I took down some flags and DH wasn’t happy

[LittleChopper]

On my commute today, I noticed someone had hung three large St George flags on a bridge coming out of our village. They have been popping up everywhere but this particular instance I thought “I’m not having that”. On the way home I pulled over and took them down.

when I got home and DH asked why I was binning three large flags I told him and he.. had some interesting opinions. He told me I shouldn’t be pissing off people in the village, that they have every right to hang an England flag in England, and that I’m being too political.

For a start, I would argue that I’ve always been quite strongly opinionated so he shouldn’t be surprised I did it.

Just as others have the right to their opinion I have mine. We have people in the village who are migrants… why should they have to look at that. It’s clear why they were hanging there given what’s going on at the moment and I’ve never see a flag hanging in the village in the decade we’ve been here so why else would they be there now.

I’m just so disappointed with it all. With the UK, with DH.

Next time maybe I’ll add to the collection instead. 🇬🇷🇮🇪🇮🇳🇦🇫🇧🇸🇵🇰🇪🇸🇸🇩🇿🇦🏴󠁧󠁢󠁳󠁣󠁴󠁿

Good for you OP. Be careful though, I've seen people confronted and videoed by the thick, nasty, violent, racist coked-up hooligans friendly patriots with legitimate concerns who put them up.

If they did come up by us, I think I’d put up something really random in our window like the Swedish flag - we actually have one due to a Eurovision party we went to 😂

Public property. If you want to express your opinion, do it on your own property, like the dicks who've erected flagpoles in their gardens.

Nice to know where the racists live. I actually appreciate their advertising it.

If putting up flags deters people wanting to come over in boats, then I’m all for it tbh. When elections come around, when people put boards up for the Conservatives or Reform (because I’m guessing you’re either Labour or Corbynite), are you also going to go on your little trip round the village and remove them? Or if you see the Palestinian terrorist supporting flag, are you equally disgusted that the Jews in your community might be intimidated, and be removing them? I suspect not……

If you did add to the collection as you have suggested, what would you think of someone who took them down and binned them?

An ignorant bigoted thief?

You make some bold claims. Could you substantiate them by explaining:

• how a refugee enters the UK on ‘correct routes’?

• why refugees entering the UK without a visa aren’t immediately arrested, if it’s illegal?

• how much money a person awaiting an asylum decision is entitled to per week?

• how that compares to what people are entitled to in countries like France and Germany - if in UK they get a ‘sweet deal’?

• how we welcome ‘legitimate asylum seekers’?

• what we’ve learned since we refused to admit refugees escaping the Holocaust in the 1930s/40s (as today, cheered on by some sections of the media) who went on to be horrifically murdered?

Unfortunately, the racists are the ones who have despoiled our flag. Unless you're racist yourself, you don't need to apologise for them.

how do you fly a flag at half mast in a bridge?

They disgust me. They are up for racist purposes only to send a message that England is for the English and migrants are not welcome. It is alarming how the country is veering to the right. Well done OP.

Our national flag isn't causing offence. The motivations of the people who have co-opted it for their "cause" is causing offence - we don't want to see our national flag defiled in this way. Try to understand the difference.

Because the reason people are putting up flags, now, rather than always having had them up is to tell immigrants/ black and brown people they are unwelcome here. It’s very obvious and the faux naive ‘why would anyone have a problem with the flag’ you hear all the time of threads like this means you’re either very dense or taking the piss. These are real human beings who feel threatened in communities they’ll lived in all their lives. It is not a laugh.

Who is ‘we’? Don’t speak for me or millions of others who like to see the English flag. I won’t be held responsible for other peoples insecurities about a piece of material waving about in the wind. 🇬🇧 Get a grip fgs….

Exactly this. My friend's brown DC was upset walking past a house in our neighbourhood with a flag flying, because he knows it indicates he isn't welcome. Somewhere he's lived all his life.

Arseholes.

OP I have been doing the same!! Good for you. I don’t know what we have become. These flags do not make me feel proud of my English heritage and culture…they make me feel ashamed as they represent hatred and hostility.

You know exactly why.

Why do people feel the need to respond on these threads under the pretence of living under a rock and not having a slightest clue what is going on???

"... the only way to highlight their concerns"? Goodness, how lacking in imagination they must be.

I'm convinced that if all those people at the march in London were 'anti protesters', and the wrongly labelled 'far right' consisted of a measley 5,000 people, people like you would be insisting that there was a million there at least.

But, because you're in the minority, you've got to be purposely downplaying the true figures because you can't accept just how many people supported the march. Luckily we can all see the reality by the aerial view shots.

We don’t have any flags up where I live but there are lots of yellow ribbons everywhere

So you'd be happy to see a symbol of your children being unwelcome in their own neighbourhood? Just because of the colour of their skin.

So much hate around. Makes me ashamed to be English.

Is it being flown from their own property? Fine by me. Is flying the Thai flag in this country currently being promoted by a known far right criminal? No? Also fine by me. You see the difference?

Taking down flags isn’t really the same as expressing disagreement, it’s removing someone else’s expression.

People have every right to disagree and to show that disagreement, but the healthier way is to do so through your own words, symbols, or actions, not by silencing others. Flying a flag is one form of opinion, and taking it down doesn’t add to the conversation, it just shuts one side out.

Lol ok. I'm going to insist that I can count even better than you and that there was really 70,000 lefties there. I've been to Wembley, so I must be right. I'm not falling for that right wing propaganda.

He's technically not wrong. You should have added other flags as this would show inclusion. All you're doing by removing them is fuelling their 'we're being oppressed' narrative and make this whole thing worse.

It’s not on their property though so it’s basically littering

Exactly