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[Owlbread]

Owlbread, I think you're onto something here.

That is very kind of you to say but I really wouldn't know, I am not an Englishman and therefore I am not able to speak with much authority on the matter. You gents will understand it better than I.

[MetalSlimeHunt]

Owlbread, I think you're onto something here.

That is very kind of you to say but I really wouldn't know, I am not an Englishman.

As far as you know.

* DUN DUN DUNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNN!

[Loud Whispers]

Owlbread, I think you're onto something here.

That is very kind of you to say but I really wouldn't know, I am not an Englishman and therefore I am not able to speak with much authority on the matter. You gents will understand it better than I.

I'm not English yet even before reading that I'd have said I were British.

As far as you know.

AND THEN OWLBREAD WAS THE ENGLISH

[Owlbread]

As far as you know.

* DUN DUN DUNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNN!

I have heard that at one time all Scots were, for a brief period, Englishmen when most of Scotland was still covered in ice. My ancestors would be included in that, either among the original Britons or possibly Irish. My DNA markers have not been confirmed. Besides those of immigrant descent who have come straight to Scotland of course and have thus never been Englishmen at all - interesting. Does that make a Pakistani immigrant to Scotland more Scottish than one of those old bigots complaining about all the foreigners? A trivial matter of course and unworthy of serious debate, I just found it interesting.

I'm not English yet even before reading that I'd have said I were British.

A thousand pardons, I always thought you were. Forgive me. Not that it would be a bad thing of course. Cough.

AND THEN OWLBREAD WAS THE ENGLISH

Well, technically I am considering Scotland was annexed by England which renamed itself Great Britain and then became the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland. At least that's according to British government legal advice, which is a bit contentious.

But yes - back onto the subject of British nationalism and all the rest of it. I honestly think an English parliament or assembly and more talk of an inclusive "Englishness" would help remedy the problem of stuff like the BNP, UKIP, the British Freedom Party and so forth.

I know whenever politicians discuss things like an English parliament or regional assemblies (e.g. North East of England, South-West and so forth) they always talk about how most English regions rejected the proposals for the assemblies back in the early 2000s/late 90s. I think though that was at least partly a reaction to the fact that it wasn't an English parliament rather than just a regional one. After this big independence debate I am sure the number in favour of an English parliament would have increased hugely, thereby allowing for better representation for English people and also for regional assemblies to come back to the table, seeing as they wouldn't be at the expense of a national parliament. England should, in my opinion, be a federal state. It's just too large to be unitary.

[MonkeyHead]

Owlbread, I think you're onto something here.

Seconded - extreme English nationalism is less of a risk if there is a specified forum for those concerned with "Englishness" to hold court. Of course, my ideal solution wuld be for Wales, NI, and Scotland to not be part of Westminster, but thats less probable than establishing a new chamber.

As far as you know.

* DUN DUN DUNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNN!

I have heard that at one time all Scots were, for a brief period, Englishmen when most of Scotland was still covered in ice. Besides those of immigrant descent who have come straight to Scotland of course - interesting.

Ah, long enough ago you were all Welsh anyhows...

[Dutchling]

All you people and your extremely decentralized systems of government keeps confusing me D:

I mean, it seems to work, but I just don't see how making on country multiple countries can ever be a good idea

[scriver]

Says the guy from the country made out of fifteen nether-countries?

[Loud Whispers]

All you people and your extremely decentralized systems of government keeps confusing me D:

I mean, it seems to work, but I just don't see how making on country multiple countries can ever be a good idea

I'm just that more sadder that France didn't merge with the UK to make things even more confusing.

[Owlbread]

Seconded - extreme English nationalism is less of a risk if there is a specified forum for those concerned with "Englishness" to hold court. Of course, my ideal solution wuld be for Wales, NI, and Scotland to not be part of Westminster, but thats less probable than establishing a new chamber.

I agree with you wholeheartedly - it is my ideal solution as well, I'm just thinking of what we can do in the current framework.

Ah, long enough ago you were all Welsh anyhows...

I am possibly a direct descendant of the Old Welsh speaking population of Scotland, but I am just as likely to be Irish. Judging my by DNA markers that is.

All you people and your extremely decentralized systems of government keeps confusing me D:

I mean, it seems to work, but I just don't see how making on country multiple countries can ever be a good idea

The problem isn't necessarily when we try to make countries into multiple countries, rather it's when multiple countries become one country.

[Digital Hellhound]

I'm just sad Charlemagne's empire didn't stay together. You could add Germany and some Italy into the mix!

[palsch]

I'm not particularly convinced that that would help.

The way I see it there are two major nationalist trends in England right now.

The first is Old Toryism. This still lingers in the Conservative party, but mostly on the backbenches and in the local parties. Today UKIP are the most visible face of this. It's mostly cultural conservatism, with hints of glorying empire and colonial days. Racism here is incidental and more a matter of wanting to conserve 'British' culture against outside influences, maybe with some Paula Deen style longing for the long past days where people of colour were there to serve their colonial masters.

The second is the thuggish racism behind the BNP and EDL. These groups are often explicitly Nazi in nature (have a picture of an ELD member giving a Nazi salute while wearing a poppy for maximum irony points) and you can almost always trace the pedigree of such groups back to early British Nazi organisations. Their focus tends to be populist racism; damned immigrants taking our jobs. It's also flavour of the month racism. Since 9/11 most groups have made their primary focus anti-Islamic sentiment. Since the economic crisis they have started focusing more on the Polish and other Eastern European immigrants - more likely to be seen as filling roles unemployed Brits might otherwise take - despite Polish immigration to the UK having flattened out before the economy tanked.

The two definitely overlap and I'd say that the group linked before are a hybrid form; Old Toryism playing the populist racism card. But I don't think that either of these are solved by strengthening English identity over British.

For the first, emphasising Englishness and surrendering Britishness is a further retreat from the glory days. While they could probably enact their conservative policies more easily in an English parliament it's the general moving from leading an army to playing chess. There will be those who would accept the change but it's so fundamentally opposite to their worldview I can't imagine it being an easy pill to swallow.

For the second, the same populist arguments still work for England over Britain. The BNP and EDL are pretty much indistinguishable in ideology, just that one labels itself British and the other English. Strengthening one set of symbols that these groups already fetishise is unlikely to weaken them.

[Owlbread]

I'm not particularly convinced that that would help.

The way I see it there are two major nationalist trends in England right now.

The first is Old Toryism. This still lingers in the Conservative party, but mostly on the backbenches and in the local parties. Today UKIP are the most visible face of this. It's mostly cultural conservatism, with hints of glorying empire and colonial days. Racism here is incidental and more a matter of wanting to conserve 'British' culture against outside influences, maybe with some Paula Deen style longing for the long past days where people of colour were there to serve their colonial masters.

But what is British culture? Stuff like "British culture" and the "glory days" in the eyes of the people we're describing tend to take on an extremely English hue, at least, a classical English one.

The second is the thuggish racism behind the BNP and EDL. These groups are often explicitly Nazi in nature (have a picture of an ELD member giving a Nazi salute while wearing a poppy for maximum irony points) and you can almost always trace the pedigree of such groups back to early British Nazi organisations. Their focus tends to be populist racism; damned immigrants taking our jobs. It's also flavour of the month racism. Since 9/11 most groups have made their primary focus anti-Islamic sentiment. Since the economic crisis they have started focusing more on the Polish and other Eastern European immigrants - more likely to be seen as filling roles unemployed Brits might otherwise take - despite Polish immigration to the UK having flattened out before the economy tanked.

We're not really going to change people like that, but we can at least take the argument away from them that their culture and identity isn't represented enough. That will deter any moderates from considering them and hopefully shrink their numbers a bit. I know it's rare to find a moderate among the EDL but I've met quite a few people you could call "moderate" who have those sentiments - that their culture and all that is being "forgotten" and so forth. Of course if I told them to walk a mile in the shoes of a Highland woman, past her burnt family croft, past the local church that forbids her to sing the old songs, past the school where her children are taught in English and beaten with canes and leather belts if they speak their native tongue, past the grave of her husband who died in the colonies fighting enemies her ancestors would never have dreamed of, then back to a lonely village where she lives with friends because the rest of her family went to Canada... then maybe they wouldn't be so quick to talk of English culture being in peril.

The two definitely overlap and I'd say that the group linked before are a hybrid form; Old Toryism playing the populist racism card. But I don't think that either of these are solved by strengthening English identity over British.

For the first, emphasising Englishness and surrendering Britishness is a further retreat from the glory days. While they could probably enact their conservative policies more easily in an English parliament it's the general moving from leading an army to playing chess. There will be those who would accept the change but it's so fundamentally opposite to their worldview I can't imagine it being an easy pill to swallow.

It won't be an easy pill to swallow but what else can we do besides what we're doing already? We're doing the best we can, I was just trying to offer one way of getting to one of the sources of the problem. I know you could call it a retreat from the glory days but I'd like to see the reaction from people in England towards it. The whole idea of the "glory days" is very important.

For the second, the same populist arguments still work for England over Britain. The BNP and EDL are pretty much indistinguishable in ideology, just that one labels itself British and the other English. Strengthening one set of symbols that these groups already fetishise is unlikely to weaken them.

But strengthening both sets of symbols - Britishness and Englishness - as being inclusive of immigrants, not exclusive to the English "ethnicity" will certainly weaken them.

[10ebbor10]

Answering a question of a few pages previous.

Christian call to prayer = Church Bells. They're everywhere, and you hear them every day.

[palsch]

We're not really going to change people like that, but we can at least take the argument away from them that their culture and identity isn't represented enough.

No you can't. At that level of racist cultural protectionism it's not enough to have their culture and identity represented. They require that their culture and identity aren't ever challenged. Where challenged means having any alternative portrayed in anything but the worst light and from a sufficient distance. Preferably an ocean or two.

You see this all the time when a dominant majority claim persecution. I'll let people come up with their own examples. But when it boils down to one side demanding that the other side shut up and go away the solution isn't to give the first side a louder voice and hope that satisfies them.

But strengthening both sets of symbols - Britishness and Englishness - as being inclusive of immigrants, not exclusive to the English "ethnicity" will certainly weaken them.

But that is entirely orthogonal to separating the symbols or giving them more importance.

My worry here is that giving more power to the Old Tory faction (who are the ones who win most from a devolved English parliament) at a time when the populist racist groups are still so loud would swing entirely the other way, with the newly emphasised symbols and identity being even more divisive and insular. Strengthening such voices can only push their point of view further into the public conciousness.

As for my view of what should be done, I don't think there are any easy answers. Anti-fascist work (Hope Not Hate and similar) are important on a ground level, as is opposing UKIP style culture conservatism and ignorant isolationism (imagining that the UK retains some magical importance in the world that makes us better off without the very ties that actually give us any importance in the world). But there are no magic bullets that will make these things vanish or reduce their influence. Their roots are in forces that are nigh on impossible to change directly; cultural conservatism, economic hardship and casual racism. Hopefully time will help change these. But until then it's just fighting to reduce their influence and effects.

[Loud Whispers]

Answering a question of a few pages previous.

Christian call to prayer = Church Bells. They're everywhere, and you hear them every day.

And there we see the differences. One is ingrained in British culture, used to signify times of mourning and celebration for the entire country or for individuals. At around the 1700's bell ringing lost its meaning as a call to prayer because the bell ringers were seen as debauched and the association carried. Soon it became more about the people. In 1731 in Leceister one of the bell ringers summed up its new meaning rather well:
 “We upon bells completed the whole peal of Grandsire Triples in three hours and two minutes to the great satisfaction of thousands both in town and country”.
Bell ringing also became a part of what shaped British society as the first women were allowed to become bell ringers in the 1900's after the Victorian reforms, bell ringing being a highly payed job. After 1918 most people felt little about being Godly and church attendance dropped rapidly alongside bell ringing. By 1939 bells were silenced except to report on troop movements. 60 years later most bells would be restored and ring for the country, their clerical meaning long since lost, and instead reborn in culture as they ring again and again for events like the Olympics, the Royal Wedding and the Diamond Jubilee.
The other has no part in British national identity and only has meaning in praising Allah.