What is C21st patriotism?
by Max Wind-Cowie
Today Demos launches a new report on pride and patriotism in 21st Century Britain. The impulse for this research was two-fold: one, we wanted to know whether patriotism and civic or national pride are important to policy and whether the hand-wringing about their perceived decline is justified; and two, we wanted to know what people identify with about Britain and what makes them feel proud of our country. The answer to question one was an emphatic 'yes'. Polling revealed that people overwhelmingly want more opportunities to express their pride in Britain, that they feel we are less proud of our collective self than were our forebears and - crucially - that greater levels of patriotism and pride in individuals leads to greater volunteering, community engagement and interpersonal trust. To question two the answers were more nuanced.
British people accept a very traditional narrative of what it means to be patriotic. They don’t believe that it means worshiping the flag, rejoicing in the Queen and singing Jerusalem at the Proms. Unfortunately, for most people, these rituals and fetishes of 'Britishness' ring hollow. They don't loathe them, they're not scared of them, but neither do they evoke the sentiment of pride.
Even less appealing to our focus groups and poll respondents were 'Brownite' notions of patriotism. People pooh-poohed the idea of patriotism as somehow bound up in what a nice, liberal, tolerant bunch we are. They're not proud of Britain because we're a democracy – because so are lots of other countries – and, importantly, because to be proud of Britain for that reason feels too conditional, too contrived and too temporary. Instead, people turn to the fabric of daily British life to find inspiration for patriotism. They are proud of our culture of volunteering and social action, they are proud of our manners and our respect for each other, they are proud of our politeness and our eccentricities. It's behaviour, more than either institutions or symbols, that the British take pride in. And this feeling was backed up by when and why people feel shame, too. People are embarrassed of Britain when they see British people behaving badly abroad or when they see rudeness and callousness on the street. Patriotism, it seems, stems from the littler things in life rather than either the grandiose claims of history or the semi-mystic symbols of nation.
This all gives us great cause for hope. Because the things that British people are proud of are things that British people are, genuinely, good at. At least 66 per cent of British people volunteered in the last 12 months. We saw the kind of social action that inspires patriotism when hundreds took their brooms to the streets in the wake of the summer riots. And whatever else may be in decline, we do still queue! From our research, it seems, that the more we see of ourselves, the prouder we become.
Steven
I am a British citizen and apparently my passport says I am also an EU citizen. I've also served in the British Army. So much for political constructs, what am I really:
I am English, I am part of the English Nation.
A Nation is a large aggregate of people united by common descent, culture and language - regardless of whether they hold the territory they exist in - for example the Cheyenne Nation exists in the USA.
The English are a ethnic group - just like any other - indeed are recognised as such by no less authority than the United Nations. Furthermore the UN recognises England as the homeland of the English Nation.
Please note: it is unlawful under international law to interfere with the identity of any ethnic group.
Racially the English are Northern European, a 'Caucasian sub-race established sometime during the Last Glacial Maximum' - that's about 25,000 years ago.
All the ancient tribes which make up the English genotype lived within a 300 mile radius of each other - hence the R1b gene.
The English ethnic group is well over a thousand years old and pre-dates the indigenous New Zealand Maori.
Denying the English an identity for reasons rooted in the fashionable ideology of the political class is profoundly immoral. It is also the beginnings of genocide.
So Max, you could say my patriotism has well and truly 'faded into nationalism', to quote Brendan. Quite frankly I don't care what it's called the English are obligated to survive as a Nation.
If it takes a lifetime to ensure that the birthright given me by my ancestors continues then, like the warriors at the Battle of Maldon I'll stand with my kinsmen, and fight to the last.
Some of us feel it's the end of days so it's about survival, not patriotism or nationalism or any other 'ism'. If you don't understand kinship or prefer some other relationship that's up to you however, it is the common folk who rely on kinship because it lifts us up, sustains and costs us nothing. That is the way it was in centuries past when the ruling class from the Normans onwards abused English peasants. And if that wasn't bad enough we now have a political class who are bent on eradicating our identity.
An organization called English Witness collects information on politicians who either deny our existence or conspire with others to alter our identity for political or economic reasons. Increments to genocide are punishable under international law and we are looking forward to the day when the first case is presented at the UN. The trashing of our identity and therefore our heritage is unprecedented. A properly constructed psychological impact assessment performed on the English Nation is at the planning stage, thus
English schoolchildren will be asked about their education, in particular any anxiety* about their race or ethnicity after being told their ancestors were responsible for the North Atlantic slave trade.
* which can lead to self-loathing and even psychosis
There are a number other questions but I'm not inclined to reveal any more. For security reasons EW does not appear on the internet.
In a democracy it's the people who change the government, not the other way round.
Dr Johnson
"Patriotism is the last refuge of a scoundrel" - Dr Samuel Johnson
malcolm.rasala
"At least 66 per cent of British people volunteered in the last 12 months" What an absolute and blatant lie.
Think about this lie coming from someone with 'Wind' in his name. At least 66% of babies volunteered? They are British. At least 66% of say over 70 year olds volunteered? At least 66% of the hospitalized volunteered? They are British. At least 66% of the Royal Family volunteered? What on £30+ million a year we give them? At least 66% of captains of industry volunteered? When did they have the time? At least 66% of think-tank wonks and politicians volunteered?. In your dreams. At least 66% of university students volunteered? What have you been drinking!!! At least 66% of 2 to 18 year olds volunteered. What planet is this thinker-twanker living on?
How Mr Wind-Cowie can blatantly so lie like this indicates the appallingly low level of his intelligence and his complete lack of morality. As the Bard said "And spit upon him...he lies and lies and lies"
Reality
Steven go have a DNA test. See how English you are. What is the betting your blood contains the blood of many nationalities. There is no pure nation on the face of the earth. People have been interbreeding for thousands of years. You need to go back to school and study your history. You are spouting nonsense.
Mark Macho
Steven, in truth I know of no one denying the English an identity.
And English people have been dominant in the British polity.
The very word English comes from the Angles who were from somewhere else. And they defeated resident peoples who were just as convinced of their identity and rights as you are. What about their
patriotism? Or is your patriotism more patriotic?
I would say the most durable pride of patriots lies in what outsiders admire about them. Most people and peoples love themselves.
But if others find something to admire in you that means you have
touched on something a bit more universal. The English are rather insistent on the notion that others find them admirable. And protest
this rather often.
The real compliment is not praise by oneself but imitation by others. But be careful of accuracy. Some think democracy was invented here. How untrue is that?
The English have many great accomplishments to their credit. One of them is some real examples of clear thinking that have changed the world. Let's see that tradition is maintained. You can demand others consider you clever and good, but it is better to really be clever and good, and so much so that others cannot fail to notice.
Read Mein Kampf. 50,000,000 people died because of its excesses
and we are just getting out of the hole it dug for us. Being English is great. But there are other people in the world too. You and your
relatives are probably alive because of some of their inventions.
Liking others is not opposed to liking oneself. It is part of it.
Mark Macho
PS Steven, before you go on about the Normans they were just
Vikings who settled in France as the Angles were Vikings who settled in
Denmark and Germany, if it is even proper to mention such modern
countries and languages to refer to such a distant time.
Wes
This is only being asked because globalization reduces nations and states to ghosts of their former selves as the worlds connections and flows change and grow.
I used to say this as a youth.. "i love being part of a union, but there is f-all great about britain", and as an adult, i see no reason to change that thinking.
cnawan
As we've opened the topic up to the entire English diaspora I might as well chime in from 'Australia's Sideburn'.
I'm ethnically English, Scottish, Welsh and French, but culturally Kiwi. As such I can certainly relate to the politeness and volunteering aspects - they seem to have stuck with us for two centuries. I don't think there could be a better foundation for making friends with strangers. Perhaps you could sum it up as 'Don't be a jerk, and remember to share'.
I don't feel that my neighbour's ethnic identity limits my own. Foreign language TV shows do not threaten me. I like that Maori and Pasifika culture make New Zealand rather unique in the world. I like sharing the best aspects of myself, my ancestry and my culture with other people and I seek out the same in return.
I don't want to feel exceptional - being part of a global community is enough for me.
ps. Rift Valley. 10,000 humans. Any challenge kinda looks like cake compared to that.
pps. Maori DNA was tracked back along the route of the Polynesian diaspora to a seaside village in Korea. Issues of ethnic longevity kind of depend on where and when you draw the borders I guess.
Tory Pride & Patriotism in Practice
From the New York Times
LONDON — No matter what happens at the European summit meeting on the euro in Brussels that begins Thursday, Britain is sure to lose.
Prime Minister David Cameron said that he would protect Britain's interests in Europe.
There is looming recognition at 10 Downing Street that if the euro falls, Britain will sink along with everyone else. But if Europe manages to pull itself together by forging closer unity among the 17 countries that use the euro, then Britain faces being ever more marginalized in decisions on the Continent.
Many Europeans have been irritated by British Conservatives’ quiet satisfaction throughout the crisis with the decision not to join the euro (the United Kingdom ostentatiously kept its currency, the pound), particularly when juxtaposed with the panic over Britain’s inability to have any significant impact on Europe’s biggest crisis since the end of the cold war.
“Germany is the unquestioned leader of Europe,” said Charles Grant, director of the Center for European Reform. “France is definitely subordinate to Germany, and Britain has less influence than at any time I can recall.”
Of particular concern here is the health of Britain’s financial industry, a vital economic engine at a time of slowing growth and deep cuts in government spending, which is seen to be vulnerable to new European regulations that could hurt British competitiveness in global markets.
Despite all that is at stake, Prime Minister David Cameron’s coalition government looks doomed to be cast in the role of impotent bystander, torn between anti-Europe forces and European leaders’ moves toward greater fiscal integration on the Continent — with or without Britain.
On Wednesday, Mr. Cameron told a fractious Parliament that his main goal in Brussels was to “seek safeguards for Britain” and “protect our own national interest” by resisting measures like a proposed financial transaction tax. But such Britain-centric rhetoric has annoyed the brokers of Europe’s future, Chancellor Angela Merkel of Germany and President Nicolas Sarkozy of France, who are trying to find a way to save the euro while imposing legally binding fiscal discipline on the Continent’s floundering southern economies.
They have not been shy about expressing their frustration. Just six weeks ago, after Mr. Cameron tried to inject himself into talks about the euro, Mr. Sarkozy said bluntly, “You have lost a good opportunity to shut up.” He later added: “We are sick of you criticizing us and telling us what to do. You say you hate the euro and now you want to interfere in our meetings.”
Steven Fielding, director of the Center for British Politics at the University of Nottingham, said: “Cameron might sound off to look good to his backbenchers, but in Europe, he hasn’t got much to negotiate with. It’s been made clear that France and Germany can do whatever the hell they like and Britain can say yes or no, but it doesn’t matter, since they’ll do it anyway.”
The paradox of this is that plans for tighter integration among the 17 euro zone countries are at the same time destined to create greater divisions within Europe — divisions between countries that use the euro and those that do not, and divisions within the euro zone itself, depending on the health and importance of the various economies. A two-, three-, four- and even five-tier Europe could possibly emerge.
“The markets have defined who are the good guys and who are the bad guys, and their interest rates are in many ways the manifestation of this,” said Alexander Stubb, Finland’s minister for European affairs. “When we look at future E.U. rules, it is the triple-A countries that are running the show.”
The political price of Britain’s self-proclaimed exceptionalism was made clear with a vengeance to Mr. Cameron on Wednesday, when he was pounded from all sides in a raucous session in the House of Commons. Fractious Europe-hating Conservative backbenchers called for him to stand firm on Europe, to “show bulldog spirit,” in a “resolute and uncompromising defense of British national interests,” as one legislator, Andrew Rosindell, put it.
Trying to placate them, the prime minister pledged not to sign anything that did not contain “British safeguards.”
Meanwhile, should the Europeans in the euro zone “go ahead with a separate treaty” that leaves out the noneuro countries, Mr. Cameron explained, “then clearly that is not a treaty that Britain would be signing or would be amending.” However, he said, he would still retain “some leverage” over the process.
“The more the euro zone countries ask for, the more we will ask for in return,” he said. But France and Germany have already made it abundantly clear that they will go ahead with their plans for the euro zone without regard to the needs or interests of Britain.
The explosive debate in Britain, while never welcome, comes at an unusually inopportune time for Mr. Cameron. The so-called special relationship with the United States is not looking all that special right now, and enormous cuts in defense spending are making it hard for the British military to maintain its status as America’s right hand.
The austerity budget is fraying at the edges, amid strikes and protests over layoffs and rising fees. Growth has been slowing, despite Mr. Cameron’s insistence that businesses would pick up the pace when it became clear that the government’s finances were sound. And now Britain looks to be in an unusually poor position to defend its interests in Europe.
Members of the Labour opposition lost no time exploiting what they saw as Mr. Cameron’s weakness on the issue.
“Six weeks ago, he was promising his backbenchers a handbagging for Europe, and now he’s just reduced to hand-wringing,” the Labour leader, Ed Miliband, told Parliament, as his party members whooped their approval. “The problem for Britain is that at that most important European summit for a generation, that matters hugely for businesses up and down the country, the prime minister is simply left on the sidelines.”
Even more worryingly for the government, several prominent Conservatives, including the cabinet minister in charge of Northern Ireland, Owen Paterson, broke ranks with the party line and said flatly that Mr. Cameron should make good on what they called his promise to hold a national referendum on any proposed European treaty changes. With much of Britain in the anti-Europe camp, the no side would surely prevail in such a vote.
Mrs. Merkel has said that she would like any treaty changes to be approved by the entire European Union, so in theory Britain could exercise a veto. But Germany and France have also said they will make changes in the way the euro zone alone operates, if that is the only way to defend the common currency.
Most dangerous to Mr. Cameron was the unwelcome intervention of the mayor of London, Boris Johnson, a potential wild-card rival for the Conservative leadership. Mr. Johnson, who is perhaps Britain’s most popular politician, enjoys injecting himself into questions of foreign policy when the spirit moves him.
If Britain was asked to sign a treaty creating “a very dominant economic government” across Europe, he told BBC radio, then Mr. Cameron should veto it. “And if we felt unable to veto it, I certainly think that it should be put to a referendum,” he said. He added that in rescuing the euro, there was a danger of “saving the cancer, not the patient.”
Mr. Cameron says he has pledged to call a referendum on any treaty that would transfer more power from Britain to Europe. None of the current possibilities features such a treaty, he said, so there is no cause for a referendum.
The other political pressure on Mr. Cameron, of course, comes from the unique challenge of a coalition government with partners who disagree on many issues, including Europe. This puts him and his deputy prime minister, Nick Clegg, a Liberal Democrat, in tough spots for equal but opposing reasons.
“Nick Clegg has party activists who don’t like the idea of the coalition and don’t like many of the things it has done, and they’re the most Europhile of the three main parties,” Mr. Fielding of the Center for British Politics said. “And David Cameron has on his back benches people who don’t like the idea of the coalition and don’t like many of the things it has done, and they’re the most Euroskeptic. It’s a tricky position for them all to be in.”
Brendan Caffrey
What is missing here is the possibility that patriotism might well mean different things to different parts of Britain.
Also, there is no discussion of how patriotism fades into nationalism, not only in Scotland, but also Wales, Cornwall and Northern Ireland.
A critic of the idea of patriotism might say today, how will my patriotic feelings survive if I am faced with a real fear of job insecurity?
Please see my blog at:
whyworktoday2967.wordpress.com/