My curious nature asked me today that what is meant by “Patriotism”? Suddenly my breathing rate increased and words stuck at my epiglottis. I hesitated to answer and became somehow furious as well that what sort of question it is. It was not because the word Patriotism was not in mind treasury but because I lacked it in my action. Anyhow, I tried to calm down myself and started to define it to my inner self but again I was not satisfied with my definition. I called it country love and helped out to connect it with nationalism. But the answer was not satisfactory that urged me to search it out from the global source internet. I rushed to Google and typed it with urgency and found many results in nanoseconds. I went through three to four sites and got goosed bumps while reading them. Because the level of patriotism given by the philosophers was beyond the margin of my thoughts.
However, I continued with my reading and found out a profound definition for the word “Patriotism” given by a Scottish-American philosopher Alasdair Chalmers MacIntyre who says that “Patriotism is a central Moral Virtue.” I read it many times and was unable to analyze it. It took me a long time to crack it down. And then I asked myself do I have a sense of Patriotism? I was a bit reluctant to reciprocate this question. Because I had never perceived patriotism as a moral virtue. And my definition of it was about country’s love but again what sort of love is yet to be explained. This is understood that there is no such platonic love that can be idealized. Then my mind was wondering where to place this definition of patriotism. It continuously hit my moral obligations and provoked a sense of conscience inside me. And asked me several questions some of them are: Am I sincere with my country? Am I doing something extra in my professional life? What about my parents and family? How am I contributing to society? And what is my role as a citizen?
All these questions were random but self-realizing. That is why I have noted them here and I am asking these questions from every individual of this country. Be very honest and just tell yourself not me that Are you a Patriot? I would like to end my write-up with the quote of Jinnah father of the nation who said about patriotism: “We must develop a sense of patriotism which galvanizes us all into one united and strong nation.”
Hence to pursue the words of our father we must have to keep patriotism on top of our minds.
