[empath75]

> Why do certain people think that the tendency towards global governance and the abolition of states, ethnicity (i.e. actual diversity) is a good thing?

Because the rise of ethnic-based nationalism lead to two world wars that killed millions of people and included several genocides?

[oh_sigh]

I get WWII, but WWI was ethno-nationalism driven?

[eesmith]

You mean the war triggered by the Yugoslav nationalist who assassinated the heir to the throne of Austria-Hungary, with the goal of having Austria-Hungary cede the South Slav provinces to Yugoslavia?

Quoting https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Austria-Hungary :

> Austria-Hungary was a great power but it contained a large number of ethnic groups that sought their own nation. It was ruled by a coalition of two powerful minorities, the Germans and the Hungarians. Stresses regarding nationalism were building up, and the severe shock of a poorly handled war caused the system to collapse.

There is no clear single cause of WWI. Quoting now from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Causes_of_World_War_I :

> [Historians] look at such factors as political, territorial and economic conflicts, militarism, a complex web of alliances and alignments, imperialism, the growth of nationalism, and the power vacuum created by the decline of the Ottoman Empire.

The Ottoman Empire, as a reminder, carried out genocide against several ethnic groups during WWI.

That Wikipedia page also points out:

> Senior German generals such as Helmuth von Moltke talked in apocalyptic terms about the need for Germans to fight for their existence as a people and culture. MacMillan states: "Reflecting the Social Darwinist theories of the era, many Germans saw Slavs, as especially Russia as the natural opponent of the Teutonic races".

and further says:

> Bénézet's book The World War and What was Behind It (1918) blamed on German aggression combined with perceived threats to the traditional social order from radicals and ethnic nationalists.

[observation]

I see that view as a form of revisionism. Was it ethnic based nationalism, or was it ethnic based nationalism and political ideology and perverse financial incentives and class warfare and... seemingly countless other things.

[zo1]

Perhaps we need to look at it from a meta-perspective then? I'd argue that it was caused by the existence, and ultimate subservience of people to, a state. Large states too, where power was allowed to accumulate, develop and weaponize itself in the form of an army.