What makes you really citizen of a country? [GAs]

Citizenship is simply a status given to you by the corresponding state. Nationality or being a "good" citizen is a construct made up by man, for better or worse, and therefore an idea open for change and discussion. In some societies you are/were a good citizen when you followed the leader and obeyed every rule without thinking, in others you were encouraged to fulfill your own needs without regard towards what would benefit the whole community and then the ones where the needs of the many are put over the needs of the few. And then there's the gray zone and the ones lying to themselves. It's a totally subjective matter which is best or what makes a decent human being and in the end depends on the people living in the respective form of government/state of mind.

I don't think you should question yourself if you're a good citizen or how you could become one, but start with why there are people around you that need to mask their own shortcomings by excluding people simply because of their origin. They are fuckwits to be ignored and left in their own misery or - if they act up - to be put in check, because you can't face intolerance by tolerating it. Would be a contradiction in itself.

Thanks for the gibs ;P.

I feel your pain. I am from Turkmenistan. I am studying now in Poland. It takes exactly half of minute to professors to pronounce my surname. And they ask sometimes where i am from. Well most people don't even know a thing about this dictatorship country. They ask about religion in your country. When you say that it is Islam they think you are one of "those", that you all same even if you have another world view and don't take the religion seriously. Well sometimes i just wish to not differ from others, to have an easy name and surname, to no look dumber, to have something in common.
From my point of view citizenship is just a bullshit. It is like playing a roulette. Either you are born in a good place or in a worst place. And when you want to get to a better place you need to respect their tradition, laws e.t.c maybe even change your point of view, think differently....

bump

bump despite the threat, not because of it.

bump

bumpers

I generally think that someone who has swedish citizenship is a swede, but naturally i would not think of someone who just moved here, and who might (or might not) have any respect for my culture as being as much of a "natural" swede as someone who was born here (wheter or not they actually look swedish matters a bit less to me).

The mentions of a borderless future (and similar) that some have put fort sounds kind of ridiciolus to me, as borders show things like where one governments area of jurisdiction starts or ends...otherwise we could just have Iraq governing the lands of Sweden, Sweden governing the lands of the USA, and the USA governing the lands of Russia and vice versa, would be just as useless.

I could write pages about this subject, but bleh, i'm tired now, this stuff is way too heavy to think about just before bed...

I don't care if someone was born within the same borders as me, or even if they speak the native language. If they're decent people, it's all good.

bump

People has different cultures and you can't change that and can't generalize everything. I really think the beautiful part of life is meet different people, with different cultures, different stories. I don't like my country, but I can say that is a "mestizo country" and everywhere I go I talk with strangers that has a lot of stories about the whole world. That's amazing.

http://image.prntscr.com/image/f15b1b4bb31d40449728392aa608d070.png
What's the problem with beeing Romanian living in Italy?
"your people are all violents and thiefs", "you should go home to where you came from". Those are a bit over the line though.
I wont tell you to go home, or be bothered by your presence. Quite opposite if i like you, but i wont consider you a Serb no mather what :)

bump

Definitely voted "Citizenship is something that can be acquired, through respect of my country's laws but one can keep his own culture as long as it doesn't go in conflict with mine." It's usually people who take (violent) exception to this idea that are truly threats to humanity.

I am truly sorry you experienced such prejudice as a Romanian living in Italy. A lot of Europeans smugly believe America is the only country with racism and prejudice but all one has to do is look at the history of Europe to see that idea lasts about as long as a pile of gold-pressed latinum in a rigged Dabo game.

Bump

Bumpo!

Citizenship is just a piece of paper. Identity, though, is something else entirely.

I am an American citizen of Asian ethnicity that was born and raised in the USA for the first 22 years of my life. I then moved to Japan and have been living here as a permanent resident for over a decade.

I think I can relate to your feelings very well. Identity as a function of nationality has been something on my mind a lot recently.

When I lived in the USA, especially the area in which I grew up, I didn't look like anybody else although my thoughts, actions, language were 100% American -- I didn't know or identify with anything else really. However, I'm sure there were a good number of people that felt because of my Asian ethnicity that I was not nor could ever become a "real" American (whatever that means). I never had a problem with this when I lived in the USA -- I identified as being 100% American because I never really knew anything else that I could be... even though some people would never accept that. I was still comfortable with who I was because I could easily dismiss those who didn't accept me as bigoted.

Things got a little more complicated when I moved to Japan. Now I looked like everyone around me, but my thoughts, actions, language were still very American. HOWEVER, I did not fit the expectation of what an American living in Japan is supposed to look like... ie, now, I don't look like a foreigner anymore but I actually am. And in a few rare instances, I've met some Japanese people who could not accept that I was American (again, because of the way I look), yet also would never accept me as Japanese. So then the question becomes... what the hell am I? This troubled me greatly, and threw me into a bit of an identity crisis... for the first time in my life I started to question whether or not I was a "real" American or not. This became especially significant as I became more integrated into Japanese culture and society, yet felt more and more "in the middle" in terms of my national identity. I realized I would never be 100% accepted as Japanese, nor would I ever be 100% accepted as American. And this thought made me feel very lonely.

But then, something interesting happened. I realized that I may never fit into some neat little category to all people... but that can be incredibly freeing. I mean, look at how divided America is in terms of political ideas... being "American" can mean so many different things to so many different people. And that one's nationality really has very little to do with what kind of person they are. So instead of tying so much of my identity with this piece of paper that says that I'm an American citizen or this other piece of paper that says I'm allowed to live in Japan; or even this DNA I have that says I'm Asian, I instead choose to create my identity based on my experiences, principles, and ideologies. And I try to seek out others who put more importance in who I actually am than what they imagine I am because of such broad concepts as race and nationality.

bump

bump, does this mean i win

i try to be on the bright side usually but my best guess is that you will never be fully accepted for every person that you call a friend there will be another who will be hostile to you for no reason, people are stupid that way and the reason is on the core most of us are raised to be proud to be from what country we are but some families may take a step forward and makes the kid think they are also better than the others. I think that is a worldwide problem and if you take a step back and think about it when a country in not an issue sometimes 2 people from the same country can be a part of a heated debate about who is better by a city they happen to live on, both cities in the same country.

I believe that no matter where you happen to be born if a culture fascinates you and you want to live that way of life you should, Maybe one day we only have an country the Earth and we are all Earthians or Earthlings and we get over what city are are born or what religion and staff like that it would be a better world

Bump

mini-bump

bump

Bump!