The war in Iraq has had some interesting effects. One of them is that I’ve been thinking a lot lately about identity, about how we form the core concept of who we are.
Does identity come from where you are born? Does it come from where your ancestors were born? Does it come from your religion? Does it come from the values your parents tried to instill in you as you grew up? Does it come from the prevailing morays of your teenage and college years?
Or does it come from a distillation by some internal, hardwired process as it filters all the lessons taught by parents, by religion, by reading, and by experience…by success as much as by failure?
In the global world, I very much doubt that identity is solely a function of national boundaries or ethnic heritage. Take a look at the behavior of Boston Irish. They’re more proud of being Irish than a Dublin native, and yet, born of two Irish-descended parents in America makes you an American by birth.
The consideration of how national and ethnic origin inputs into identity is brought into sharp focus by the debate over the war in Iraq.
Proponents of the war will tell you that disagreeing with Bush makes you unpatriotic, makes you less of an American. Opponents will tell you that not only is voicing a dissenting opinion patriotic, the right to voice it is the essence of being an American.
But what exactly does it mean to be “an American?” As Americans, are we all that our overseas detractors believe — ie: loud, crass, culturally insensitive? Are we what our national self-image says we are — ie: strong, creative, pioneering, take-no-prisoners heroes?
The scary thing is, nationality is but one of the two top layers of identity. The other is sex. And that, I still need to ponder.