What is your nation's deadly sin?

[Ruggery]

For the UK (especially but by no means exclusively England): a combination of an imperialistic politics that has sought to take over the world and, with varying degrees of success, eliminate other people's languages and cultures, with a highly insular, monolingual general/popular culture.

Scotland and Wales too?

[Tooting Carmen]

Scotland and Wales too?

While initially the victims of English imperialism (though even that is not quite so true in the case of the Scots - the Act of Union in 1707 was voluntary on their part, after all), both participated in the British Empire to a non-negligible degree.

[Sarin]

A question: How do Indians think of themselves as a country, as a national identity? Because I feel most of the conflict comes from the fact your country is as diverse in beliefs and blood as it can get. As a teenager I had to represent India in one of those UN model shitshows about the Islamic State, and it was really crazy when in my readings I discovered there are hundreds of millions of muslims there.

Just giving a rough sketch since it could be very intricate , tedious & imperfect to exhaustively answer :

Spoiler!

Yes , India is very diverse,multi dimensional when it comes to social identities . An Indian , at the same time , has multiple such identities etched in his mind - religious , caste , ethnic , linguistic etc. , naturally generating faultlines out of which religious one has been mismanaged as also exploited the most by ulterior forces and consequently spilled the most blood , prominent being Hindu-Muslim . Then their have been some ethnic ones also on various triggers or garbs like cultural preservation , migrants influx , water or language disputes etc. like Kashmir , Punjab , Assam (vis a vis Bengalis) , low grade NE insurgency etc. among which some eventually acquired a religious color also . And there have been Naxalites disturbances also in certain tribal belts which prima facie were based upon class exploitation and sometimes with casteist color also like that in Bihar (Ranvir Sena vis a vis Naxalites) . Not to forget the Hindu social stratifications like Brahmin/Thakur/Dalit etc. etc. with minor tussles or tension sometimes breaking out , randomly or planned . Among Muslims sometimes on Shia-Sunni , Deobandi-Barelvi etc . Then there are these Dravidian mutterings at times also .

(this^ is just a rough sweeping and majorly around my broader region i.e. North)

But having said about the peripheral but vocal voices of separatism & deadly conflics at one pt. or the other , the identity as an Indian & affinity towards a just & united India runs deep usually & had this not been Modi govt. since '14 that itself is hell bent on breaking communal unity & can go to any extent just to secure their position , I couldn't have envisioned India breaking up (atleast in near future).


As of communal conflicts involving Muslim , there were few Muslim rulers like Aurangzeb that went fanatic & adopted nutty ways (basically shooting in the Mughal foot itself) but the real chasm b/w Hindu-Muslim as exists today was meticulously carved out by the ulterior forces that have been aggressively at the forefront of it ever since 1857 (more on here) which from past 3 decades now is the power craving BJP/RSS when their Ayodhya campaign provided the much needed political kick to them . Their divisive politics is simple - keep striking the 'Hindu ego' vigourously & unrelentingly with the contrived hammers of Muslim atrocities , takeover fear , Hindu superiority etc. that generates so much of mixed passions of hate , anger , fear , pride in their minds against the Muslims that Hindus simply become their bots that are dangerously impervious to logic , reasoning & humane voices as also fact of the matter . That whole Hindu race is in danger from the sword of Islam * & that only BJP is their saviour is just what they want to get played out loudly in their minds in every walk of life . And it is glaring they did achieved some good succes in it .

(*for this , their modus operandi is usually - agent provocateurship , false flags , distortion of history , crooked divisive propaganda , peddling fake contents etc. & mind you via not just state or non-state actors but the mighty IB/RAW itself which has been deeply complicit in this)


But that said , there also emerged strong religious forces at the opposite end of the spectrum right from medieval era upto current times that were syncretic & laid tremendous stress on oneness of mankind as descending from one & the same Divine so as to instill & inculcate pluralism , communal harmony & peaceful co-existence in Indian society for its healthy growth . From the influential Bhakti & Sufi movements , Sikhism preachings etc. in medieval times to Gandhianism in modern era meant to inculcate & reinforce such buffering values , eventually culminating into their enshrinement in the Constitution* as its basic feature , they cumulatively had a profound impact on the mass psyche that is still evident & pronounced amidst all the hate , especially in the countryside generally .

*in this regard , Constitution which is like Bible for India as a nation inter-alia lays down these commandments for the Indian State :

Spoiler!

Preamble - "WE, THE PEOPLE OF INDIA, having solemnly resolved to constitute India into a SOVEREIGN SOCIALIST SECULAR DEMOCRATIC REPUBLIC and to secure to all its citizens ; JUSTICE, social, economic and political ; LIBERTY of thought, expression, belief, faith and worship ; EQUALITY of status and of opportunity ; and to promote among them all FRATERNITY assuring the dignity of the individual and the unity and integrity of the Nation"

(mind you meaning of term 'secular' is radically different from that of its western counterpart)

Part 3 of the Constitution materializes above by mandating upon Indian State to guarantee rights which are 'fundamental' to achieve above like - Equality before law & Prohibition of discrimination on grounds of religion, race, caste,sex or place of birth ; No discrimination on grounds only of religion, race, caste, sex, descent, place of birth, residence or any of them in employement to state services ; No discrimination on grounds only of religion, race, caste, sex, descent, place of birth, residence in access or use of public places ; Abolition of Untouchability ; Freedom of conscience and free profession, practice and propagation of religion ; Protection of interests of minorities having a distinct , language, script or culture ; Protection of certain rights regarding freedom of speech, etc.

[Anglo-Celtic]

It shall be the eighth one.

I feel like you can apply all of these to all the Western countries. The West is currently attempting suicide all over.

They want to take the whole world down with them. Hence the psychopaths' reaction to Italians who choose life.

[Smaug]

Stupid sounding thread, but I saw this elsewhere and felt interesting.

In Lust, Gluttony, Greed, Sloth, Wrath, Envy, Pride., which one do you think your fellows suffer the most of?

As to colonial Italians, we are greedy as fuck. There's an old saying here that the way you can make an Italian fit an elephant inside of a VW Beetle is to tell him it's for free. For Brazilians in general, we're envious as fuck, very few peoples in the world care so much about "status" than us, here you should never tell anyone that you're doing well.

I never heard this saying about Italians.

I agree about Brazilians, though, it’s a society built on façades.

[Hexachordia]

Most people feel no attachment to anything about truth and what is or are true, they are basically indifferent with what is/are false or true, only when it is about exact and material merits or harms, they feel the urge to question about anything at all. Indifference is the code of chinese spirit today, as far as I know but am not sure about antiquity though. But I know there are many brilliant minds who are concerned about truth like me do as chinese, they are not vocal and prolific in expressing their ideas as far as to make me feel indifference is not a major part of the chinese spirit.

But truth is not facts only, it has deep relevances to the metaphysics and believes and faith and many immaterial values, ideas, can never be clear cut but it does not mean it does not exist or matter. You can see mob mentality of chinese people online and offline too, they would mass upon a weak or a wronged individual for any excuses, they might sound righteous with the facts, much justified with morals, but in fact, you must not mistake it for their sense of justice, because they lack compassion, a very central bit of human soul as a proper civilized person, only mob and hive mentality, numb, insensitive, primitive, reactional, vulgar. I do not know if lacking compassion while living a seemingly chaste life is a virtue or sheer ignorance, but a few brilliant people could not change the whole landscape, which do exist and I have witnessed too. Poisoned by the facts, lacking any integrity of truth--Modern China.

[Andullero]

Greed and Slothfulness, mostly.

[Ruggery]

While initially the victims of English imperialism (though even that is not quite so true in the case of the Scots - the Act of Union in 1707 was voluntary on their part, after all), both participated in the British Empire to a non-negligible degree.

Scotland likes to blame only the English for the atrocities and bad things the UK did when they benefited from the British imperial in addition to also participating in some atrocities such as those of Northern Ireland, that is why some Irish do not trust Scotland to despite the fact that Scotland has recently grown in anti-British sentiment.

[coolfrenchguy]

Nationalmasochism.

Essentially all notable problems are derived from that (being prone to superordinate structures like EU and globalism, not caring for the country’s and people's long term future, reproduction deficiency). And, btw., this is also no advantage for neighbours when you have a Germany going crazy that way. The results will eventually harm others as well.

it is why with and under the over-pushed influence of your trotsko-greens pro-migrants feminazis in love with the Lumpenproletariat formated by the frankfurt school and their dirty trostko-bolchevik minds,your chanceler ,olaf scholtz, is begging like a little girl about the serious energy problems related ,by close or by far ,to the russian invasion of ukraine.
but the main problem is than all this recent mess of ,and, with the EU ,it's created by all parts by germany,and germany have a big responsability too, because all is linked to a kind of germanic excessive pride with the recent example of the over-developped nationalism with the third reich with AH and the NSDP ,but before that it wasn't pinky at all too,with all the previous franco-german wars

people seems not really well informed about whom are the real puppetteers and whom are pulling the strings otherwise they will stopped to vote for people who are considering you as one of their enemy
the recent rose of the recent populist parties,like the AFD or PEGIDA ( Patriotische Europäer gegen die Islamisierung des Abendlandes/Patriotic Europeans against the Islamisation of the Occident),fratelli d'italia,the National gathering for france,the sweden democrats in sweden,EKRE( Eesti Konservatiivne Rahvaerakond) in estonia ,or the iliberal right-wing countries with conservative positions like in HUngary or Poland is the results of all of this atlantist vision of the world dominated by the corrupted USA and their american nightmare
even than Poland is the doggy of the USA and Nato,but it's quite understanable to the close menace than is the neo-trostko-bolchevik than is VP,
because don't be fooled because VP is not an ethno-differencialist (like me),is not an ethno-nationalist or call it whatever you want ,and i never was,he's still a fucking trostko-blochevik with his fucking red nazis friends than are the chinese gvt and the northen korean gvt,he's not for the self determination of the people (like me),it's PROPAGANDA ,the same propaganda made by ancient or actual tyrannic and totalitarian regimes
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Propaganda

[capocannoniere]

I never heard this saying about Italians.

I agree about Brazilians, though, it’s a society built on façades.

It's probably an internal Brazilian joke. The entire one was "How to you make a German fit an Elephant inside of a VW Beetle? Tell him he is not able to do it. And how do you make an Italian do it? You tell him it's for free".