to ask whether you are "patriotic"

[textingdisaster]

and what that word means to you?

Tristram Hunt (on Newsnight yesterday and in the context of the Emily Thornberry tweet) said: "we should also be very clear that we are hugely in favour in the Labour Party of people expressing pride in their national identity and national symbols."

So I am wondering what "national identity" and "national symbols" and "expressing pride in them" (or not) mean to different people...

I'm welsh. Being patriotic is like breathing here. From nursery school onwards. I rather like it!

I don't think the UK has a national identity any longer. It's too fragmented. First you have Scotland Wales England and Northern Ireland. Then you have the north south divide. Then you have an unelected head of state.

Then you have an unelected head of state. I was naively thinking that this unelected head of state is a huge part of the british identity....
And seeing the love you have for elected head of state, I would not give it much weight...

I am patriotic but only as a Scot. I've never felt British and feel no ties to England, Wales or NI.

No, I'm not patriotic. It's a complete accident of birth and I can't stand flag waving jingoism.

I do feel lucky to have been born here however. The NHS and decent telly.

No, not at all.
I happen to live in this country because I happen to have been born in this country to parents who happen to have been born in this country.

I don't in all honesty see what there is in a series of random chances to be proud of, or patriotic about. Certainly I can have no sense of pride - I did not achieve my birth in the uk through my hard work and effort.

I live here, right now. In the future I intend to relocate. When I do, I'll live happily there and not be proud of it either. Nor will I remember my green fields with misty eyed pride. I don't believe we currently have a world any of us have any right to be proud of. I'll just be getting on with my life as best I can.

I don't even know how patriotic feels. I'm not proud of the uk. I don't feel proud to have been born here. There are things I am happy about and things I am unhappy about. I just go about my business. I'm not really sure what else there is.

I suppose I am, yes.

I may have been born here by accident but from the moment I was born into the country, I became knitted into the fabric of it. I am in awe of and respectful of some of the brilliant institutions and people who walked this land before I did and shaped where and who I am. I am likewise mindful of the darker side of our shared history and the lessons it has taught us. Some days I feel quite alone in this, especially politically.

I am English and ultimately, hope to live in Scotland. I am also tied to how British I am. England is my home and its history and geography have shaped who my family is and how I have developed. I do want people to seize with pride the real elements of patriotism in order to share what we have and who we are with everybody. And that's not a flag or a thinly-veiled mistrust of anything outside of who we are; its an acknowledgement of the rich tapestry of Britain. Celebrate the good bits, learn from the bad and don't use it for your own nefarious means.

The brilliant Show Of Hands song 'Roots' has always summed it up for me. And then the bloody EDL started playing it.

Lucky, yes, and grateful to have been born somewhere we are relatively safe and relatively free.
Patriotic in the sense of "feeling, expressing, or inspired by love for one's country" (dictionary definition), probably not. I try not to be. Patriotic can lead to all kinds of trouble.