When will the BBC be held accountable for their lack of patriotism

The BBC is left wing though. I mean, there's no two ways about it. It's just, taken the "good" with the "bad", it's the most amazing institution and we are so lucky to have it. It's one of the fantastic things about this country we should be grateful for. Sometimes I think people should spend two years away, then they'd realise how lucky they are to live here.

Claig. Your reply to TCNY was spot on.

Climberchick. There is nothing wrong with patrotism, without it we wouldn't have a country would we? Who would have fought Hitler? If we did not have a notion of patrotism? It's not to do with respect either, I certainly don't love all things about this country, I don't have respect for some things that go on here, but I am patriotic, because I love this country, unlike some dimbos on this site!

mathanxiety, that quote from Trevor-Roper is a good one. I'll repeat it for emphasis; (Murdoch) 'aims to moronise and Americanise the population ? wants to destroy our institutions, to rot them with a daily corrosive acid.?

While there are some aspects of the Beeb that can make it its own worst enemy & give fuel to the Murdoch camp, I'll stand up and say that those parroting the 'far-left propoganda (sic) group' line are nothing more than useful idiots or those with a vested commercial interest. Just my opinion LFN (if indeed you are still reading)

Do you feel disrespected by your country?

Appletrees No I was saying that respect for your country is a two way thing and it shouldn't just be automatic. A bit touchy or what

Hitler would have eaten Britain for breakfast, Claig, if he had succeeded in the Battle of Britain, (except for the fact, which is the main fact that emerges from the Table Talk, that he was a vegetarian.) The recording of the dinner conversations was originally conceived as a Nazi propaganda exercise, executed in order to show the depth and breadth of Hitler's knowledge of all aspects of life and the world at large, his love of the German people, and his essential humanity, chatting away with members of his household.

HTR eventually made a fool of himself over the alleged Hitler Diaries, and was criticised early in his career for overstating Hitler's charisma in his book on the last days of the Fuhrer. But he did take Mein Kampf seriously as a statement of Hitler's intentions. The Table Talk book he wrote the introduction broadcasts his basic idea that the essential character of the main actors on the historical stage is what is important in 'moving history along' so to speak, and not any 'isms' or general trends in any given era. History is not a slow moving train crash in other words, according to him. It was not meant to be an espousal of Hitler's essential normality or niceness, his programme, or an endorsement of vegetarianism.

He was right about Murdoch though Murdoch being the alternative to the BBC (in case you're still reading this LFN) ?He aims to moronise and Americanise the population ? wants to destroy our institutions, to rot them with a daily corrosive acid.?

Edward VIII was an idiot, a mischievous meddler, and Churchill was right to keep him out in the cold. He showed no evidence of personal maturity or hint of any critical faculties in his dealings with political leaders. That members of the upper crust (the Mitfords, Mosleys, etc.) fancied themselves as some sort of elite who could still exercise any sort of influence in Britain or in the wider world is well known. It reveals more about them than about the reality of wartime Britain.

Cots = Scots.

Dammit. If you're going to take the piss out of a nation, spell the bloody name right.

Appletrees - Well the Cots DO keep pretending to like the bagpipes, which is maybe not childish, more teenage contrarianism.

Hitler was not anti-British. Read Hugh Trevor-Roper's Hitler's Table Talk. He admired the British and their empire. His favourite film was 'Lives of a Bengal Lancer' and he admired the fact that Britain ruled all of India with so few civil servants. He said the English were Germans, since they were Anglo-Saxons.

He had always said that the ideal alliance would be Britain, Germany and Japan. Britain would rule its global empire with its navy, Germany would be a land power on the Contintent, and Japan in Asia. Hitler made a peace offer in 1940. There were aristocrats in Britain who were seeking peace with Germany, and King Edward VIII was exiled by Churchill. I think that some of the Queen Mother's letters to Lord Halifax have been held back under the 100 year rule.

Hitler was not going to invade Britain at the time of Dunkirk. There have been History Channel programmes which discuss Hitler's 3 day Halt order when German panzer units were 20 miles from the British troops at Dunkirk and had them surrounded. Rommel wanted to press forward but was stopped from doing so.

Really climber. So you think most Scots are awfully childish, along with almost all Singaporeans,Welsh, French, Indians, Irish, etc etc, anyone who supports their side in a sports event, as opposed to the best team etc etc. Don't be so ridiculous.

Patriotism I think of it like kids and adults. You're either of the opinion that respect needs to be earned, or you should respect me just because. I'm the former.

Hitler was most definitely anti-British.

Claig, read a history book. Any history book. Except any by David Irving.

You will find that when Hitler invaded Poland Britain and France declared war on the Third Reich, as Hitler knew they would, and as Britain and France had warned they would. They were not just waiting for a chance to declare war on Hitler. War against Germany was the last thing either Britain or France wanted.

Hitler wanted to conquer Britain. He couldn't because of the existence of the English Channel and the shortcomings of the Luftwaffe, and sheer luck going the way of the British in the Battle of Britain -- the Battle of Britain was Hitler throwing everything he had against the RAF in an attempt to conquer Britain, not just for the heck of it.... He could not have destroyed Britain at Dunkirk. His forces were stretched too far as they had been successful beyond their wildest projections in in their invasion of Belgium and northern France. Invasion of Britain was never on the cards at the Dunkirk juncture.

For such a patriot, you seem to know very little about what your patriotic feelings are about.

And read something about the Catholic Church that is not authored by Dan Brown.

Have you read some of the Fatima's Secret stuff and heard some of the priests on that? It is pretty frightening. Isn't the Pope supposed to be the temporal ruler, I can't remember the exact terminology.

And in light of the blind alley that nationalism, or 'patriotism', has led the world into not once but twice, I hope you realise the Catholic Church got it right wrt nationalism, i.e. that it is neither natural nor a good thing. The RC Church wants people to worship God, alone, and have no other gods but him (as in the Ten Commandments), acknowledge that all people are the children of god, created by God, and equal to each other as such (hence religion-based rejection of racism, always a temptation when you start categorising people into different races, human nature being flawed and fallen, etc.)

(Not 'rule the world' or 'owe allegiance to the Church' btw.)

But Hitler was constantly trying to do a deal with Britain. He was not anti-British. He could have destroyed Britain at Dunkirk, but he didn't do it, because he thought that Britain would eventually do a deal with Germany.

He didn't declare war on Britain and France, they declared war on Germany. He did want to destroy Russia because they were communists and were a potential enemy of the Nazis.

Well, you can think what you want about Nazi intentions, but they wanted to carve up the world among themselves and the Japanese, and would probably have gone on to absorb Japan, certainly Italy and Spain if that became necessary -- which it wouldn't have if they had caused no trouble. They created a network of vassal states in eastern Europe and pushed east into the Soviet Union with the intention of wiping out the Slavs and colonising European Russia and beyond. Had they succeeded we would not exist. Our ancestors would have died shovelling salt in Siberia.

No I don't think the Nazis did want world domination. The Nazis didn't care that the Italian fascists were patriotic for Italy, and Franco was patriotic for Spain. In fact they wanted that, because they believed only in the nation and not in internationalism.

Yes of course patriots were duped by their leaders. That is the way of the world. I think love is innate, and patriotism is love of country and I think that as it is a form of love, it is also innate, and stems from love of family and ultimately from love of self.

Thanks, I thought that that is what the Syllabus of Errors would say. You are right, it says that because Catholicism is a universal, international thing. It is a religion similar to Marxism in that it wants dominion over the whole world. For the same reasons as Marxism, it doesn't want people to have national loyalties, it wants people of all nations to owe greater allegiance to the Church than their nation.

Did the Nazis have no intention of world domination? Or was that just the cynical leaders while the common or garden Nazis who did the actual killing of millions were fundamentally 'patriots'? Again, if all the Marxist foot soldiers are just the dupes of the rulers, how are all the 'patriots' not just the dupes of theirs? You keep on insisting that patriotism is something innate but you have provided no example that cannot be explained by some other force entirely.

The Syllabus of Errors considered nationalism an Error, an opium of the people if you will, a substitute for religion, a form of idolatry. It did not consider nationalistic feeling or sentiment to be something good or innate. But then the Catholic Church is an international organisation dedicated to its global mission, international peace under the guidance of the Holy Church, etc., so of course it would be fundamentally opposed to nationalism/ love of one's country/ patriotism/ 'my country right or wrong' etc.

Yes, interesting about Collins. I don't know as much of his history as you do.

'The Marxists I have known believe every word of what they preach; their belief seems to me to be almost religious in nature.'
yes I agree with that. I am not talking about ordinary Marxists. They do sincerely believe in what they do and they believe that they are right. I am really talking about the cynical leaders at the top. They don't believe it, they are in it for power and they use Marxism to get power.

You couldn't substitute Nazis, Chinese, Indians, Pakistanis, Americans, Russians, Vikings, North Koreans, Iranians, British Imperialists, Spanish conquistadors, Afrikaaners in terms of denying the patriotism of other countries. It is only the Marxists who seek to do that. That is because they are international socialists who seek to rule the whole world, whereas the others are national and do not seek to rule the whole world.

I agree that patriotism also has a dark side, because it can easily be used to manipulate people, and of course many wars are fought for the interests of the powerful and people are tricked that they are fighting for their country. The powerful tricksters know that patriotism is natural and they try to turn it to their advantage.

What did the Syllabus of Errors say about nationalism?

Michael Collins was assassinated because he had reneged on what his organisation (the Irish Republican Brotherhood) stood for, according to the party of his assassins. The idea of a Republic, with all power derived from the will of the people, without a monarch even as titular head of state granting power from the top down, was important -- an example of an abstract notion having real and concrete effects.

The IRB was a small secret society dedicated to armed insurrection operating within the wider framework of Irish nationalism. It was respected and at the same time feared by many other groups and societies working towards similar goals in Ireland a the time. Operationally speaking, it was a revenge killing and a very important blow struck against the Treatyite party in the Civil War that was then raging in Ireland. Eliminating Michael Collins meant that the IRB (a fundamentally undemocratic group) ceased to be the huge threat to other groups that it was while he lived.

WRT Climategate -- yes there was overstatement of the case, but that is not to say that the Bush administration had it right and there is no such thing as global warming. Certain facts about our impact on the planet and its atmosphere remain and must be recognised and dealt with.

The Marxists I have known believe every word of what they preach; their belief seems to me to be almost religious in nature. They tend to be humans, and get their beliefs about their individual communities, as well as their motivation whether pro patria or pro Marx from the same place that anyone else gets theirs from -- you can't argue that it was only the Soviet citizens in WW2 who, having been indoctrinated into Marxism, were then fed a handy patriotic lie in order to get them to fight for Marxist world domination, while in every other 'nation' no such cynicism ever existed on the part of the ruling classes, and the citizens felt some natural upsurge of their innate patriotism. Either all humans are capable of being manipulated by a carefully crafted patriotic narrative or none are.

'Marxists seek to rob and deny other countries of their patriotism, in order to weaken them, but they are patriotic for their own country in order to strengthen it.'

You could substitute any other proper noun here for 'Marxists' and it would hold true -- Nazis, Chinese, Indians, Pakistanis, Americans, Russians, Vikings, North Koreans, Iranians, British Imperialists, Spanish conquistadors, Afrikaaners. Whether they are 'patriotic' in order to strengthen or fearful of the consequences of weakness is debatable.

I was brought up as a Catholic and maybe it's what you could call a 'sturdy indefensible' aspect of how I go through my life. It's certainly not scientific or logical. I was happy to accept what I was told and taught about my religion; others in my family did not and do not. If I had been born Jewish I might keep kosher and worry about eating anything my sister cooked in her kitchen. (I may have made up for my quiescence in this regard by an excess of contrariness in other areas...) I am the oldest child, maybe that has something to do with it... I can see in patriotism something of the same dynamic and suspect the same capacity to manipulate opinion may be in effect. Religious or ritualistic practice in its most rudimentary form predates any evidence of patriotism though. I don't think the two can be placed on the same level (thinking of the Syllabus of Errors of 1864 and what it had to say about nationalism, which had only in the late 19th century come under the papal radar.)

I didn't say the BBC were Marxists or unpatriotic. Are you arguing backwards from your finishing point?

Marxists don't believe what they preach. That is why, of course, the Soviet Union was patriotic, just like every other country, because they too know that it is natural and needed for cohesion against an enemy. Marxists seek to rob and deny other countries of their patriotism, in order to weaken them, but they are patriotic for their own country in order to strengthen it.

Michael Collins was assassinated because the assassins didn't think he was patriotic enough. But in his earlier days, they all thought he was patriotic.

Plato's world is the world of thought and wisdom, not opinion. You are a catholic and on many threads you defend Catholicism. It could be argued that that is a world of opinion and is not scientific or even logical. Plato applied logic and reason, not opinion, in order to get nearer to the truth.

You say, about science, 'It's a world where whims and sentiment cannot be substituted for evidence or facts or solid argument.'
Was that true of what went on in Climategate?

'People who aren't patriotic may have swallowed a Marxist propaganda line.'

Just coming back to the idea you have that Marxism and patriotism are mutually incompatible, and thinking of the Soviet experience in WW2 -- but nah, there's no point arguing or putting forth any sort of evidence-based points here. They just sink into the wooly, marshmallowey-ness, never to be read for all I know, certainly never to be addressed.

Michael Collins is loved by many Irish people, but reviled by many too, and he was both loved and reviled during his lifetime, by many Irish people -- Loyalists or Unionists for being a guerilla fighter, and after the Treaty, by Republicans for selling out the Republic. That's why he was assassinated during the Civil War that followed the Treaty.

Plato's world is the world of opinion. The world of science and mathematics is still alive and kicking, and still seeking truth, based on fact, painstaking built on evidence and well-tested, and testable, theses and hypotheses. It's not a simple world. It's a world where whims and sentiment cannot be substituted for evidence or facts or solid argument.

Yours is the world of seeing a phenomenon and perhaps identifying it correctly, and proceeding, on the basis that your perceptions are just as valid as the results of any scientific inquiry, to argue backwards from your finish point. "I (think) I can identify patriotism and I think it is a natural and good thing, therefore Marxists, who are Bad, cannot be patriots, and therefore anyone who is not a patriot must be a Marxist or under the spell of Marxism. And the BBC are therefore Marxists and therefore they are unpatriotic and also Bad".

Plato's world is the world of truth, since that is the objective of philosophy, to understand the truth.

Then you are in the world of Plato, and not the climatologists in East Anglia.