Patriotism and you!

So I've been mulling something over just to kill the time and try to put myself in some of my he.. err vigilante's shoes (if you see me on Pinnacle with that big ol' arachnos symbol - just visiting for the badges )

I tend to see my heros as above the politcal interests of thier home country. They wouldn't get involved in a war between to terrestrial nations except in the most dire case.

Anyways, where does your hero draw the line between serving the intrests of the place you call home and the greater good?

I've played with patriotism as a motivator on a number of my characters, mostly to bolster the reasoning that some of my less-than-evil characters have had to stay in the Rogue Isles or be Loyalists in Praetoria.

I've got an Arachnos Soldier who I'd like to end up as a vigilante. He was born in the Rogue Isles, and despite the fact that he knows quite well that the system is horribly corrupt and even actively harmful, he's naive enough that his fondness for his home was enough to make him think that he could do some good by joining Arachnos. Of course, following the VEAT storyline, by the time I start playing him, he's already seen that he was wrong and is trying to get out.

A good example in Praetoria is a character of mine who grew up there and has a strong drive to protect his city and the people living there, and at least at first, thinks that although Cole's system of law is imperfect, it's the best way to do good. He likely would have a rude awakening as soon as he tried reporting abuses that he's witnessed.

As for purely heroic characters, the Primal Earth version of that Praetorian is a man who lived his whole life in Atlas Park, and despite not having powers of his own, simply had to go out and fight when the Rikti came. Nowadays, he spends most of his time running a small supergroup whose goal is to keep Atlas Park safe.

On the other hand, my first level 50 is a nearly entirely team-oriented Empathy/Electric Defender who works with UN Peacekeeping missions, going aroung the world trying to protect innocents from oppressive regimes and natural disasters. He is definitely more motivated by his sense of morals than his affection for his home. (He happens to have grown up mostly on various atolls in the Pacific where nuclear testing occurred... his parents were globe-trotting medics as well, just of the non-superpowered variety.)

It totally depends on which character we are talking about. Honestly, I cannot give you a straight answer on this, because of all the different back stories across my alts.

I don't think I have any heroes who would go to extremes. I have some toons who would look the other way, I have others who would try to negotiate with their government and protest, I have others still that would have tried to preemptively stop the fighting by offering their assistance over seas. When it comes to patriotism, I'd say every single hero I have is a patriot, but would choose to show it in non-extreme ways.

As for the subject at hand, most of my characters revolve around a strange man who has been walking the Earth for thousands of years (basically he can live on 'for an undetermined amount of time' and those who 'follow' him tend to live very, very long lives too) and has adopted a few individuals of great talent, or that simply sparked his interest.
Namely, my widow is mostly fanatical in her 'goals'. Basically, she's the zealous type that goes 'I don't think, he does. All I do is what he wish'.

Some of my other characters are more 'flexible', namely my Bane, who despite following the plan to become a member of Arachnos, still has her own goal of finding her sister, my Warshade, with whom she had made a strange pack during World War I that 'no matter what, they would stay the same and find each other again'.

My SS/Fire Brute is kind of like Mynx or Bobcat, except that she's a human-tiger 'hybrid' that resulted from an outdoor experiment on some laboratory in India. To make a short story, err, short, she was found by the same 'person' that leads the previous ones and ended up following him. You know, no where else to go, might be a good idea to follow a strange man and his bunch of followers.

In short, my characters mostly have 'personal' goals that do not really affect the greater schemes of things. Or simply no real goal at all; they're not complex individuals, if you forgot the fact that most of them have been living for centuries and that they all have a small fanatical side for their 'adopter'.
What is his goals though? Nah-ah, not telling

An interesting example of the opposite is my Samurai character Takezo despite, and partly because, he is temporally displaced from Edo period Japan, he actually rejects modern Japanese government. Part of this consternation was that he read about what Japan did in World War II and immediately came to feel his own nation was dead to him, it's a process he's slowly begun forgive them, understanding that it's a different government now, and as a bonus the Tokugawa shogunate is also out of power. (His family has a grudge against Tokugawa for setting castes as a birth thing when Tokugawa himself had been born a peasant. Takezo's family is a similar case of rising from peasantry into Samurai caste)
So, no, he's not going to be the kind of person that goes out on a limb out of national loyalties.
The rest of mine have a strong "politics ruin everything" stance and similarly are not going to breech their morals for the sake of politics and nationality. So it kind of makes Malta justified in their hatred of them.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Samuel_Tow City of Heroes is a game about freedom of expression and variety of experiences far more so than it is about representing any one theme, topic or genre.

War is the most dire causes. There's some kind of deflation of the term "war" these days, like it's something that happens on CNN and always to other people. When the war comes, it is no longer about terrestrial politics. It's about you, your family, and your home, except possibly if you live in a country where there is practically no threat of invasion and occupation.

<ooc>
When I grew up, there was a section in the phone book named "When the war comes". Not "if", "when".

And the reason is that Sweden was slap bang in the middle between NATO and the Warzaw pact. If there were to be a war, the Soviet Baltic fleet would have to pass Öresund, the narrow straight between Denmark and Sweden, to get out into the Atlantic. In order for the Baltic fleet to actually be able to do anything to stop the US convoys to Europe, the Soviet army would have to invade Denmark and the south of Sweden to open the straight. And of course NATO knew that as well, so they had plans to occupy Sweden to prevent the Soviets from doing it.

Add to that the general sense of doom in the 80s, and you have a good explanation of "when" rather than "if". So here, when the war would come, it wasn't patriotic fervour that made you pick up arms. It was the most dire cause.

Which translates into a few of my characters.
</ooc>

I live in a sovereign state with foreign troops occupying parts of it. They claim it is a police action to protect the public, but let's face it: it is an invasion with at least the tacit approval of the US government. That is to me the most dire cause.

So when I defeat a Longbow soldier, I don't arrest someone. I kill an invader. I kill someone who is occupying my home, threatening my family, someone who is trying to take away my freedom and my liberty.

Most of my characters tend to be apolitical, save one. Sora Tavarisch is my dual citizenship hero (United States/Russia) - born in Moscow, and emigrated first to Cambridge for her second doctorate and then to Paragon City. Moscow is still 'home', and her older brother Stefan is a member of the Valiant Defenders (Russia's first and premier group of superheroes).

Originally, she was one of several scientists who planned to participate in a joint US/Russia exchange to foster community and scientific understanding between the two nations. That all changed when the Rikti invaded shortly after she arrived in Paragon City.

But although she also loves her new home (she's been here since the war), her time in the Vanguard has ingrained in her that ALL of Earth must be protected. If, God forbid, the US and Russia began another arms race/Cold War, Sora would probably turn to many of the other multinational heroes to stand up as examples as to what humanity should strive for.

Michelle
aka
Samuraiko/Dark_Respite

my characters tend to stand more by church than state, and thats about all i can say on that topic.

Take the Magic: The Gathering 'What Color Are You?' Quiz.

This is probably going to make me sound like a complete ***, but I'm not American, yet by nature of what the game is, all of my characters exist and work in America. As such, I've never really seen anything about them as patriotic, and have had them cooperate with the American government or stick to American culture, tradition and customs pretty much only when it doesn't get in the way.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Arcanaville Samuel_Tow is the only poster that makes me want to punch him in the head more often when I'm agreeing with him than when I'm disagreeing with him.

I had a hard time playing Spider Blue, my Arachnos Soldier, until I met Hardcase.

(To be honest the VEAT storyline does not captivate me at all.)

I have always seen Recluse's philosophy as being "The strong thrive. The weak perish. That is as it should be."

Hardcase is a Redside contact who basically says, "Yeah, we may be tough, but that doesn't mean we shouldn't look after our own."

That led to Spider's philosophy: "The strong thrive-- and protect what is theirs."

In his mind, Spider Blue is a hero of the people of the Rogue Isles. He will fight to protect them and keep them from harm. In effect, he's saying, "I'm so strong I don't have to let the weak perish."

He acquires power. He beats up the Longbow invaders of his homeland-- and gladly does the same thing to the Freedom Phalanx and Vindicators when they show up on his turf.

But he also protects the people.

I like to say that he's Prince Namor with a sense of humor.

So, Spider Blue is definitely patriotic ... not to the government of the Rogue Isles, but to the people. It's his home. He defends it.

The closest thing I have to a "Patriot" character is my sociopathic android Ryat Dreadnaught, who had no qualms about detonating a Neutron Bomb under Imperial City because "They're the Enemy." He's that fiercely loyal to Primal Earth, and, tangentially, the U.S. as that's the nation where he was built.

Another android in the series dresses the part for one of his outfits (lots of Red,White and Blue), but his attitude is so aloof, it comes off as just a "Gimmick of the Day."

Otherwise, patriotism and politics doesn't really play a part in my characters' behavior. That's probably due in part to my upbringing, though, as patriotism didn't really factor too heavily in it in the first place.

I "took a walk" through King's Row tonight and saw that there aren't all that many Longbow around anymore; not like the early days when you couldn't throw a rock without hitting them. The one outside the hospital talking to the security guard was typical, though - "We have to put these punks in King's Row on alert!"

Where the Longbow in Atlas Park and Galaxy City seem to be prototypical superhero types, the Longbow in King's Row have always seemed to be in need of an attitude adjustment in regards to their dealings with the gangs and people of King's Row.

ObPatriotism:

None of my characters have ever been in a position to feel like they were being forced to decide between patriotism or not, except for one who is deliberately characterized as being a bit daft in that department.

From a real-world standpoint, I had an interesting experience here on the forums last year around this time. It was Independence Day and in the spirit of the occasion, I logged into BabelFish and had it translate a greeting into French, along the lines of "In recognition of Independence Day in the United States, I wanted to thank you all [French forum users] for the help that your ancestors gave our ancestors. Without it, we wouldn't have a holiday to celebrate."

I'm sure it sounded like machine-generated French, but the French forumites seemed to enjoy it. It sparked a short but interesting conversation wherein the handful of respondents commented on the fact that while they appreciated the greeting, that they thought it was a bit odd that America has a holiday dedicated, essentially, to patriotism. One or two responded back in English, so we were able to actually talk a bit. :-)

They seemed to feel that this was a bit, um, silly is the wrong word, but i'm not sure what the right word is - not frivolous or amusing, really, but some amalgam of all three that I'm not really popping out of my brain right now. They said that they had no similar holiday and couldn't imagine French or even European people getting much behind a similar patriotic holiday. They felt that something like, say, Bastille Day fell into a different category somehow.

I imagine from this that a foreign player like Sam might have some issues with "playacting" a patriotic character, particularly an American character, given that they don't really "feel" our concept of patriotism quite like we do. That's what I took away from it, anyway.

OTOH, my characters pretty much all are patriots to the extent that they believe in the Constitution and they believe that Longbow is an offense against it, if not an outright violation of it and they treat it accordingly.

"Patriotism is the willingness to kill and be killed for trivial reasons" - Bertrand Russell

That quote pretty much sums up my, and by extension, my heroes' views on the subject. To fight for humanity, to fight to protect the world, or to make it a better place, that is worthy. To fight for a country? To fight for an arbitrary set of borders? That is not worthy of a hero. That's not to say they feel no pride or such in their nation, but that there are such greater things out there that patriotism is a trivial and outdated concept.