Certainly. both of them were as per http://www.dictionary.com
I see. The definitions are valid, I was just pointing out that in practice, they are often linked.
I've always had an odd view of nationalism and ethnocentrism due to my background. I was born and raised in England, with an English father and a Greek mother, who emigrated from Greece during the military junta, a point which I'll come back to later. She is still fiercely proud of where she comes from and tries to keep her national identity alive through speaking it at home, going to the Greek church every Sunday etc.
My father's side of the family however is also rather nationalistic. He comes from a military family that has served since WW1, thus he is very patriotic. Now where does that leave me and my 3 brothers, who grew up in England, with both these strong beliefs in our household?
I'd like to use, as an example, the Falklands conflict in the 80s and the Greek-Turkish conflict in the 70s. My father served in the Falklands and returned home with a hateful attitude towards the Argentinians. Later that year however his sister married an Argentinian. Of course he was always tetchy about this, but after he actually met him he realised they had a hell of a lot in common and are now very close friends, but for a time it was very awkward at family gatherings. My point in this instance being that nationalistic sentiment made my father prejudge someone based on their nationality.
I'd like to come back to the point of the Greek military Junta. They ruled Greece with an iron fist for a fairly long period. Far right, ultra-nationalistic, using all the tools of a totalitarian regime, secret police, torture squads etc. As is always the way with these regimes when they start to collapse, they tried to rally support by starting a war with the old enemy, Turkey, over Cyprus. The irony being that most Greek and Turkish Cypriots lived in very intergrated communities.
Anyway, back to how this affected me in England. One of my best school friends was Turkish. My mother forbade me from seeing him because of these troubles. At the time I was quite young, and so did not fully understand why. When I asked my mother for a logical explanation, she provided none and just changed the subject.
That is why, in my mind, nationalism is hogwash. It is a tool used by governments to gain support, turning man against man. These are two instances that have affacted me, but I can think plenty of other major events throughout history which had more disastrous results.
World War I, Serbia wanted to be a country itself and declare itself independent from the austro-hungarian empire. Yes thats right, the first world war is SERBIA's fault. If the Serbian nationalist wasn't the fire that lit the Balkan powder keg off, then WWI wold have not happened. WWII was caused pretty much by WWI where the Germans had to pay for reparations, so WWII could also have been avoided.
You cannot implicate Serbia as a whole. It was one, small, radical group that assassinated Franz Ferdinand. This claim also ignores the underlying cause of WW1, which was competetive nationalism and imperialism among the main powers of the time.
No, I am not conservative. Change is fine enough for me, but there is things we might need to keep as they are.
Conservatism does not mean everything should stay as it is, just that the good stuff should be kept and reform should be much more gradual, as and when it is necessary.
