This is a voter group that needs another look at some point. Cliff, I know you are working on Japan, ministers, and some other things as well right now, I’m not advocating this be an immediate priority, but something to look at at some point.
Patriots in this game are represented in a very negative light. Possibly the most telling thing about how this game sees patriots is the fact that low racial tension reduces patriot membership. Right there I know exactly what kind of people you’re referring to, and such people would self identify as patriots. That said, the kind of people who want to “keep THOSE kinds of people out of MY country!” and the people who are happy to see a well funded space program are not the same people. Some overlap might occur, but we’re talking about a Venn diagram here, not a single circle.
I’m not honestly sure where to even start here, but patriots need a re-build at some point.
I will point out that having a country flooded by a minority group, such as refugees, has historically led to increased nationalism and a type of patriotism. I do think that the voter group could do with a second look tho.
They overlap in the same way I feel like one religious person might hate abortion law and another might not care as much. This is fundamentally how the game represents voter groups, and I don’t believe it’s an issue.
My issue with the group is it’s just poorly named. Patriots are more akin to Nationalists. Something I feel Democracy 4 misses the ball on is representing the Globalism vs Nationalism debate. I think amending Patriots would definitely be a good step forward in addressing that.
I’m quite sympathetic to this, and feel the same could be said of religion. While of course there can’t be perfection, the voter groups ought to be able to slide into different kinds of states, in this case a theoretically enlightened, liberal patriot.
I might advocate that racial tension be relegated to situations caused by immigration difficulty, poverty, or advocation of racist measures by the state (profiling, cruel and punitive anti-immigration, aggressive foreign policy etc), rather than being wedded to voter groups, which themselves ought not be portrayed as inherently bigoted or unreasonable.
Further, a handful of inputs from traditionally liberal or left-wing policies pleasing Patriots wouldn’t go amiss. Plenty of American patriots are heavily libertarian, and there have been times when communist states have been brimming with socialist patriotism.
I think a good solution to the Patriots vs Racism problem would be to make it so that Ethnic Minorities are supportive of policies such as Immigration (even though evidence exists to suggest migrants are more oppositional to migration than native populations, at least in UK and US polling), and oppositional to Military Policy, whereas Patriots are the reverse, and as such the scenario runs as if Patriots and Ethnic Minorities are oppositional, which they can often be said to be, but without the need to condemn Patriots as racists.
That doesn’t prevent certain situations, Far Right Rally for instance, increasing Patriot Membership while also increasing Racial Tensions, but I don’t think it’s fair to map Patriots as if they were Neo-Nazis when you could just have Neo-Nazi events contribute to Patriots.