had its good and bad sides, but seriously, its time has gone. Our greatest problems are global, and they must be dealt with on a global level. We’ll never reach that goal with the current situation of nation states competing over diminishing resources, each measuring their success based on the misfortunes of their competitors.
1 thought on “Midsummer Blues”