To want to tell old school friend she’s being thick?

[StillCoughingandLaughing]

I won’t, because I haven’t seen her in 20 years and she’d think I’d gone barmy, but I really, really want to.

She’s just shared this poem on Facebook. For a start, most of it is total nonsense. Take pride in being ENGLISH, yet wave the Union Jack?! Kids don’t learn Shakespeare any more? Since when? And kids never did learn Milton or Shaw at school - I didn’t cover Shaw until ‘A’ Level or Milton until degree level. I’d put money on her not knowing who they even were.

But this isn’t what annoys me most of all. What really gets my goat is this: Where does this true patriot, misty-eyed for the days when we all sat around discussing Saint George and Agincourt whilst eating Yorkshire pudding, live?

Texas.

Thank you for making me laugh @FizzyGreenWater.

The line in the 'poem' about Europe being miles away over the sea also set me off. No helping some people.

Maybe suggest she actually reads Shaw's John Bull's Other Island, OP. If she can read, that is. It's not clear.

Does she realise that Mons is actually in Belgium, or is Belgium only 'Brussels What Tells The English What To Do' or something? Come to think of it, my great-uncle was injured at Mons, and last I checked he was not only Irish, but a fervent republican who was in the British army only because, like many Irish member of the BA, he needed a job.

I have a cousin that posts about angles protecting her family

Maybe they did. The Vandals the Jutes and the Visigoths not so much.

Oh God - she’s added a new one today:

Post, ‘Yes, it’s a little-known fact that Greta Thunberg personally invented the polystyrene fast food box when she was in nappies.’

Or alternatively, ‘Time to switch on your critical thinking, you dimwit.’

I haven’t RTFT but Shaw was born in Ireland and is usually considered an Irish playwright not English. The poem is a load of nonsense.

Oh dear God.

My friend's husband (re)posts exactly this kind of shite. The britishness-under-threat shite. The not-to-blame-for-climate-change crap. The good-old-days crap.

My prediction is that next she will be posting the smacking-taught-me-to-respect-other-people crap.

I've had to unfollow several people who share nonsense like that. There's no arguing with them. It really is worrying though that people actually believe and share this stuff I just don't want to read it.

How old is this friend? I was imagining maybe 40 but now I'm thinking 70-75?

She is indeed 40 Ravensmum, which is what makes it even more ridiculous. Our parents’ generation took pop bottles back to the shop, not ours - certainly not where we lived anyway! And the polystyrene fast food boxes that apparently this generation invented were very much a thing in the 80s when we grew up - in fact, you were far more likely to see them then than you are now. The late 80s was when we also woke up to the issues caused by CFCs and unleaded petrol - EVERYONE was desperate to show that they were ‘going green’. If she thinks criticising how previous generations behaved in terms of the environment is new, she has a very short memory - despite apparently being able to remember life as it was lived 30 years before we were born 😬

*Right or wrong I do hate being called a European,
Why?

Interesting fact: currently, as glass is not recycled as much as plastic, and is a lot heavier to transport, glass bottles actually have a higher carbon footprint than plastic ones.

If you haven't seen her in 20 years are you actually friends? or have you just added each other for old times sake. If a post she has shared is bothering you so much just delete her and move on with your life. No point over thinking this.

They study Shakespeare from year 5 up round here. What a dimmo. They maybe don't in the US I suppose.

My local fb group is full of this, and also quite unpleasant witch hunts started recently for everyone with a foreign-sounding name, God forbid Eastern European.
As in, someone asks for a recommendation for a children's art club, and people like your schoolmate come and tell them to go back to Poland and look for art clubs there or why our taxes should pay for your children to study art. Ironic as the only decent art school in the vicinity is ran by an Eastern European lady (and is obviously private, so no taxpayers were hurt).

'My prediction is that next she will be posting the smacking-taught-me-to-respect-other-people crap.'

It rather clearly didn't!

The metre is fucking dreadful.

ddl1

Haha, no, it didn't!

Whenever I see one of those posts, it's always from somebody I would HATE my children to grow up like. Reinforces my decision not to smack!

'I have a cousin who posts about angles protecting her family'

She sounds a bit obtuse.

People are so fucking stupid. Of course we are European. It's a continent. On which we live. Even leaving the EU can not change Geography, unless you are deranged.

Since when CAN'T English people call themselves English?!! No one - but NO ONE - is stopping them. Because no one cares

Your not ALOUD to fly the Engerland flag or some scary furriner might get OFFENDED don't you know?

God, that hurt to type. I would be willing to bet that not one non-British person has ever got offended seeing a British or English flag flown (in this country at least; bet there were/are loads who were rather upset and offended in it being flown in the lands which we invaded).

So if glass and shopping trollies were so great, why did people of that age who must have been content with them fucking start using plastic? It's almost like her generation changed it...

My FIL has just posted this exact same poem. Funny, because I doubt he knows who those writers (except Shakespeare) are, or even much about the great battles listed. He really does grind my gears at times.

I have to agree there's a real reticence to celebrate our Englishness in the same way being Scottish or Welsh is celebrated. You're far more likely to find someone who's English describe themselves as British while those from Scotland and Wales are more likely to say Scottish or Welsh than British, in my experience anyway.

I think a large part of this is that in many ways, the patriotic English mantra has been swallowed up by the xenophobic and racist twaddle that Tommy Robinson and Britain First/BNP etc promote. St George's Flag and increasingly the Union Jack are being associated with nasty right wing nonsense, increasingly so since Brexit.

Of course there are some exceptions, such as during the World Cup but overall there's definitely a hesitation to express an English patriotism. I think Scotland and Wales have suffered due to the over-dominance of England in the union over the years and that's why there's such a need to re-assert their individual identities.

Obviously the whole poem thing is utter bollocks. And she's probably one of the Brexiteer crazies. So I'm not defending anything she says AT ALL! Just to be clear on that point.

I'm a staunch Remainer and I'm also very opposed to Scotland leaving the union too (which I accept is none of my business and entirely an emotional response on my part). I'm so over-invested in Brexit and utterly disgusted by the steady creep of xenophobia, and the Trump-style spreading of casual racism.

I have to admit that when I see people who have a St George's Flag or Union Jack next to their Twitter name, I think "here we go" and I'm usually right. Being a proud Brit, and in particular being a proud English person has nasty connotations right now as the flags are being used as a symbol of extreme right-wing nationalism.

I've seen so much of this absolute bullshit posted on FB and Twitter by people who believe everything they read. It's so frustrating.