Am I Patriot?

For as long as patriotism is being what Kenyans are making news over these days, then I am proud to say that I for sure, I'm not a patriot.

If I had to choose where to be, I'd choose to be where I felt safe, was able to go about my own business, develop myself and make and work towards my own personal growth. I would never declare some space, that in actuality belongs to God, seemingly because I was born in it. No. If my neighbors proved to be capable of murder, based on our birth distributed differences, then I would not want to be anywhere near them. I would opt to leave. I have no desire to change people or no great hope in that people change that much either. Borders are man made. And were it not for modern day border policies, human nature would have had many people move around a whole lot more, as was common before formal rule took over the world.

I have potential to be a patriot. If I could choose citizenship. Citizenship based on character and nobility, not birth places, color, accents or tribes.

I could very easily belong to a citizens group of intelligent thinkers, fair and balanced persons, people who understand self responsibility and overall responsibility to the world around you. I could be a citizen of people who are more interested in humanity, the things that havent changed since before Christ, the real things of the human nature. And in this realm of citizenship, I could be a patriot.

But patriotism, lover of a country filled with kinsmen that march around with machetes against their own kind over subtle differences? No, not for me. Actually I want to be far removed. From all types of people that have the potential to sink this low. I want no association.

Not only within citizenship, but even within species.

It bothers me that myself, and these machete wielding persons are of the same biological species. I'm willing to argue a sub species. And not along the lines people usually divide others; race, citizenship et al; no. A sub species, based purely on thought and thought processes.

Anyone who can find a way to justify an ethnic/racial cleansing at any time I don't want to be connected to. It's bad enough that we both are living beings. Even from a plant, bacteria, fungi; I would be offended by this behaviour. But to bring it so close to home, my so called country of citizenship, in addition to species? It's all too much for me. I want out.

I'm being told, it's about education level... well, maybe. But to what extent? I never once had an instructor tell me not to ever consider murdering my neighbors over my own opinions. And read around, there are really educated folk supporting and or calling for bloodshed. No, it's not about education. It has to be a sub species.

How else does it make sense to the rest of us?

Make no mistake, there are hierachy levels within this sub species. And no doubt, those with machetes, or inciting them or supporting them are definitely a grade - or more lower.

It baffles me in an overwhelming way that anyone would want to be president over a nation that raises these kinds of voices. Save for the innocent, guilted by association, these kinds of people?

I wish I had an island that I could relocate all "unwanted " and willing persons to. Where they could live as they pleased, within the rules of civility, but with pure knowledge that they can be free from savage attacks over associations provided by birth. I wonder how many, in the name of loyalties to places of birth would refuse to leave...Them, they are patriots of their birth places.

I am not willing to die, get maimed or lose a relative over a region in one of the world's continents. I am also not willing to suffer the same losses over what people deem as unfair chances or opportunities metted my way. If it bothers them that much, then I am willing to leave, so they may have my opportunities. I'll go elsewhere and make other opportunities. And I am definitely not willing to be neighbors with people capable of inflicting that kind of suffering on mankind. I want nothing to do with these people. We must have no associations.

Had I been born in another country, save for my accent, would I not essentially still be the same person, with the same thoughts and feelings? Would I still not desire the same things from life? Would I not value morality and other humanitarian values over material wealth? Would being born anywhere else have made me different? or as an adult, aren't I simply a product of waht I've chosen to make of myself? How I have chosen to use my mind, extent I have succumbed to undue influences and my propensity to be a sheep within the goat mentality that herds groups of people together; strengthening them in their loud voices but not in their correctness? At the end of teh day, wouldn't I still have to choose exactly what kind of person I was going to be?

I think I would. As far as behaviour and moral responsibility, I think we all choose who we become. And I think these two things largely define us as who we are in all the ways that matter.

Not having millions of dollars or lack thereof.

So my patriotism is to citizenship that is of a higher order other than borders and birth places. It's based instead on the choices we can make for ourselves as individuals. Because I for one, strongly believe that anyone who takes credit for or kills over aspects of humanity that no one chooses but is born into, is worth little to nothing; to him/herself and all those around.