.BRITISH PATRIOTISM
.
(Comments: tony.papard@btinternet.com)
So Gordon Brown wants us in Britain all to be 'more patriotic' and start waving the British flag. Well, a British Heritage Day, when we celebrate the culture, inventions, etc. we have given the world is fine. However, a jingoistic celebration of our imperialist past and supposed superiority over 'those damn foreigners' is completely the wrong message to be giving out at this time especially. We are now part of the European Union, so surely we should be waving the EU flag and celebrating what unites us in Europe, not harping on about our differences and what makes us 'uniquely British'. What have we done recently to justify this new patriotism - saying 'Yes Sir, whatever you say sir' to some half-baked American President? In defiance of world opinion, joining in an illegal war which has made the world terrorist threat a thousand times worse, and has done very little for the people of Iraq either? Torture is still going on in Iraqi prisons, and now they have a divided country with terrorist bombs going off daily. If we are celebrating 'standing shoulder to shoulder' with the lunatic right which runs the USA perhaps we should be waving the Stars and Stripes? Not that this expresses the views of many of the ordinary American people, who also opposed this illegal war.
So perhaps we are supposed to celebrate 'past glories' like inventing the concentration camps, which Hitler and the Nazis then copied. The colonialism of the British Empire which enslaved and exploited millions. The colonialism which left a complete mess in places like the Indian sub-continent, Cyprus, Palestine, Ireland and, yes, Iraq after we'd interfered and then left. Drawing lines on maps of the Indian sub-continent which had no respect for local religious, national and ethnic sensitivities for instance. Look at how Kashmir is divided between Pakistan and India, a legacy of British rule, or rather, how we divided the colony up before we left it. In Iraq we did the opposite, forcibly and artificially uniting ethnic and religious groups into one country against their wishes, and the chickens are coming home to roost now as the country is on the verge of civil war between Kurds, Sunnis and Shiites. Or Cyprus, where we always wanted a divided island, and in 1974 we got our wish. With thousands of British troops stationed permanently on the island Britain (a supposed guarantor of the island's 1960 Independence Constitution) stood idly by and let first Greece (by means of the fascist Athens junta's coup against President Makarios) and then Turkey invade the island. We now have the 'solution' Britain always advocated for Cyprus - a three way division between Turks, Greeks and the British (the vast occupied military base areas). Or Palestine under the British Mandate when we promised the country to both the Palestinians and the Israelis at the same time, and the result has been war, hatred and bloodshed there ever since. Or Ireland, where we again drew a line on a map and divided the country to give the so-called 'loyalists' an artificial majority in just 6 counties, slicing these off from the rest of the province of Ulster and from the rest of Ireland.
So what else are we going to celebrate - the wars we've fought against Germany perhaps in the last century? The unjust Treaty of Versailles settlement imposed on Germany after the imperialist First World War and which led directly to the rise of Hitler and the Second World War? We then declared war again on Germany in 1939 to defend Poland, and the end result was Poland, Czechoslovakia and the whole of Eastern Europe was under Nazi/Soviet occupation for the next 50 years. Who'd ever trust Britain to defend them again, since Churchill connived in handing over Eastern Europe to the Soviet sphere of influence? He then had the audacity to appear dismayed that 'an Iron Curtain' had descended over Europe cutting the continent in two. Britain, under Churchill, gave its agreement to that Iron Curtain descending, whether we agree with that decision or not, those are the facts. I happen to believe Eastern European Socialism wasn't all bad, but the Poles and Czechs whom Britain promised to liberate from Nazi occupation might not trust us again when in 1945 they found the Soviet dictator Stalin now effectively ruled over them instead of the Nazi dictator Hitler, all with British and American agreement. The continent was carved up between the Soviet Union, USA and UK at Yalta and Potsdam, and the Poles, Czechs, Hungarians and others certainly weren't consulted by the USA or UK, though Soviet-style elections were later held in these countries. As always in wars, the spoils were divided between the victorious powers, so it was hypocritical of Churchill to cry crocodile tears for Eastern Europe 'behind the Iron Curtain' which he'd agreed to.
Well the monarchy is something Gordon Brown apparently wants to celebrate. In an era when more and more Britons are republicans, when the royals are less respected than ever before because of the way many of them behave. When the Queen has to put on a pop concert in Buckingham Palace gardens in order to get the young people to celebrate her 60th jubilee. When the whole undemocratic institution, along with its obscene flaunting of their ill-gotten wealth, is ripe for being swept away in favor of a republic?
We can certainly celebrate our democracy, freedom of speech and other liberties (even though these are being whittled away daily due to the 'terrorist threat' made worse by Bush/Blair's illegal Iraq war) - but these values are held in common with our EU partners. It is time we celebrated the European Union, possibly with a Europe-wide Constitution Day if a new EU Constitution can be drawn up and agreed upon. Let's celebrate what unites us, and peace in Europe, not harp on about what divides us and our jingoistic past. We are all Europeans now, and we should be as proud of that as Americans are proud of their federation.
No, Mr Brown, I don't want to see a Union (Jack) Flag standing alone in every front garden in the country. But I'd gladly welcome an EU and an UN flag alongside a British, English, Scots, Welsh or Cornish flag, emphasizing our national identities and cultures along with our internationalism and our shared democratic values with the rest of the EU.
I'm not saying the Union Flag should be banned or scrapped, but unless representing something uniquely British which we can be proud of (such as hosting the 2012 Olympics, our British cultural heritage, etc.), it should be flown alongside the EU flag because we are now part of that federation, which we must strive to make even more democratic. This is NOT the time to give out the message that the British are better than everyone else. We are 4 nationalities which will soon help to make up the multi-national patchwork of a federal Europe: English, Welsh, Scots and Cornish. (Ireland is a separate country within the EU and should be reunited. Even Northern Ireland is clearly not part of Great Britain. 'United Kingdom of Great Britain AND Northern Ireland' is our country's official title, clearly indicating Northern Ireland is NOT a part of Britain. Incidentally, it's high time we dropped the jingoistic 'Great' in Britain; we don't say 'Great' Germany, 'Great' France, 'Great' USA, so why 'Great' Britain? It's not as if there was really such a place as 'Little' Britain.)
I'm certainly not singing jingoistic, outdated, imperialist anthems like 'Rule Britannia', 'Land of Hope and Glory' and 'God Save The Queen' with their obscene imperialist words about ruling the waves, making us mightier yet and crushing rebellious Scots.
We need to cultivate a European identity, a European citizenship and start saluting the EU flag and standing up for the EU anthem. The same applies to the UN flag and any UN anthem which is composed in future. Internationalism, Peace and Freedom should be what we celebrate, not petty-bourgeois nationalism which has already destroyed the Soviet Union and the Yugoslav federation, and split Czechoslovakia, leading to terrible ethnic conflicts and genocide in some of these places.
Let's be proud of our British inventions and cultural heritage, and by all means display the Union Flag to celebrate these, but we should not engage in jingoistic nonsense about Britain being better than everyone else, certainly not when we seem to take all our orders from an Uncle Sam led by its religious and loony right!
So I'm in favor of a British Heritage day, when we wave the Union Flag to celebrate the culture and inventions we've given the world. But not some jingoistic celebration and glorification of our imperialist past, and maintaining that we are better than all the other states of the EU.