AN INDEPENDENT STATE OF ONE

I will no longer affiliate myself with any of you bastards. I want no part of your nations or your systems or your beliefs. I refuse to passively endorse your willfully naive values, cosy hypocrisies and murderous ideologies. I am a deist, although often doubting, and I worship at an alterless church with the sky for a roof and sermons delivered on the breeze. I have created my own flag too and I speak a new language that I have invented for my use alone. I have composed my own national anthem and I have declared myself to be in an independent state of one.

You do not fill me with wonder. You just make me wonder what it's all for. You have broken my heart but I'm not broken yet. My defences are up but I will continue to trade and negotiate. I will participate in your customs but I will no longer pretend to fully appreciate them. I'll just be there like a visiting dignitary. That is, I will try to be dignified but I can't guarantee anything. I might get nervous and drink too much and there might be an outburst. I might suddenly announce that this is a farce and that I want to go home and then I will go home and there will be relief all round. I might talk to a homeless man that I meet on my way back to my sovereignty. I'll find him crouched in his cardboard kingdom and bidding me welcome in exchange for some small token. I'll give him a smoke if I have one. He'll tell me how you beat him and how you fucked him and how you now fear him and he'll ask me my story and I'll tell him that I just lost interest.

And he'll offer me a drink and I'll take it without knowing what it is and he'll fall asleep but I'll stay awake and watch the sun begin to seep through the clouds and the litter running down the empty street and I'll see the best amongst you, in high vis jackets, sweeping up your shit. Making the world presentable again so you can continue to make it a mess. I'd consider a complete trade blockade with you bastards but I know I'd starve to death. 

Gone From Here...

NATIONALISM

(pictured above: The national flag of Insania)

Nationalism is great isn’t it? I think it is anyway. It’s cute. You have a bit of a fight and win your land and give it a little name like something-land or something-ania or just something. You make a little flag with a picture on it or maybe just a few colours or maybe a barcode and you put it up a pole and salute it in your little military outfits with the buttons all polished and you invent a little march you can do and blow a trumpet and sing a little song about your nation with little words about how great everything is and how good you are at fighting and how God likes you the best and all that. It really is very sweet the whole nationalism thing and practical too.

The practical element is the morale boosting that nationalism provides. I mean, if you didn’t have nationalism how could you muster the will to go off killing wogs just because they threaten your sweet deal on hot water bottle imports? (Oh dear, I’ve just realised I typed ‘wogs’ out loud. Please forgive me. I’m not racist or anything, it’s just the nationalist fervour.) If you didn’t have nationalism you might find yourself on a battlefield wondering just what the Hell you’re doing ramming a bayonet into a complete stranger. Where would your hot water bottle imports be then? I’ll tell you where, at the mercy of Wogland that’s where! The wogs would be exporting hot water bottles to you for top dollar and using the money to buy bayonets so they can stick them into you.

Of course, seeing as there would be a demand, you could always start making bayonets and selling them to the wogs. This might actually start good trade relations. Some important wog nation dignitaries might visit your nation and exchange gifts with your nation’s dignitaries, little tokens like a tasty cabbage or a fancy ornament or a fancy ornament of a tasty cabbage. And the wog nation’s dignitaries could stay for a few days and go see a few important statues or something and it would be on the telly and then the wog nation’s dignitaries would invite your nation’s dignitaries to Wogland and you’d be glad because the wog nation’s dignitaries liked your nation’s dignitaries.

National dignitaries are so called because they are dignified enough to represent their nations, unlike the rest of you. You’re not dignified like national dignitaries at all. You’re just normal undignitaries, shuffling around the place, blowing your noses and stuffing used tissues into pockets filled with old bus tickets. Jesus, when I think of it, the state of you. Really! All you’re good for is getting bayonets stuck into you. At least that way you’re doing your nation some service. Going forward.