July Peace History

On Nationalism and Patriotism

“Patriotism is your conviction that this country is superior to all other countries because you were born in it.”
— George Bernard Shaw, author

“The love of one’s country

is a splendid thing.

But why should love

stop at the border?”
–Pablo Casals, musician

“Patriotism is when love of your own people comes first;

nationalism, when hate for people other than your own comes first.”
–Charles de Gaulle, French leader

“Flags are bits of colored cloth that governments use 

first to shrink-wrap people’s brains

and then as ceremonial shrouds 

to bury the dead.”
–Arundhati Roy, author

“Nationalism is an infantile disease. It is the measles of mankind”.
— Albert Einstein, scientist

“Patriotism is the willingness to kill and be killed for trivial reasons.”
–Bertrand Russell, philosopher

“Patriotism is loving your country always

and your government when it deserves it.”
–Mark Twain, author

“It is not easy to see how the more extreme forms of nationalism can long survive when men have seen the Earth in its true perspective as a single small globe against the stars.”
— Arthur C. Clarke, author