Comment by thinkingemote | Hacker News Reader

Comment by thinkingemote | Hacker News Reader

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[edited to make it shorter]

There has been a change. The traditional supporters of reunification are outdated.

The original Irish nationalists would not want a weaker national identity but a stronger one through unification. I've heard that the older supporters feel that something has been compromised. I'm not saying older supporters are racist - rather that the ideals they have of an Irish people and nationhood are not being promoted by their previous political champions. The people hold outdated views. Newer adopted ideals of immigration and open borders are perceived to be more important than campaigning with these older ideals for reunification which many consider to be at odds with each other in some ways.

My impression is that their old views are comfortably dissolving away than being actively or angrily being fought for which leads to less enthusiasm about the issue. The notion of what Ireland is to them is less important now. They have more peace with a corresponding weakening of the Cause.

Many modern people today consider the very notion of national identity as outdated and troublesome. From Ukraine to Palestine, its based on the thorny issue of nation and people. The Troubles were based on the issue of nation and people.

I think you're just using terms loosely. Also I think Wikipedia article on nationalism is pretty good and should remove any confusion.

In my opinion there is nothing outdated in the term "nation". Also, if you're from the US, you need to understand that Europe is very diverse, and there are a lot of nuances.

In the topic of our discussion - nationalism in countries which were colonies or under control of a "perceived" foreign state for a long time are pro-independence from that state first, and their flavour of nationalism is very different than in the ones which were historically "colonisers" themselves.

As an example, you can see that a lot of people which voted for Wales independence, were actually pro-EU, and Brexit actually increased the amount of people in Wales who wanted independence. So Welsh nationalism is very different than British nationalism, however the territories and people can intersect.

So there should be no surprise that Irish nationalism is about governing Ireland independent from UK first, and can be pro-EU, especially, when British nationalists can be against-EU (which may not be the case in reality or not uniformly).

Any national government tries to rule based on the values of their people. And these values can differ from one territory to another.

Also, speaking of Ireland you need to account that almost half of the Ireland population emigrated because of different hardships in the last century, so it is difficult for a county to have isolationism values when its population values moving to different countries as well.

> Most of the troubles we see across the world from Ukraine to Palestine are based on the thorny issue of nation and people.

I cannot speak about Israel-Pelestine conflict, but living in Ukraine I can assure you that you are very wrong here. There is zero issue with the question of nation and nationalism related to this conflict.

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