gondaily

It's so frustrating to want to put my feelings into words and failing. I feel so ignorant all the time, like I don't know enough to speak on any issue. When I do speak, I feel like I always miss something, some detail of the bigger picture, and it's always pointed out to me.

That's a good thing, I suppose. To be able to speak your mind and be corrected and helped.

I'm a patriot, I think, but I'm not a nationalist. I love my country because it's given me so much: a good education, good health services, good public transport... I love our language and our culture, our music both old and new, I love our rivers and the ocean that graces our shores, our forests, our food and our water... I saw a TikTok a few days ago, actually where a Portuguese person talked about how, whenever they travel abroad, they're flabbergasted by how terrible foreign water is. I've traveled all over Europe and can vouch for that. Foreign water sucks, it's crazy. Portuguese tap water is better than Dutch bottled water. I love our people too, all of them.

However, whenever I express this, I feel like I'm crazy. It's like there's only two kinds of people in this country: those that hate everything about it, and nationalist xenophobes. The people that see the good points of our country are not the ones that hate everything about it, by the way... And I really don't want to be associated with the xenophobes.

Partially, I'm scared that I'll become like them. I don't want to be hateful. It really does seem like the fascistic side of the deal really does have a monopoly on patriotism, though. Not patriotism, I suppose, it really is nationalism, but I find that that's a difference that only matters to the people that already know it, and that's not the everyman.

I saw this other TikTok about how the right has a narrative, and even if the narrative doesn't make sense, it's more than what the left has, so people flock to it in times of need. The right wins because the left fails to convince... And I find that this might be a big issue. I see people talk about how there's a big focus on the bad sides of our history---of which there are many---instead of the good sides. I don't know... I feel like that's a talking point, but if it resonates, then it matters, I feel like. I mean, I know of our country's history, and I still love it. I want to make our country better, to improve it, but it seems that the narrative that appeals to this mysterious time from before when we swam in gold coins like uncle scrooge is what people care about. And of course, it's all the browns in our midst. It's very frustrating...

I don't know. I feel like what I'm saying doesn't make that much sense, but I'm kinda hoping that getting it out might help me wring out some meaning out of this digital rag drenched by my stream-of-consciousness.

I find it really frustrating that Lemmy doesn't let you link posts or comments natively. You can like a comm with ! like in !gondaily@lemm.ee, you can link a user with @ like @gon@lemm.ee, but you can't link a post or a comment. I've looked into it a little, and I get why it's not possible, but it sucks!