A rant about pride

Winter

Gag me with a spoon
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Pride is a very dangerous aspect of humanity. I think pride is what keeps us as an entire species from intergrating into a fullfledged outfit of true unison.

I read about gay pride parades. I hear about ethnic pride seminars. It seems that the liberally biased media encourages these aspects of our society as the new status quo; where as aryan pride *sans the hatred for other ethnicities* is completely taboo. An obvious contradiction, but for some reason, an acceptable contradiction in this warped society.

Pride parades, and the whole concept of pride itself, I believe reaffirms the walls placed within society that seperates peoples based on ethnicity, demographics, socio-economical structures, etc. Pride builds a false sense of self-worth in a concept inherited rather than a concept gained through effort and dilligence.

Its easy to have pride, or develop an abstract sense of strength in your dna, inherent sexuality, or some other birth-righted trait within the self. Why would anyone take pride in what they were given with at birth? At the same note, why would anyone seek shame in the same said things? It all seems counter-productive to many things that the media dictates as neighboring partner to pride; things like unity, peace, tolerance.

When someone takes pride in things such as ethnicity, and what not, often times its not displayed with discretion. Often times these pride-showcases are blunt, outlandish, and just plain intrusive. Intruding on others, forcing others to accept ones own innate pride, wont do well to convince others that they should share that sense of false security.

In fact, what does happen? Anger. "Why must you shove your whatever in my face?" What follows, is hostility. On both sides. And in the end, just another layer of confinement that takes us as a species one more step away from that ultimate unifying goal of tolerance, and togetherness.

You dont have to take pride, to appreciate your own inherit nature or past. But there is an obvious difference from pride, and appreciation. Appreciation is geared for the self. To extend the esteem of the self farther, by the self, and for the self only. Whereas pride is an outward intrusion, forcably conveying to others that they must seek the same ideology for the one conveying the mindset.

So it seems, that if we continue to build illusions of grandure and respect based off of forcably showing others what to think, pride, then we are willingly accepting the fact that we wish to be seperated from others. We are willingly defying what some parades, and showcases are meant to achieve; a sense of unity. We are willingly antagonizing others. We are willingly, yet subconciously, goading others into experiencing all sorts of negative emotions, from insecurity, hostility, and feelings of rejection.

Bleh.
 
I just want to say that I like this line of thinking, and I like the post. I'm going to have to respond more in-depth later, though, cause there's just too much going on right now for me to give this the thought that it deserves. :cool:
 
Just a thought that came right to me while reading this interesting post. I don't know if anyone will agree but I get the feeling that some people mix pride and honour toghether. If you have some sense of honour you will not let anyone disgrace you whereas pride involves an act of display and therefore brings all the issues Winter talked about. Honour as nothing to do with race, gender or any other human trait, it does involve a sense of pride, pride in what you are as an individual. But mere pride makes one weak, because it is more about vanity, you spread more and more until someone touches it and then you show your fangs, but sooner or later there are too many 'attacks' and so the beast becomes a victim and needs to show how he and the ones similar to him are pitiful. Pride is then displayed over and over whether you want it or not, they just want to shove it into your mouth because YOU ignored them when they were persecuted. I'm not saying that discrimination is ok but when there none or when it is only to the extent where anyone could be discriminated for something it just is selfish. Anyway, in my opinion the big difference is that you can have honour and defend your image, but at the same time be humble whereas pride, to me, always involves vanity and is a selfish trait unlike what it is supposed to be for group pride.
hum... I'm being very pointless, seems like I should have thought a little bit more, but hell this is internet who gives a ... (sorry for the use of the masculin pronoun only, I do include the feminin, they just need to create a gender-free pronoun)
 
Hmm, good post, Winter, worth some rep. Although I would differentiate a bit. Pride of oneself's achievements is OK, as long as it doesn't get out of hand (as "in-your-face pride"). What I never really understood is collective pride (if I understood correctly, this is what you mainly talked about). Why should I feel pride for the actions/achievements of others?

I'm not too negative even about that, as long as it doesn't get out of hand. Being proud because your national team won a match, no problem. Have fun! But looking down upon other nations because of something like that, no way.

I don't think, humanity should be one great "true unison". Would be too boring. We should accept & respect differences, & in the sense of self-respect, we should also be able/allowed to have & show pride resulting from those differences.
 
Winter said:
Pride is a very dangerous aspect of humanity. I think pride is what keeps us as an entire species from intergrating into a fullfledged outfit of true unison.

I read about gay pride parades. I hear about ethnic pride seminars. It seems that the liberally biased media encourages these aspects of our society as the new status quo; where as aryan pride *sans the hatred for other ethnicities* is completely taboo. An obvious contradiction, but for some reason, an acceptable contradiction in this warped society.

Pride parades, and the whole concept of pride itself, I believe reaffirms the walls placed within society that seperates peoples based on ethnicity, demographics, socio-economical structures, etc. Pride builds a false sense of self-worth in a concept inherited rather than a concept gained through effort and dilligence.
A certain degree of pride it seems to me is the first step for persecuted and ostrasized minorities anywhere in having their civil rights and liberties recognized, even when they're still in the process of becoming a respected part of society. You don't hear as much about Black or Gay pride today as in the '60's and '70's because the struggle has become more fragmented and focused on individual as opposed to group achievement (through civil rights laws etc), but I certainly don't hold against anyone getting a sense of satisfaction from the accomplishments of their forebearers or high achievers in their in-group as long as it's used for personal motivation and not to tear others down as Bossel said. Almost any behavior can have negative consequences if taken to the extreme, that's no reason to say it's entirely destructive, though.
 
I take Pride in what I don't know.... :D
I couldn't find Pride at the despair.com site, but sometimes Pride leads to Arrogance, and they did have this one:
http://www.despair.com/demotivators/arrogance.html
it even has a picture of a lion in it....and lions live with a pride... :D
ok....bad example...
 
Elizabeth said:
A certain degree of pride it seems to me is the first step for persecuted and ostrasized minorities anywhere in having their civil rights and liberties recognized, even when they're still in the process of becoming a respected part of society. You don't hear as much about Black or Gay pride today as in the '60's and '70's because the struggle has become more fragmented and focused on individual as opposed to group achievement (through civil rights laws etc),

Have you been to northern/central California lately? Specifically Davis/Berkley areas...

Almost any behavior can have negative consequences if taken to the extreme, that's no reason to say it's entirely destructive, though.

I think the arrogance-riddled aspect of pride has more than enough reason to count it as destructive.
 
Alright, I hope these thought don't seem as random to everyone else as they do to me. Here goes:

1) I didn't realize that the word pride had such negative connotations these days. I always thought of it as "having proper self-respect" (from Merriam-Webster), but to me pride also entails a sense of happiness and a wanting to share the things in which one has pride with others. I do understand that it has negative connotations, but to me it seems as though they belong in a different context. I guess we just have different understandings of the word.

2) The group pride thing can be a bit annoying and aggressive at times. I agree with Elizabeth that it can be good for a group to come together and take pride in themselves for achievements, such as civil rights advances. But I also agree with you that many times this gets taken over the line, and ends up just being either a "you'd better accept us, or else..." or a "we're right cause this is how we are, and everyone else is missing out" type of thing. That's definitely destructive and divisive.

3) My feelings on pride in innate qualities and talents is a bit up in the air. Using the definition above, I see not much of a problem with it. Now, it does seem a bit strange to take pride in being born a certain way, but then again, that is what makes us different and we should cherish it. I know that I have some talents that are above most people's, just as everyone does, but is it wrong to admit that or be proud because of it? Part of me thinks that I was just born this way, just like everyone is born a certain way, so there's no point in being proud of that, because I haven't done anything for it. It just is that way. What one should be proud of is playing the hand one is dealt, no matter what it is, in the best possible way. But another part of me thinks that being happy with those qualities that make us who we are is important, and we shouldn't take them for granted. I guess it's a balancing act like so many other things in life. I guess, in summary, I feel that everyone should be content with themselves and what they possess as a set of talents, but they should take more pride in what they do with their talents.
 
Winter said:
Have you been to northern/central California lately? Specifically Davis/Berkley areas...
No, but I have been in Japan where there is clearly a deep-seated pride in their cultural heritage, history and sense of 'group ownership' or 'group awareness' but where foreigners can read into it as much 'arrogance' and 'separateness' as comparative modesty and humbleness. Extremely conservative, "anti-foreign" rallies are also very low key affairs by American standards without even a strong Japanese base of support. In other words, as has been said here already, pockets of liberal extremism where artificial 'esteem-building' socialization exercises rule (seminars, parades etc) shouldn't really be used to define the entire range of the feeling or concept of pride. And even if it did, there isn't much that can be done to outlaw overt conceit or egotism besides try to understand the people that buy into it and why they're acting as they are....:?
 

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