Globalism vs. Nationalism as a Jedi

Should we try and look at the big picture? yes!

Should we also try and look from outside the box that is our world? Yes!

Should we try and understand things from as many different perspectives of our own? Absolutely!

Should we do this at the expense of our current environment and community? Subjective to what is involved.


Is there needy children in nigeria, yup! Can I go there and help take care of them, I could but I would be probably throwing my marriage away, not have the money to take care of my house, take care of the sheltered abused cats me and my wife have adopted over the years, and I would have to find a replacement to take care of my community as an emt-i as well. So maybe I'll just donate some money for someone else who is capable of doing those things without the expense to their communities to which they live in and still help out.

I see this question come up, someone preaching for the current let the refugees in protests in the US. But none of them will take one into their home. So yes its a terrible thing, yes someone should do something about it, but only if your able to without sacrificing more then your capable of sacrificing. And really is it sacrificing if your capable of sacrificing it? or just redirecting resources where they need to go? If you have to use the word sacrifice, one must wonder whether it is appropriate in the first place.

For myself, neither.

I believe that we should want for everyone to be well off, but not push it to the extent of what we've seen today where everyone is involved in everyone else's problems.

I believe that nationalism has it's place in terms of wanting to resolve the problems we see around us first. However I don't believe in believing one nation is better than others.

What I do believe in is finding a cause, and working on it. Globalism and Nationalism both place your eggs into too many baskets.

If you want to help people in another land, find something specific you want to work on. Better water quality? Find a team that is working on a system that will improve water quality that is cost effective and help install it across areas that don't have good 3water quality. Medical assistance in other countries? Doctors Without Borders. Want to just help people that need medical assistance? Work on becoming a doctor or EMS. Homelessness? Join/Create an organization that tackles that as a problem. Want to help economies grow so they can have better futures world-wide? Get a corporation going that trades with various countries. Want to see wars end?...Okay to be fair, I don't have an answer for that one. But I'm sure someone can come up with something!

Every country faces their own problems without bringing in new people. A sense of nationalism will not resolve those issues. Countries that experience horrible war conditions (such as what is going on in the Middle East or Venezuela) will not be helped by straining the resources of another country under a value of globalism.

Everyone is important, but at some point if we want to be of any use, we need to pick what group of people would benefit from our individual help the most, and pursue a role that will benefit them.

If you look at the Charter for Human Rights its sort of central about how we should have fair individual agency. So in that context of agency our capacity to detect, understand and alter things really decreases as a function of wealth and distance. If we are poor we can only effect our immediate space around us and with the cheapest of objects. If we are rich we can leverage other peoples time as labor to achieve output using specialty equipment to create greater change at greater distances. This represents a type of 'power' which when used has an associated footprint... in causality, and it's there which I think the problems occur and really start to define what might constitute responsible or irresponsible use of power. So for me globalism is about making accessible the widest range of mechanisms of individual agency in a modern world where power easily exceeds our capacity to understand that footprint. And because we live on a closed space (Earth) it happens to coincide in practical terms with the capabilities of that technological advancement as well, such as travel and communications. It's a subtle distinction but important I think.

While in contrast nationalism is more about improving the agency of a set of individuals (its citizens). To me then globalism and nationalism have quite different scopes but also speeds, and therefore can co-exist and operate effectively - so long as they don't compete with each other.

So in the same way as individuals should have agency, nations need agency as well otherwise they will compete. If one considers a nation to be just that particular set of legal rules then it should be simple for the boundaries to be recognized and understood ie diplomacy, but human nature creates... and technological developments mean its easier for less people to do more by being irresponsible with that power, more and more, which means the 'community' of individuals is probably better determined by the depth of power available - and it has exceeded national boundaries!! As such globalization really is the most appropriate level of interconnection to better achieve awareness so that advancement can try to be channeled in the most appropriate way possible IMO.

Globalism won't ever work unless humanity as a group is faced with imminent extinction. We're too selfish, it's why on a broad scale capitalism works and communism doesn't.

Given that people are naturally far from perfect, we don't want to risk ourselves for "that starving child in Africa." A lot of times, people really don't care unless they are only one or two degrees removed from an issue. This most often leads to people having a tribe-first mindset (nationalism). Nationalism in scarcity leads to external conflict (most any resource war), globalism in scarcity leads to either a fractured identity or massive destruction (i.e. Hungarian Revolution and Great Leap Forward respectively). Both globalism and nationalism work as ways to unify a group to do something the individuals wouldn't do otherwise, and how that power is wielded is what defines whether or not it's good.

Tl;dr transhumanism is the peak application of Jediism, but we're far from ideal

Globalism sounds like an awesome thing, but when the theory is put into practice, we get third party institutions and organizations making all these laws and resolutions that do not benefit the people of the world. As a species, we have not reached the maturity level to be a global society just yet. We have to be able to develop the ability to get positive and progressive initiatives done in our own countries while being able to bilaterally work with different countries who have different needs and wants.

It's like we have to pass first grade before we can go onto to the second grade. We have to be able to terrain form and master the energy sources on this planet before we can out into our solar system and do the same. We have to be able to snuff out corruption and make local governments work towards the will of the people or you'll have more of the same with a one world government/global community.

As a student of mass communications and media, I feel it is important to look at nationalism vs. globalism through the lens of how information is distributed. Much of how we view the world as individuals or as societal groups greatly depends on the information we have access to. Generally, the more information you have, the more global your view will become. The less you have access to, the more likely you are to be nationalist. I realize these are broad generalizations, and here are some broad examples to go with it

Perhaps the most "nationalistic" nation in the world today is North Korea, and it due to the fact that the average North Korean is prevented from knowing anything happening outside of their borders. They know only what the government tells them. They do not know they can choose to be Christian or Muslim because they have no idea those religions exist. They believe they are superior to all other nations because their leader went to the moon, played a perfect round of golf and invented everything good in the world. It is all about controlling the information. This is how Hitler achieved his rise to power, and it is how demagogues trick people into believing everything they say is the "truth". Some people fall into religious traps as well by putting all of their unwavering faith into one almighty god that can never be wrong. If you only have one source and that source is infallible, you will always believe them, no matter how outlandish or counter-intuitive the actual information seems to be.

On the other hand, when you have nation/states that encourage open exchange of information (read that as having a free press), you see a high level of thought diversity. People begin to absorb vast amounts of information from various and often conflicting sources, and then they must decide to test the veracity of the information from each source or just take one source at face value over others. The same happens with political and religious identities. This ultimately leads to people making choices from a variety of options and sometimes combining multiple options into a whole new combined identity. It hopefully teaches people to be discerning and to question authority. It makes people more likely to rely on facts and logical argument over appeals to emotion or following out of blind faith. Soon the lines begin to blur as various philosophies blend over time and you have what looks like a very globalist society. All of this conflicting information bumping into each other creates a lot of uncomfortable friction, as can be seen in the recent political rhetoric all over the world as identities would rather conflict than blend, but it is inevitable in a society with access to information.

As the exchange of information becomes faster and the reach of communication becomes more and more global, it is more and more likely that the once nationalistic individual societies will be influenced by outside information that breaks down those borders. When people can travel as freely as the information does, it will become even more obvious. As the Chinese discovered Michael Jackson, they wanted more American pop music. As Americans discovered yoga, we all started walking around in ridiculously tight and stretchy pants. As the world discovers Wikileaks, no nationalist demagogue will be safe in their seat of power. The pace at which we share information is only increasing, and the access to it is increasing as well.

As a syncretic philosophy, Jediism takes information from a wide array of sources and allows the individual to then combine that information to inform a distinct and original brand of "Jedi". It's why we can never agree on what "Jedi" means or on a definition of the "Force". To some, Jedi is a way of life. To some it is a religion. To others it is a fictional character who brainwashes people. We all use different information to inform our opinions and we have A LOT of information at our fingertips. This makes Jediism much more globalist, which I don't see as a bad thing. Well, assuming Jedi don't decide to start controlling the information themselves and allow that power to corrupt the otherwise benevolent mission of Jediism (I'm looking at you, Mace Windu! )

A very good and timely topic. May the force be with you.

Globalism vs Nationalism, imho, is a question of scope.

Please bear with me.

When a sperm fertilizes and egg the 2 become one and then they start dividing. They divide until there are trillions of cells. Under the weight of only 7 billion we cells of planet earth continue to divide but cannot peacefully coexist. We are cancer upon cancer to each other.

In the process of division, at some point, a child is born. That child has a family of his own. This grows into a tribe and then a nation. The nation is simply an outgrowth of the family unit. By design, a child is meant to be taken care of and protected by its parents. What happens when it's not? The further we get away from each other the harder it is to connect and when we try we see strangers who may even speak a strange language.

If you consider the behavior of a family or that of a colony of bees, imagine if all families gave up their children to be grown in equal pods; an environment in which parents don't matter, village and family don't matter, and everyone is treated equally? Would it be equally good or inherently bad by design?

One of the biggest criticisms to the Jedi Order was that they were seen (and they allowed themselves to have this reputation) as a righteous force of justice in the galaxy. The problem with that is their scope was so broad that there were many places they didn't go, many wrongs they didn't right, massive slavery and the like. When Qui Gon and Obi Wan go to Tatooine they're on a mission. Because their mission wasn't to free slaves on Tatooine Anakin's mother was sold, captured, and who knows what else, leaving Anakin to want vengeance. Obviously the Jedi couldn't be everywhere but it seemed like they never stayed anywhere unless they were Jedi who had left the order. The order was very much used by the Senate which represented a globalist agenda but because the Order was servant to that agenda it was able to be manipulated by those who wanted power over all life in the galaxy.

In my opinion this was an imbalance.

The Jedi Order should have had a temple on each planet, including Tatooine, Hutta, Nar Shadaa, etc.They should have been spread out, representing the protons in each cell. So they should have had local Jedi handling local concerns; people who grew up on that planet and knew the people. The force chose all manner of humans and aliens to have access to it. But they acted more like the Mormon church and less like the Catholic Church. As much as I don't like the latter, their presence around the world is undeniable. And because they have parishioners everywhere they have churches their ability to help their communities is far greater than ours. That power comes from being organized. What good is 35 Trillon cells if they're not organized? But each organ is like its own nation. Each cell has its own programming and its own job to do. I don't think the heart cells worry too much about the lung cells. But by beating they are keeping the lung cells alive.

So the point is there has to be a balance. We cannot be completely random and all over the place with a pure spiritual message about peace and harmony but lacking discipline or organization. This is like being globalists only. It would be wildly inefficient if I, living in Ohio, attempted to solve problems in Berlin while several Jedi living in Berlin are coming to solve problems in Ohio. What should happen is that I work to solve problems locally and those in closer proximity come together to work on bigger problems that concern a larger area. And if the problem is really big that's when you call for more Jedi. This is the power of any church body. It is the recognition that they are a body and that there is a need for a head, an arm, a leg, etc.

So I would say we need a globalist agenda and nucleus with distributed local action. The force should be like packets of energy and knowledge flowing from one Jedi to another across the world. But nature is very efficient in how it uses energy. The mistake I see many nations and rebels make is they misuse energy and try to use it so inefficiently that it becomes less than effective. And that's the difference between trying to levitate a stone and trying to levitate an x-wing out of a swamp.

While we cannot forgo engagement with the well-being of those in our immediate surroundings, I am thinking a Jedi-like approach would emphasize globalism over nationalism.

We might equate what we see having occurred in an evolutionary sense with the will of the Force. Life, as we understand things, began as single cells. Those cells consolidated themselves into little cell-communities, and finally into more complex organisms. Those organisms themselves changed and acquired new capabilities, and then began to emulate the cells and form their own communities - families, then tribes, then villages, then fiefdoms or states, then nations. Earthly forms of life have been expanding and becoming ever more interconnected for a long, long time (but not in a galaxy far away!)

I don't see a reason for this process to stop at the borders of nations - which, after all, are just imaginary lines that no species on Earth except humans can perceive anyway. Including the welfare of our brethren half a globe away from us doesn't mean we wish less for the land in which we live; we just wish the best for all humanity instead of just our smaller segment of it.