is it wrong to be proud of who you are?

[the_ultimate_evil]

i'm amazed this stayed civil

 

[jaguarr]

There's nothing wrong in having pride in who you are, where you come from or what your heritage may happen to be. It's when you use those things as a reason to put yourself above others that it becomes a problem. Besides, it's not like it's a singular thing and every person is only allowed one thing to have pride in. You can be proud to be American, British, Candadian or whatever country you are from. In the same breath, you can also be proud of your African-American, Irish, Cuban, Chinese or whatever racial heritage (or all of them for a lot of people these days). You can be proud to be a Democrat, Republican, Libertarian, Anarchist, whatever. You can be proud to have blonde hair or brown eyes. You can be proud to be an athlete or a musician or a writer, or all of those things. You can be proud to be all of these things at the same time. They make up who you are cumulatively and there shouldn't be any shame in appreciating who you are. Pride is only a sin when you let it take you down negative paths, but it's also necessary if you're going to have healthy self-esteem to carry you through life.

jag

 

[Jerry!]

No I agree with The Joker. Pride should be reserved for accomplishments. Whether you are Irish or Latin or Mexican or black or whatever, it's all a crap shoot. Same goes with what country you were born in. It fits more to say "I'm happy to be _____". Or "I am happy to be an American" or whatever you are. I'm not saying it's bad to say I'm proud to be whatever, but it just doesn't make much sense. The way the word is being used is wrong.

Being proud to be a musician or an athelete is not the same as being proud of your heritage, because those are accomplishments. You did that, you became a musician or an athelete because you worked for it. You didn't work to become Chinese and/or being born in China.

 

[jaguarr]

No I agree with The Joker. Pride should be reserved for accomplishments. Whether you are Irish or Latin or Mexican or black or whatever, it's all a crap shoot. Same goes with what country you were born in. It fits more to say "I'm happy to be _____". Or "I am happy to be an American" or whatever you are. I'm not saying it's bad to say I'm proud to be whatever, but it just doesn't make much sense. The way the word is being used is wrong.

Being proud to be a musician or an athelete is not the same as being proud of your heritage, because those are accomplishments. You did that, you became a musician or an athelete because you worked for it. You didn't work to become Chinese and/or being born in China.

Then it all becomes a matter of semantics and the sentiment remains the same, no matter what you call it. Getting hung up on what you call it seems like a lot of wasted energy to me, but whatever you want to call it is what's going to work for you. I think we're all talking about the same thing here, in the end.

jag

 

[Jerry!]

double post

 

[Jerry!]

I'm not getting hung up on it at all, I just realized it as well after I watched Carlin's last HBO special. The word is just being used wrong. It's fine, I know it's never going to change, it's just one of those weird misconceptions we have.

 

[jaguarr]

I'm not getting hung up on it at all, I just realized it as well after I watched Carlin's last HBO special. The word is just being used wrong. It's fine, I know it's never going to change, it's just one of those weird misconceptions we have.

Yeah, I've seen Carlin's rant on it, too. It's sort of one of those cultural things where the traditional meaning of a word has sort of evolved in the language to encompass a bit more than it originally was intended by it's classical definition. In the end, everyone's pretty much talking about the same thing, though. *shrug*

jag

 

[chamber-music]

ha ha ha...no you couldnt. You couldnt even defend yourself from the germans. Now, go play nice with the rest of your little european union.

I'm not patriotic or nationalistic but for a small island Britain did manage to hold off germany for a while when the rest of europe got captured. Also there have been numerous times britian has sided with the US over European Union.

I'm proud to be American because of the opportunites that we have. I wouldn't argue that my country is better than any other. That would be a display of arrogance. There are alot of countries with good ideas we could adapt.

Its nice to hear some people who are humble

 

[Carcharodon]

Well...that depends on who you are, doesn't it?