Yes, my country is the greatest country in the whole wide world. Depending on where in the world you grew up, and where you currently reside, you may have heard this narrative numerous times, and you may actually believe it yourself.
Of course, citizens and leaders of all 195 countries in the world would like to believe they are the greatest, but some leaders have more difficulty than others converting their citizens to this belief system. Indeed, there are benefits to having a citizenry woefully convinced of this highly subjective claim. Afterall, nothing unites people more than patriotism, and a united nation is a powerful nation.
In some places, people are forced to love their country, like North Korea, while in others, patriotism is optional, but nevertheless encouraged by way of subtle indoctrination.
In the 2006 mockumentary Borat, played by Sacha Baron Cohen, Borat Sagdiyev travels to the United States from his native Kazakhstan, and while hosting a rodeo in one of the most ultraconservative parts of the country, he sings the Kazak national anthem to the tune of the US national anthem which, not surprisingly, is not well received.
Here’s a sample of the fictional Kazak national anthem Borat sings before an audience of diehard American right-wingers in the deep south.
♪ Kazakhstan is the greatest… country in the world… all other countries… are run by little girls…♪
Another one of Borat’s claims as to why Kazakhstan is the greatest country in the world is his assertion that it has the “best potassium” while “all other countries have inferior potassium.”
Borat is widely considered among the geatest satires in the history of cinema, but although Borat is a fictional character (something the majority of people who appeared in the film were completely unaware of at the time of filming), there may very well be an inner-Borat in all of us.
An insular perspective
I was born and raised in the United States, where since childhood we are taught, with fervent repetition, that America is the “greatest country in the world”. Naturally, one rarely questions such assertions when raised to believe they are as undeniable as the existence of the moon. Plus, seeing so many people move to the US from other countries only emboldened my belief that “America is the greatest” because “everybody wants to live here.”
I even remember a family member telling me how she had travelled all over the world, which only reinforced her belief that there is no place as wonderful as the United States of America, a message she fed me on a regular basis, and one that I swallowed whole, no questions asked.
My insular worldview changed when I was sixteen years old and travelled alone to my mother’s hometown of Sincelejo, in northern Colombia, to spend my summer vacation.
Upon arrival, my first instinct was to reaffirm my previously instilled beliefs, that this country was a shithole, just like all countries outside of the US are probably shitholes, my inner-Borat manifesting itself. As time went by, however, my Spanish gradually improved. I began making new friends and I really started to like this place, to the point where I began to question the notion that the US is “the greatest country in the world.”
Many years later I would find myself relocating from the US to Bogota, Colombia’s bustling capital city, to pursue my bachelor’s degree. There I would meet many different people and see different perspectives of how Colombians view their own country.
There were those who hated Colombia because of its excessive political problems, corruption and crime, while there were also those who proudly made the claim that “Colombia is the greatest country” because “Colombians are the friendliest people on Earth” or because they believe Colombian families are closer, happier and more traditional than in “other countries”.
I even heard a few people, who had obviously never spent much time abroad, tell me that people in “other countries” don’t bathe regularly, inferring that Colombians are the cleanest people on Earth.
One day I spoke to a Colombian who told me he had travelled the entire world, which made him realize no country is as amazing as Colombia, a message that sounded eerily familiar.
Superiority around the globe
After living in Colombia for nearly seven years I moved to Japan to teach English and ended up living there for almost 4 years. As was the case in Colombia, I met many different people and got many different perspectives on how the Japanese view themselves. Although some claimed they wish they could be more like western countries, others seemed convinced of their own superiority compared to the rest of the world.
I was surprised when a Japanese student told me many Japanese people are convinced that in “other countries” people don’t bathe regularly, and that the Japanese are basically the cleanest people on Earth. I paused for a moment and thought to myself, I’ve heard this argument before somewhere.
One day I saw a Facebook post written by one of my Japanese friends, in English, after he had just returned to Japan from a trip abroad. In the post he expressed how he was so happy to be back in Japan and how he had travelled to so many countries around the world, which helped him realize Japan is by far the greatest country in the world.
I would later relocate to Spain to pursue my master’s degree. While there, not surprisingly, I would catch wind of many of the same arguments for national superiority as I did in the US, Colombia and Japan. One thing Spain has in common with the US (and most other economically stable, safe and welcoming democratic countries) is that many people from other parts of the world immigrate here (not to mention the hoards of yearly tourists), which convinces many Spaniards that they live in the “greatest country in the world” because “everybody wants to live here”.
Common patterns
Here’s a quick summary of some of the most common arguments for national (or cultural) superiority that I’ve heard while living in different parts of the world:
1. Many people immigrate to my country (and only my country), therefore it is the greatest country in the world.
2. I’ve travelled around the world which has helped me realize how inferior all other countries are to mine.
3. People in other countries don’t bathe regularly, as they do in mine.
4. Women in other countries are promiscuous, but the women in my country are not like that.
5. People in other countries are lazy, but in my country people work hard.
6. All other countries have inferior potassium.
The above affirmations can also go for other regions within the same country (e.g everybody wants to move to New York City because this city is the greatest) or even within the in-group to stigmatize the out-group (democrats are lazy, unlike us, or the potassium in eastern Kasakhstan is superior to that in southern Kazakhstan).
(Full disclosure: The objective of this article isn’t to suggest that we are all exactly the same or that there are no cultural differences with regards to bathing habits, how many hours the average person works, or who has the best potassium, etc. It’s to point out that people often think the same way about your country (or culture) as you feel about theirs, and these opinions are often based on ideas that are far from reality.)
Reality
But idolizing your own country by assuming every other country is a cesspool is a beautiful thing, isn’t it?
Hmm, not really.
Sure, convincing yourself and your compatriots that your nation is above all others can serve as a form of cohesion among citizens within national borders. But historically, it has also led to violent forms of imperialism.
In the US, for example, the widespread belief that “my country is the greatest” (the most advanced, the most civilized, the most ethical) has convinced American leaders to engage in countless military incursions throughout the world, from trying to “save” Vietnam from communism, which cost the lives of over 58,000 US soldiers and millions of Vietnamese soldiers and civilians, to the more recent invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq (and many more in between), which resulted in over half a million deaths (nearly half of them Afghan and Iraqi civilians, including women and children).
Today, Vietnam is a communist country, Afghanistan is back in control of the Taliban, and the US failed to instill a peaceful and functional democracy in Iraq, which became flooded with terrorist groups that have torn the country apart since the US led invasion.
Not as many people in Colombia believe their country is the greatest in the world as those in the United States, but there is still a fair share who are convinced of this idea, despite the fact that Colombia has been host to one of the longest civil conflicts in world history and has the highest level of income inequality in all of Latin America.
In Japan, the idea that it was the greatest country in the world drove its leaders to commit atrocious war crimes in China and Korea in the 1930’s, and the bombing of Pearl Harbor in 1941, which led to the country’s demise, while Spaniards were convinced of their own superiority when they conquered the American continent and committed acts of genocide to local populations. Today, Russia’s conviction that it is the greatest country in the world has led to the invasion and mass murder of thousands of Ukrainians and counting.
The “enlightened” traveller
Many people like to believe those who are “well-travelled” are enlightened individuals who practically levitate when they walk. This is a myth. Travelling can actually reinforce the my country is superior complex, as noted in the “travelling helped me learn how much better my country is than anywhere else” fallacy. The fact is, people usually see and believe what they want to, and just spending time at a resort for a few days in a foreign country isn’t exactly an “enlightening” experience.
When I lived in Japan, I remember meeting people from the US, Canada and the UK who often complained about how much they couldn’t stand Japanese people and how they felt superior to them, even though they had been living in Japan for 20+ years. Although this wasn’t the norm, it was not uncommon either.
Can we avoid falling into the “my country…” trap?
It’s important to recognize that the my nation is the greatest belief system is merely another form of modern-day tribalism, a story passed from generation to generation, a tale our parents read to us before tucking us into bed. Sure, it feels nice to believe we’re from the greatest place on Earth, it feeds into our collective ego, and it might sometimes be fun, especially during international competitions like the World Cup or the Olympics.
But in the real world of today, unlike during our ancestral past, we need to learn to cooperate to combat global threats, like global warming, pandemics and, well… our tribal selves, who instead of spears now carry nuclear weapons.
If merely travelling isn’t an antidote for pedantic nationalistic tendencies, what is? Well, living in different countries for several years at a time, and at least making an effort to open your mind, learning the language to the best of your ability, and immersing yourself with locals can be a start. Or you can just learn more about your own country’s history and that of the world, ideally from a neutral source, and you may find out that it’s not as uniquely great (or uniquely horrible) as you previously thought.
If we can manage that, we may be able to control the inner Borat in all of us, and perhaps some day we’ll even evolve away from the my country is the greatest belief system, regardless of who has the best potassium.
