Reading Nick Kristof’s claim that “Today, we are all Egyptians,” I thought back to an old column I had written in 2006 that addressed this sort of misguided expression of solidarity with another nation in crisis:

It is ludicrous because, no matter the feelings of goodwill and solidarity, we cannot seriously identify ourselves with another nation, nor can they identify themselves with us, because in so many respects every nation, every people is significantly different in meaningful ways that precludes an identification of any two. The fundamental differences between nations also prevent a ready and reflexive identification of the interests of any two nations on the basis of decent moral outrage at evils perpetrated on another people’s civilians.

When the conflict is an internal political struggle between two groups of people of the same nation, as it is in Egypt, it is even harder to argue that “we are all Egyptians.” The thugs attacking the protesters earlier this week are Egyptians, as are the people who gave them the orders to attack. Those obviously aren’t the Egyptians with whom Kristof wants us to identify. Kristof doesn’t want to be that sort of Egyptian, as they are the ones trying to help Mubarak hang on a little longer, and the purpose of these expressions of solidarity is to declare a side in an ongoing conflict. Certainly, Kristof must assume that the protesters represent the broad majority, and that the supporters of the regime are unrepresentative, but he can’t possibly know that. When both sides in the struggle are Egyptian and they are divided by political goals and interests, it doesn’t tell us very much to declare solidarity with Egyptians. In the end, these expressions of solidarity are sentimental or ideological, and they tend not to mean very much in terms of lending other people anything more than a little moral support, and they are driven by some incessant need to take sides in other nations’ affairs.

More important, these expressions are simply not true. Kristof wants to support the protesters, and he thinks everyone should do likewise, and that’s his prerogative, but what makes his sympathy and solidarity notable is that he is not an Egyptian and never will be. He is identifying with the protesters because he sympathizes with their struggle, and he hopes that they succeed, but like McCain’s meaningless declaration that “we are all Georgians” it implies a degree of identification on our part with another people that simply doesn’t exist. Making these statements gives the misleading impression that “we” are going to do a great deal to help, when most of “us” are not going to do anything. It’s almost presumptuous to claim to belong to another people’s political struggle when “we” don’t have to bear any of the risks or face any of the consequences.

It may also be a mistake to declare support for the protesters before we have any idea what comes of their protests. Burke wrote in his Reflections something that seems most relevant:

I must be tolerably sure, before I venture publicly to congratulate men upon a blessing, that they have actually received one. Flattery corrupts both the receiver and the giver; and adulation is not of more service to the people than to kings. I should therefore suspend my congratulation on the new liberty of France, until I was informed how it had been combined with government; with public force; with the discipline and obedience of armies; with the collection of an effective and well-distributed revenue; with morality and religion; with the solidity of property; with peace and order; with civil and social manners. All these (in their way) are good things too; and, without them, liberty is not a benefit whilst it lasts, and it not likely to continue long. The effect of liberty to individuals is, that they may do what they please: We ought to see what it will please them to do, before we risque congratulations, which may soon be turned into complaints. Prudence would dictate this in the case of separate insulated private men; but liberty, when men act in bodies, is power. Considerate people before they declare themselves will observe the use which is made of power; and particularly of so trying a thing as new power in new persons, of whose principles, tempers, and dispositions, they have little or no experience, and in situations when those who appear the most stirring in the scene may possibly not be the real movers.