"stop american nationalism"

that was the message of a bumper sticker that i saw yesterday as i left to go do laundry. during my drive, i found myself pondering what such a bumper sticker is suggesting.

question 1: who is this addressed to? an individual, a group of people, the government? i would assume that this statement is geared toward the american public. toward the group of people who live in this country and possibly consider themselves to be americans.

question 2: what exactly is american nationalism? on a definition level, nationalism is defined by www.dictionary.com as
1. Devotion to the interests or culture of one's nation.
2. The belief that nations will benefit from acting independently rather than collectively, emphasizing national rather than international goals.
3. Aspirations for national independence in a country under foreign domination.

definition's #1 and #3 appear to be fairly positive things in most any light, so #2 is probably what is being attacked. on one level, yes, we need to consider international interests. obviously. (i'm sure the bumper stickerer would argue as well that it is obvious, but not followed) but we could all think of ways that the international interest may be irrational and against what any single person might deem to be a positive international goal. i, for instance, would like to see the world push more towards being on a strict diet of cornmeal pancakes and straight espresso (but not mixed).

so the attack is against a group of people looking out for themselves, right? if my whole neighborhood decided that they were going to persecute scandinavians and my family thought that that was not fair or reasonable and acted in our own interest against this injustice, are we deemed family-ists and branded as being uncooperative? where is our commitment to the neighborhood? well, it fell to the commitment to justice, truth and, finally, what will benefit my family (because we'd be scandinavian). i am aware that my examples are somewhat ridiculous and extreme, but it seems natural that an element of nationalism must exist or else the nation or people group will not be strong in themselves, but just bow to what where the greater wind blows.

question 3: how should we stop such a thing? so is the bumper person suggesting that we put or national identity on the altar? i don't know what this looks like. "i am no longer an american"? but i live here. i live next to people. i live in america with a group of other americans. stopping me from having a national identity and looking out for our interests is asking more than i'm willing to give (and i know that the argument is that we may be looking out for our own interests directly in the face of international interests) and i can't believe that we even could do this, even if we tried.

if we aren't a nation, what are we? if you don't like our policies as a nation, or as a gov't, then argue for a change of policy, not a disassembly of the community that we have called america. i don't know if this makes much sense at all, but neither does forsaking my nationalism for the sake of some vague idealism that doesn't correspond to the real world. one must be careful in throwing out the very positive and community-and peace-building aspects of nationalism along with the political moves that are possibly dangerous 'nationalism' as was alluded to in the bumper sticker. we want and need each other in the communal sense, whether that is a family, a city, or a nation. yes, even as communities, we are not infallible. but that does not legitimize a full-on overthrow of community-forming.