Regardless of a person’s status or place in the hierarchy within a nation, to call a change of their citizenship a scandal is an exaggeration in a real sense, if not a scandal in itself.

Within this globalized world, changing from one citizenship to another for whatever reason should be seen as a usual and common occurrence.

In fact, it is all part of exercising a person’s basic human rights and their freedom to decide their fate.

So we should see the case of former Miss Indonesia Kristania Virginia Besouw’s decision to change her Indonesian citizenship to American as a normal case, rather an extraordinary occurrence — much less a scandal.

She has the right to change her citizenship even if it is to get a financially better life.

As pragmatic as it gets, this has nothing to do with her lack of nationalism.

She probably just wants to feel secure and she sees Indonesia as being unable to provide it.

This case should even be seen as a criticism of our failure to provide security and prosperity for our own citizens.

This a quid-pro-quo world. This incident should act as a warning for us all over the waning of love for the country and the nation — because we rarely have anything to feel proud of as Indonesians.

We all should see this as a challenge to make Indonesia better and greater, to make us proud and grow the love we have for the country, rather then blasting those who probably only want to seek a better life.

We should now bury a sense of narrow-minded nationalism of who can the shout loudest to criticize Kristania while doing nothing for the betterment of Indonesia and its people.

The post Editorial: Don’t Criticize Those Seeking a Better Life appeared first on The Jakarta Globe.

Source: The Jakarta Globe