Categories: uncategorized
Date: 05 June 2007 15:24:48
From the people who brought us the Olympics we now have a follow-up.
Two of our Ministers of State want to have a British Day, either as a public holiday or linked to the opening of Parliament. This will supposedly help to unite us into feeling that we are all British.
I definitely don't want to go down the American route of people being refered to by their ethnic origins in everything they do; for example Irish Americans, Italian Americans, Dopey Texan President etc. However what is a British person?
This government has already spent 10 years engendering feelings of separateness in setting up the Scottish, Irish and Welsh governments. They have even caused the English to begin feeling prouder of their Englishness. Now they want us to all feel British as well?
I don't think that, since the Roman or Saxon invasions, there is such a thing as Britishness. Maybe this was an English thing to make us feel more united when we started Empire building, after all they had to rely on us Celts to colonise the new areas of Empire.
We already have pockets of the country where immigrants have crowded together in their groups. Birmingham, Bradford and Southall in London are examples of Asian communities living together in semi-ghettos. Maybe its aimed to make such people feel more "British" and less as outsiders. Yet Britain does not have half the problems that other countries have.
Do we really need to be forced to feel more British? What does it actually mean to feel British?
I've always found that peoples' attitude to me changes when I'm on the Continent if I tell them that I'm Welsh. I have seen French, Germans, Spaniards and Dutch people smile when they hear this. The French were especially welcoming on hearing me say Pay de Galles. People seem to differentiate between the English and the other component elements and, thankfully for us, the English seem to take the flak for the things we do.
Personally I'm going to carry on declaring my Welshness.