In
1901,
G. K. Chesterton published his first book of essays called
The Defendant. In it, he wrote:
'My country, right or wrong,' is a thing that no patriot would think of saying except in a desperate case. It is like saying,
'My mother, drunk or sober.'
Governments like patriots. Governments like
the kind of patriots that are willing to support and carry out almost any of the governments' policies. Governments like the kind of patriots that require only superficial justifications as to why
their policies are just.
However, this assumes that love of country is the same as love of the politicians that control that country. What does love of country really mean? Love of the land? Love of the culture? Love of a certain set of ideals? Love of the people?
In the case of
military dictatorships that are willing to kill off large segments of the population in order to push a certain ideology, love of the government and love of the ideology come into conflict with love of the people.
In the case of the American Revolution, what many people would call "patriots" today were instead called Loyalists and Tories. "Patriot" was reserved as a label for those who loved the country's people and were willing to defend them from the actions of the government and various officials therein.