The Parallel Between European Nationalism And Rascism

The parallel between European Nationalism and Racism If one studies the history of the origin of nations and civilizations, it is usually as a result of one country trying to conquer another country, tribe or nation. The nation that succeeds in conquering the other nation usually evolves a higher form of culture that makes her feel superior to other races of the world, especially the enslaved race. This trend is very noticeable in European culture. In the last 500 years, Europeans have conquered large parts of the world and formed colonies everywhere. This has made European culture and civilization the most prevalent and acceptable way of life anywhere in the world. Europeans literally determine how people should think and look at life. This trend has made Europeans to be proud and to look down on other people. The philosophers and men of thought of Europe judge other cultures of the world from their own narrow Eurocentric point of view. European culture therefore tends to misunderstand and consequently look down on other cultures of the world. This has led to a situation where Europeans feel so proud of their achievements and conquests that they feel they are the best in the world and every other culture is somewhat inferior. This has led to the social phenomenon called “racism”. A lot of Euro-American societies have been racist for a long period of time and racism is deeply entrenched in European culture and tradition. In fact only a few centuries ago, to be a well cultured and civilized European, one had to be a racist one way or the other. The problem is that racism is not civilization at all, it only refers to the dark side of European culture and it show cases the fact that Europeans have been militaristic for a long period of time. As a result of this, a call to Nationallism (to be proud of your country), could necessarily mean a call to racism. (i.e. to fight against people from an inferior culture and bring glory to civilized Europe). Moreover, this racist attitude is so embedded in European culture, music, dance and everyday living that it is somewhat an unconscious part of European culture. A good example of this phenomenon is Nazi Germany under the rule of Adolf Hitler. Hitler was a nationalist who eventually became racist because he was so passionate for his country. Besides anti-Semitism (or more specifically anti- jewishmess) was firmly embedded in European culture for centuries before Hitler became president of Germany. Race is still a very controversial issue in today’s world even with the emergence of Barak Obama. There are still many racists in today’s world and I believe that there ideology stems from the mistake of “ white nationalism”. Such people believe Europe and America should be more civilized and in order to promote European culture, foreigners living in Europe should be flushed out so that their European nations can grow in peace without being contaminated by so called “inferior people”. Since they believe that European culture represents the height of human ingenuity and achievement, they do not want their culture to be contaminated or spoilt by a so called inferior culture. This racist tendency of European culture is further championed by the fact that people from other races and cultures of the world tend to try and copy European civilization and culture. Most people in various African countries are ashamed to speak their native language handed to them by their forefathers and even in America, some of the African Americans there tend to be ashamed to their African heritage a phenomenon which is very strange. I feel that to solve the problem of racism, white nationalism or European nationalism has to be

redefined. Groups like the KKK (Ku Klux Klan) in America and Europe should try and remove the racist element from their ideology of white/European nationalism. Being proud of the artistic and scientific achievements of your culture does not mean you have to look down or try and destroy other people. It is mistake which has caused and is still causing all sorts of conflict. Europe has to redefine itself the world is now multicultural and in this homogenous mixture of different cultures, a new global culture can emerge that can blend the spiritual aspect of African culture with the materialistic aspect of European culture and produce the total man.