Mackenzie Wenner #9

What is private and public in the community? What is the place of nation in your personal life?

Let me start first by addressing the second part of the question, the role of a nation in an individual’s life. Though admittedly not something I’ve thought long and hard on before I would say the difference between a “nation”, and a “country” or a “government” is most clear when viewed from the perspective of this question. The nation impacts the individual in nearly every facet of life but on a subconscious level. Belonging to a nation brings with it an adherence to a set of cultural norms and beliefs that are held deep within a person and play an active role in how we all live out our lives. This is contrasted by the state, which also has a pervasive level of influence on personal choices, though through very different means. An American may aspire to work hard and buy a home, because it makes him a part of a community, and it’s the course he knew his life would take from a very young age. The same man will also likely on most occasions stay reasonably within the speed limit while driving. Though the latter he does not because of a community tradition and deeply held desire to operate a vehicle safely, but rather to avoid a fine (or in the case of Virginia the savage persecution of the state). Such is the place of the nation in one’s personal life, an unending, subconscious list of reminders as to the general course one should take.

As to the boundaries of public and private within the community, I don’t think that’s a question that can be answered on a general level. I think each community decides for itself where do draw the line between public and private assets, be they physical or intellectual. There are communities you can only join by telling your deepest darkest secret, that no outsider knows. Similarly there are communities that demand the physical equivalent, the communal distribution of property. Most communities set a much lower “membership fee” but thinking on this question I would have to posit that every community one can join demands the individual give something up to the group. In our class that might be measured in time and attention. If we all had spent the majority of every class focusing on things for ourselves, like emails, or papers for another class, or online shopping that class would not have worked to produce the community it has. Opinions are shared within our class because they are listened to, and their value is reliant on the attention they are given. I think every community must demand some private asset be given up to the group to function. The test of a worthy community is if it in turn gives a greater value back to the individual.