Barack Obama is gravely concerned over the amount of patriotism he has seen since leaving the White House. And while on a trip to Indonesia over the 4th of July weekend, the former president said there was a better way for true progress.

“It’s been clear for a while that the world is at a crossroads. At an inflection point,” Obama said in Jakarta, one of his childhood homes. “If we don’t stand up for tolerance and moderation and respect for others, if we begin to doubt ourselves and all that we have accomplished, then much of the progress that we have made will not continue.”

Obama then criticized the political divisions across the world:

“What we will see is more and more people arguing against democracy, we will see more and more people who are looking to restrict freedom of the press, and we’ll see more intolerance, more tribal divisions, more ethnic divisions, and religious divisions and more violence."

And warned against too much patriotism:

“We start seeing a rise in sectarian politics, we start seeing a rise in an aggressive kind of nationalism, we start seeing both in developed and developing countries an increased resentment about minority groups and the bad treatment of people who don’t look like us or practice the same faith as us.”

Obama added that “pluralism and tolerance and openness and rule of law” are qualities shared by the U.S. and Indonesia.

“Let’s face it, if people do not show respect and tolerance, eventually you have war and conflict. Sooner or later societies break down,” Obama said.

Brought to you by the guy who never wanted to appear too nationalistic:

Sources: The Guardian, Bloomberg