Whose Flag Flies Most Upright?

Patriotism without a flag is like soup without salt. Few things bring a lump to people’s throats as quickly as the sight of a sea of flag-waving patriots. Others, again, find such scenes hard to stomach, because they associate them with nationalism. It is not simple. It is true that nationalists love flags, but even the most die-hard of them would struggle to gather as many as the Danes hang out for an average children’s birthday party. On the house, the windows, the pavement, the cake, the wall, the chandelier and the neighbor’s underpants. The Danes are very proud of their flag. Supposedly God sent it to them about a thousand years ago when they were giving a beating to one of the Baltic peoples, even smaller than themselves. In those days God probably bought his flags wholesale, since he handed out very similar ones to the other Scandinavians.

We Slovenians did not get our flag from God but through a public competition, but that does not mean it can’t whip us into a patriotic frenzy too. Remember the lady in Ilirska Bistrica beating the asphalt with the national banner. Our president is also a very passionate standard-bearer. When it comes to the size of the flagpole, you won’t find a hero in any stadium or sports hall with a longer one than the head of the Slovenian state. Only the Croatian president can compete with him to some extent, although she plays on other attributes and prefers to show off the state symbols in tight-fitting national team shirts with the coat of arms.

Many like this; others don’t, saying, look at them, populists. I am more reserved in such judgments. I am not claiming that President Pahor is not a populist; I am only saying that he is not a populist merely because he waves a flag and cheers for every sport popular with his voters. Like-chasing and an obsession with being liked may cross the boundaries of good taste, but not necessarily democratic principles. Stadiums and sports halls are, however, a place where the popularist comes dangerously close to the populist. The message of a cheering, flag-waving politician in a national team jersey is that he is just one of us. And between “I am of the people” and “I am the people” there is only a small step, but one that can be fatal for democracy.

Flag-waving is important in the context of populism also because populism casts itself as the sole defender of traditional values. People who care about democracy don’t pay enough attention to this. In the eyes of many voters in Europe, politics today is divided into two groups. In the first are those who advocate an open, progressive society, human rights, gays, lesbians, gender equality, migrants and the like. In the second is politics that claims to be on the side of security, family, national culture, identity and patriotism. When the cards are dealt like this, the game is already over and the winner known in advance.

Caught in panic and helplessness, democratic politics has so far had more or less only two ideas in response to the populist challenge, each worse than the other. Part of this politics accepts and defends the division above with suicidal courage. We are progressives fighting for human rights, they say; the rest of you are undemocratic, narrow-minded yokels. This is a lovely gift to populism and a disservice to the real protection of human rights, which cannot be effective unless people understand and accept these rights as something that also protects them and what matters to them. Others, in despair at the populists’ electoral successes, resort to imitating them and compete with them in stoking hatred and fear. This is an even lovelier gift to extremists, since it legitimizes their politics, and in the end voters will always prefer the hard original to the soft version of political opportunism, which in its populist foreplay teases the basest emotions but never dares to go all the way.

But there is also a third way. One that has the maturity and determination to stand up to the populists and strip them of the exclusive right to interpret traditional values. These values not only mean a great deal to many voters in European countries but are also one of the main criteria in deciding whom to vote for.

People are devoted to their families, and rightly so. But why should love of family be based on prejudice and discrimination against homosexuals? Why shouldn’t love of and respect for the family be based on the right to family life of all people who love each other, and on the right of all children to a family, regardless of their parents’ sexual orientation?

People want security, and they have every right to it. But why should they agree that security can only be ensured with razor wire, fences and walls? Why don’t we ensure it for people, who have every right to security, with an effective, rational, humane and firm security policy that is not based on political stoking and exploiting of prejudice and fear? People are attached to their culture and identity, and that is a good thing. But instead of the populist perversion of culture as a weapon for dividing people into ours and others, why not offer people an understanding of culture, heritage and identity that helps us get to know and respect one another? That allows us to be proud of who we are as individuals, as members of our nation and as members of the wider communities we belong to? Why not offer them a culture that helps us understand one another, not to the detriment of our identity but to its benefit?

And finally, why not respect patriotism? People love their homeland and are glad to love their homeland. And that is very good and very right. But if we want to respect patriotism, we must defeat nationalism. We cannot and must not build love of our homeland on hatred of others. Patriotism demands more than flag-waving. Love of one’s homeland also needs to be defined in terms of values, by thinking about what fills us with pride in our homeland and why it is good to be Slovenian. Without this, patriotism is a devalued, generic label, without content or meaning. An empty shell that sooner or later is inhabited by nationalist hatred.

True patriotism must also be able to be critical. Since we are devotees of traditional values, we can borrow a comparison from family life. Between children and parents there is, as a rule, deep and sincere love, but when a family member goes astray, true love shows itself through responsibility, help and, if necessary, firmness. What do you do if, in her old age, mother homeland wraps herself in a flag, sits down in the nearest bar and spends the whole afternoon drinking, smashing glasses, shouting and making threats?

There are children who will sit down at the table, order another round of beer and join their red-faced parent in raising hell until someone punches them in the face and the police arrive, or the waitress throws them all out the door. History teaches us that such drunken brawls can also end very tragically. On the other hand, there are people with enough courage and sense to take the car keys from their drunk and rowdy homeland so that she doesn’t endanger herself and others, and drive her home to sober up and sleep it off. As far as I am concerned, there is no doubt who in this story really cares for their parents, who really cares about security and who is the true patriot.