English people are second class citizens

[NotAnotherScarf]

Aibu To be annoyed about so many Facebook posts about celebrating st George's day being racist. No one post this for st Patrick's day, st Andrew's or st David's.... Hogmanay and burns night have parties

By celebrating being English, passing democracy to the world, Shakespeare, Agatha Christie, TV, the jet engine, the internet... railways, the industrial revolution, beer, the Beatles... All should be celebrated.

Yes we did some shite things...but white slavery (20+ million), the Holocaust, programs in Eastern Europe. King Leopold of Belgium hunting African people. The depopulation of parts of the USSR, the ethnic cleansing of Bosnia.....all things that in the last 125 years England has nothing to do with...yet people like to think that we who celebrate our Englishness are scum.

The English should absolutely be celebrating their English heritage/adoption of that heritage on St George's Day, but over the years it has unfortunately been hijacked by dickheads like football hooligans, racists, and Tommy Robinson.

I wonder if the issue with celebrating it is because of a lack of cohesive, long-standing traditions. St David's Day in Wales is a big celebration and is often marked by local, traditional Eisteddfods. We gift Daffodils, and Welsh cakes, and dress up in traditional Welsh lady clothes, or miners outfits (although more modern outfits centre around wearing rugby tops), and we celebrate our language and traditions through song and dance. There's often a Male Voice Choir somewhere in the mix, and Tom Jones is played at least once (😉).

What are the English/St George's Day equivalents of this? Are there even any? I lived and taught (ages 3-7) in England for over a decade - in the 2010s - and whilst noting/celebrating St George's Day slowly became more popular, there was never any event or celebration that was used across all of England. Going back to St David's Day, daffodils are EVERYWHERE. But, as far as I'm aware, roses aren't a fixture of St George's Day.

I will happily be corrected if my experiences aren't the norm!

(Just to note, I haven't read the whole thread, so apologies if this has already been discussed!)

To talk of colonisation as being something done by one state to another trivialises the meaning of colonialism and the effects it had on indigenous populations. In any event, if you insist on seeing things that way, there was an Irish state before 1801 and after then it was simply part of a larger state and so participated in the acts of that state. But I think that's a red herring.

Irish people moved in large numbers throughout the 1800s to Australia, New Zealand, north America and elsewhere. They did this as migrants, settlers, farmers, soldiers and administrators and were a full part of the phenomenon of colonialism throughout that century. The country I live in has had 3 Irish-born prime ministers. This phenomenon involved a lot of indigenous people getting shot, dying of disease, getting dispossessed of their land and culturally pushed to the margins. These are not sweeping statements. They are truths that you will find in the histories of those countries. The fact that a lot of Irish people ended up there because of a brutal and criminally mishandled famine does not mitigate the effects on the indigenous populations of the places they moved to.

None of this is to say that "Ireland" is no better than "England" or "Turkey" or wherever. It's to point out that history us a lot more complicated than the stories that any nationality likes to tell about itself.

Be careful what you wish for.
Most Irish people I know cringe at how St Patricks Day gets celebrated nowadays: loads of faux-Irish tat, 'leprachaun' hats & fake orange beards, tricoloured balloon arches outside pubs and all the rest of it.
Personally, I'm glad we don't -yet- do the same sort of thing for any other 'national' patron saint's day (although i did see a disturbing photo of someone dressed as a daffodil for St David's last year! usually people just wear traditional Welsh/ Scottish outfits rather than some gimmicky throw-away fancy dress items).

ETA: How would you like to celebrate 'Englishness'?
(ps: as others have said, neither democracy nor beer were invented in England)

Is anyone else getting bored of this shit?

Larry swiped my colleague when he tried to fuss him. Colleague was a knob, made me love Larry even more. 😽

Napoleon and Hitler.

Tarmac roads were invented by John Macadam- you have never driven along a road made the Roman way .

Well I think the blame for colonialism very much does rest with the whole of the UK and not just s part of it.

The word Scotch tends however to be used only in relation to whisky. The term for the nationality is Scottish - you're welcome.

This
What a load of tripe 😁

To talk of colonisation as being something done by one state to another trivialises the meaning of colonialism and the effects it had on indigenous populations. In any event, if you insist on seeing things that way, there was an Irish state before 1801 and after then it was simply part of a larger state and so participated in the acts of that state. But I think that's a red herring.

I'm talking about colonisation as in the actual definition of it. You seem to be talking about emigration and some of those emigrants doing bad things which yes of course happened but did not happen by order of king or government in the same way that the British Empire did. Ireland did not send out its people to take over any lands in Ireland's name.

There wasn't an Irish state before 1801 - it was ruled either directly or indirectly by the British monarch / parliament and it certainly wasn't "simply" part of a larger state after that. Why would you bother to get into a conversation about "facts that have to be faced" when you don't know the simple facts.

It is exactly this type of whataboutery and minimising of the past of the British Empire without even knowing basic facts that gets people's backs up.

I was persevering until you said passing democracy to the world 🤣🤣🤣 and THAT thought process is the reason that the English celebrations always have a slightly sinister connotation

Wow!

Ringo's parents got divorced when he was three.

Not a lot of people know that.

I'm afraid you're looking at this from the perspective of the coloniser. The dictionary definition it is what one "nation" does to another. To you, the Irish and the English may have been very distinct: to the indigenous they were all newcomers under the aegis of a foreign government.

Your claims that I've minimised anything make no sense and given that you've been unable to refute any history I've pointed at it's not for you to say that I'm unaware of basic facts.

You're not serious?!!!! I think the original inhabitants of America, India, and Australia might have something to say about England's impact on them (massively undemocratic).

I couldn’t agree more.

Fly your flag,don't fly your flag
With all that going on in the world a bit of Chinese made nylon is you're most pressing issue you've got problems.

We should definitely have a National Cat Day.

OP, if you want to celebrate St. George then have a big party to celebrate a man from the Middle East who never set foot in England, and never slayed a dragon (on account of dragons not existing).

I guess the flag being hijacked by those far right loony groups who call themselves things like the White Templar Knights put a lot of people off.

May Day is a very English celebration - maypoles, morris dancers, real ale, and the like - and absolutely nobody complains about that - the very essence of Englishness.

The way Shakespeare is taught in this country means that most people dislike his plays. To see them as originally intended is a privilege that’s not accessible to many - putting on free plays in town squares would be a great way to celebrate being English.

Well being patriotic is considered being racist nowadays so maybe then I am

It isn't, just because the media and Mr Farage are telling you that, doesn't mean you have to believe them. Being racist is considered racist. Being patriotic is fine.

Don't they? I quite like a little bit of Shakespeare.

Homing in on one of your suggestions for things to be celebrated might reveal why people find it a bit simplistic.

The Beatles were descended from Irish immigrants and played/wrote US rock and roll (and other styles). This was derived from Blues styles played by former slaves in the southern states of the USA. The Beatles had access to records because they would arrive in Liverpool on merchant ships, so Liverpool itself plays a huge role in their success.

It’s too ‘basic’ to say ‘we gave the world The Beatles’. The Beatles exist because of a complex socio-economic, geographical, cultural and historical set of conditions.

American isn’t a country…it’s a nationality.

St Patrick was British and the son of Roman colonialists, which is also quite funny if you are into saints and patriotism.