Friday 23 April 2010

Calling England.

Today, Friday 23rd April, is St. George's Day.

I'm Welsh/Italian and live in Scotland and I know about this because we learned all the days of the patron saints of Wales, Scotland, Ireland and England for no reason other than general knowledge and general respect. Neither of which is politically correct these days.

How many English people know their own saint's day now, I wonder?

You can't miss St. David's Day if you're in Wales at the time. Everyone is going around with an enormous daffodil stuck to them somewhere or dressed as a leek. Wales drew the short straw there, eh? England gets a rose, Ireland a shamrock, Scotland a thistle and the Welsh end up with a vegetable. The daffodil feels like a consolation prize. As for the dragon, have you ever experienced the full fury of a Welsh old lady? Don't imagine they are weak and feeble and don't imagine that dragon is anything other than a warning.

In Scotland, St. Andrew's day is marked with flags. Few are stupid enough to pin a thistle to their lapels but there's always one. Around here, it's always the same one and no, it's not me. The big boozy session is Burns' Night in January - haggis by the barrowload and whisky to wash it down.

The Irish get hammered on St. Patrick's day even if they are not in Ireland. You'd think they'd want to try something different for the day. I was once in Edinburgh for the event and everywhere there were huge green hats, vast shamrocks and little bodhrans (I have a full sized one from a Dublin visit and yes, I can). They must have had a direct pipe to Dublin for the Guinness, the supply was inexhaustible.

In England, there are too many hand-wringers who go on and on about St. George being Turkish or Greek or whateffa and never even visiting England, they bleat that their own national flag is racist and anyone seen with one must be re-educated. I'll bet many schools and councils will pass the day as if it is simply Friday and woe betide anyone mentioning the name 'George' or carrying a flag.

I don't understand it. Righteousness is not a specifically English problem. We have them in Scotland too and Wales and Ireland are also plastered with the loathsome creatures. They make up petty rules and expect us to follow pointless commands for no other reason than to ensure we know who is boss, but they have never succeeded in demolishing national identity as they have in England.

Then again, if you call a Scotsman racist he'll likely shrug and say 'Yeah, so? Fit's it tae dae wi' ye onyway, ya bas?' Sort of takes the fun out of it for the Righteous. The Welsh will deliver an incomprehensible babble at light speed and then ask if that's clear. With a smile. The Irish will argue 'Racist? All our beer is black.' Then it will be pub fight time and the argument will have to wait.

I think, maybe, the English are just too polite. Or rather, used to be. An Englishman rarely needed to fight, he could win with a quip, a sneer and a sidelong look. There are tales from Empire days of elderly colonial governers chasing away armed insurgents with a walking-stick. Rather than violence, they used sarcasm. And they were quick to apologise if they'd hurt someone's feelings, unlike we barbaric ones on the fringes of these islands. Complain to a Scotsman that he'd hurt your feelings and he'd probably correct the misunderstanding by demonstrating the proper meaning of the term 'hurt'.

That, of course, does not apply to the dockyard gangs and the mining villages. It applies to the gentry, the ruling class, those who have attained positions of high office. Businessmen and managers too. All very cultured, all very polite, all respected and looked up to. Even the Krays were pillars of the community. This is a country where even murderous criminals wore smart suits and looked after their mums. Muggers would stab you and apologise. Burglars would leave a note apologising for the inconvenience. A country like no other. And yet a country ripe for Righteous takeover.

Look at what happened when the Righteous had a go at Buckfast. It has too much caffeine in it, howled the Ban Brigade. And that's the way it'll stay and you can ram your indignation where it hurts, responded Buckfast. The EU once tried to ban haggis because they'd seen the recipe. It's still here. No shortage at all. I know some who cannot pass a bus stop with a no-smoking sign. They will actually delay their journey to smoke in there. It's a paradox - they vote socialist but will not do as they are told. Making all those laws is silly. The Scots are not going to take any notice. Try telling them their bin is overfilled and they'll simply pack it down harder using your head.

I wonder, though, if that inherent politeness and sense of fair play is what made the English so susceptible to the Righteous? Look, those ethnic people are discriminated against. Look, that poor man in a wheelchair can't get up the stairs to the disco. It's injustice and it must be fixed.

So it is, and so it must, but the Righteous went a lot further than fixing it. They made a fortune out of perpetuating and promoting the divisions between people, and forming new ones. All along the way they shouted down dissent with 'Racist-Nazi-Bigot' and it worked. They took away all forms of school punishment because 'it is wrong to punish a child' and now they have a generation who are not the polite, fair-minded English of old but are almost feral. They are more barbaric than the barbaric Welsh, Scottish and Irish they used to look down on.

The young English have not forgotten their history. They have never been taught about it. The years 1215 and 1644 mean nothing to them. They refer to 'Queen Elizabeth' while omitting the 'Second' because they they think Henry VIII is something Charles Laughton made up and have no idea who succeeded him. They have forgotten what happened in this country under the previous King Charles' too. It's likely to happen again under the next one, the way things are going.

They really believe the English should apologise for slavery, despite getting into that trade thousands of years later than most other countries, being the first to abolish it and enforcing that abolition by raiding other countries' slave ships. Slavery still exists in many countries that the Righteous support. That's never mentioned to the children.

The English politeness and fair play has been twisted by the Righteous into something truly revolting. It is now actually illegal to call someone a rude name. You can be arrested for shouting at someone. You must employ staff not on the basis of ability but on the basis of the local ethnic proportion. If you under-represent the white English proportion, that's fine, but under-represent any other group (except smokers who are safely deleted from any shortlist anywhere) then you will be fined. Your bin lid must close. You will not put pips in the glass bin nor will you put paper in the card bin. You will put all food waste into a bucket in your kitchen and endure the stench until collection day. You will not deviate from Righteous-dictated normality.

The English are the only people on the planet who will adapt to this and put up with it. I'll bet there's not one Englishman who has ever put a green glass bottle in the clear glass bin and felt a little smug satisfaction at that. I'm still watching out for that clear glass bottle with a hint of green.

Today is St. George's day. The patron saint of England. The Labour Party have destroyed this day. Watch for reports of English flags being deemed 'racist' in the weekend papers. Watch for reports of street parties and celebrations. You will find much more of one than the other.

Put aside your politeness and fair play. Put aside your working-man addiction to voting for people who despise you. Remember why you shiver outside the pub, why you have to hesitate before you speak, why you are called 'racist, Nazi, bigot' for daring to have your own country's flag. Remember 1215 and 1644 and what they meant.

Remember who did this to you.

And hold that memory on May 6th.



Sometimes I feel like a reverse version of Lord Haw-Haw, you know. Come on, you young English, who was he? Did they teach you about that, even?

38 comments:

Anonymous said...

Sadly I think England is beyond saving. People will not express themselves as they see fit anymore due to fear of thought crime laws and the lefts many spies eager to report any indiscretions to the authorities. People are cowed by the threat of perminant unemployment and/or a criminal record. It would take a revolution to lift the dark fog of repression that has decesnded on England.

Frank Davis said...

You will put all food waste into a bucket in your kitchen and endure the stench until collection day.

Not me! I've started burning mine, along with the cigarette butts. It kills off the children round here a treat.

I think the trouble with the English is that when they started to think of themselves as British they began to identify with being Scottish and Irish and Welsh to the exclusion of themselves. That was when the rot set in.

Righteousness is an extension of the same process to the French and Dutch and Spanish and Continentals in general (ie.e the EU) again to the exclusion of the English. The Truly Righteous identify with Tanzanians and Senegalese and Nepalese and Christmas Islanders. It's a sort of inverse snobbery. "I can identify with more excluded and marginalised and persecuted people than you can (smokers always excepted)!"

Frank Davis said...

P.S. Did you know that Earth Day (22 April) just happens to be Lenin's birthday as well?

And that No Smoking Day is Molotov's birthday?

Thought not...

Leg-iron said...

Anon-revolution has happened before and for much the same reason.

Frank - No Smoking day is Molotov's birthday? Next year, cocktails...

Billy The Fish said...

I'm off to work now, wearing a white shirt with a red cross. I work in a public service building in the East End of London. This should be fun.
Vulgar? Yes. Jingoistic and low-brow? Absolutely. But like all good employees of the state, I have been conditioned to 'value diversity and respect culture'.
One day a year, I take this to include my own.
Boy, do the Socialists hate it!

banned said...

I've never unserstood why the large pub chains, especially Wetherspoons, feel the need to embark on St. Patricks day mania every year.
I did notice quite a few St. Georges' Cross mini flags and bunting on sale in a convenience store earlier this week but rather assumed it to be connected with some football match or other.

On a cheerier note, last week I was helping to clear a house and was at a loss with what to do with the last of the stuff that could not be given away. Were we really going to empty out the glass and plastic containers of their mustard and marmelade? Break up the nicknacks and picture frames to put the plastic and glass elements in the right bins?

My Cornish cousins assued me that they still access to a proper tip and took it all away in their van. But the Cornish don't regard themselves as proper English anyway.

Guthrum said...

Wes Thu Hal Leg Iron

Biffo said...

Have they actually brought in that law about food waste? Fuck 'em I don't pay Council Tax so I can do their job for them. It still goes in my bin & if they don't like it, they can do the other thing.

I'm Irish but living in England & my St George's flag & Union Jack are already flying from the bedroom window. When in Rome... Again, if they don't like it - fuck 'em. Oh and I'm off to a St Georges Night get together with about a dozen of my friends - flags, Jerusalem & Land of Hope & Glory mandatory.

adwelly said...

1215 = signing of the Magna Carta, and 1644 = ? Halfway through the English civil war ? The founding of the Qing dynasty in China ? A two headed calf born in Suffolk ?

Enlighten us Oh Ferrous One.

Uncle Marvo said...

Anon:

England is NOT beyond saving. If it takes a revolution, then so be it.

I am playing the Joanna tonight, in the pub, for St Georges' celebration. We will be singing rude songs as well as cockney rubbish, and eating pie, mash and licquor.

And I shall be extremely pissed, and I will smoke. In the pub.

So there.

God for Harry, England, and St George.

knirirr said...

England gets a rose…

Which, unfortunately, has been pinched by a certain dastardly party. One risks being thought of as one of their supporters if one is worn and it will be worse at the moment.

Ronan said...

Happy St George's day! Have you seen those Bombardier posters, in association with English Heritage, to celebrate positive Englishness? (though I'm not sure why Henry VIII is considered positive enough for inclusion...)
theconvoblog.blogspot.com/2010/04/happy-st-georges-day-and-those-amazing.html

Anonymous said...

Knirirr

Actually the national flower of England is the dog-rose, as per the Tudor rose emblem, rather than the garden variety, so if you can find one of those, or a Tudor rose emblem, you should be in the clear!

Mrs Rigby said...

"the English are just too polite"
Maybe, but even the polite ones are reaching the end of their tether, and when that happens they fight back.

w/v = nolost

Uncle Marvo said...

"too polite"?

I'm a gentleman. That means that I hold doors open for ladies, and am polite until it is apparent that polite is not appropriate. Then the opposite is true. I can, and will, be a right handful when the time comes. I also know what will signal that time, and I look forward to it.

I am pretty sure that I am not alone in this.

Anonymous said...

You must not forget it was the Scots that brought slavery to the Union. Scotland Wouldn't sign the 1707 Treaty without it being in.

Weekend Yachtsman said...

"Fit's it tae dae wi' ye"

That would be an Aberdonian, not a Scotsman.

Anonymous said...

Uncle Marvo, I share your looking forward to when the time comes - but what is the signal you refer to?

Uncle Marvo said...

I only know what the signal is for me.

I can't say though. Would give away a certain game.

Autonomous Mind said...

A tour de force as we English seem to like saying, old bean. Leg Iron, I salute you for your incisive and humorous assessment of what it means to be shackled in modern socialist-run England. Joy of the day to you Sir.

Anonymous said...

What about Agincourt day ?
he he.

Dioclese said...

A beautifully written and well contrusted piece - well done!

I'm English, but I'm also male, caucasian, able bodied, heterosexual, and christian - so I guess I'm one of the true ethnic minorities in this country...

Katabasis said...

Great piece LI; always a pleasure to read.

Remember Old England's Tears.

Looking forward to the rise of British Sons of Liberty.

Chris said...

They refer to 'Queen Elizabeth' while omitting the 'Second' because they they think Henry VIII is something Charles Laughton made up and have no idea who succeeded him.

Edward VI /pedant

Give it time Leggy. May 6th...

I am Stan said...

Yo Leggy,

Happy St Georgy day Englishmen,

Hey,Jamie Bond,he`s a proper English gent,and he`s fucking deadly.

J said...

Cardigan?

Anonymous said...

Tonight beneath one hundred Flags
of England illuminated by a dying
sun still in embrace of the nearby
Pennine hills , here shall we,
some noble ,some of low calling,
assemble outside a tavern of ill
repute. With the providence so
beloved of Englands glorious days
we will ,fortified by ample ale, ensure that those who would cause
our land any sorrow,these will
feel the wrath of the angry poor.


Horsa's Lot

Stewart Cowan said...

Flags is it? I'm yer man. I keep the St. George's flags under the counter for the discerning customer. I hand them over in brown paper bags.

The name of the game is destruction of the UK to ease us into a global system of government. I believe this is the only reason New Labour wanted devolution.

The Righteous made the St. George's and Union flags synonymous, not with patriotism, but with racism and xenophobia.

At the same time, every other flag in the world could be flown without any such worries (except for viewers in N. Ireland).

It's good for the humble flag retailer. For example, head teachers buy flags for every nationality represented in their school. That can be dozens.

Gareth said...

"They make up petty rules and expect us to follow pointless commands for no other reason than to ensure we know who is boss, but they have never succeeded in demolishing national identity as they have in England."

It would be nice to think The Righteous are merely tolerated but I really do not know. They really know how to push our buttons to keep us contained.

Why do they fear a democratic England?

An end to the gravy trains?

Paul said...

I wouldn't be too sure - I've seen quite a few England flags round and about today, on houses, pubs and shops.

England isn't dead yet, you know.

Trooper Thompson said...

They fear what they can't control and can't understand. George Orwell explained how the left intelligencia, which, back in his days had not risen to such power as they enjoy now, had transfered their patriotism to the Soviet Union. Today with the Soviet Union gone, they have moved on to a global vision but retain their hatred for us and our culture. The main project of the 20th and now the 21st century has been the destruction of national sovereignty. They have taught everyone that love of one's country is the same as hating foreigners, and that national sovereignty is the cause of war. But, as a nationalist, my allies are nationalists the world over; our mutual enemies are the globalists who wish to merge us all into one system, the scientific dictatorship, where there's nowhere to run and nowhere to hide.

The fight-back will be tough, but this is life, it ain't easy, and it never was.

Mrs Rigby said...

Look around the internet and see how many people have been talking about St George's Day. Look in the online papers too.

Then think back to a couple of years ago, when even thinking about celebrating St George was forbidden.

Things are moving, but we English are slow to rile - and we won't be too late either, we'll be just in time, as we've always been.

(At least I hope so)

Anonymous said...

Dear Mr Leg-iron

The Union has been broken. Scotland and Wales are nice sized unit for European Union regions. Northern Ireland is for this week only; next week it will be ever so convenient if it is mashed together with the Irish Republican European Union region

That nice Mr Blair donated all or part of the UK rebate to the EU shortly before he left office for Higher Things (£20 million plus in fees) so that the EU could take over the Balfour agreement and gift ‘EU funds’ to Scotland so that she could become ‘free’ (of England) but still receive English money laundered through EU coffers.

But England is just too big. The EU has decreed that it must be broken in bite-sized pieces. Nine rings regions to be ruled by the EU - London Region and eight others. To create these, England has to be destroyed. That is why we went to war in Iraq, so that mass immigration could take place. There is no quicker way to destroy a country than mass immigration. Ask the Native Americans. Our ‘leaders’ have now ‘admitted’ their ‘mistake’ because they can – “mass immigration was a mistake” they cry, “we are sorry”. This distracts people’s attention from the fact that the main port of entry for immigrants into the UK has switched from LHR and LGW to NHS - the maternity wards. Our rulers can now turn off the overt immigration tap, and let nature take its course.
And England will be destroyed.

And in its place will be nine Euro regions alongside the Welsh and Scottish regions and two or one Irish region(s).

All hail Euro.

DP

Billy The Fish said...

I went to work yesterday wearing my white shirt with the red cross.
My journey involved hitting Liverpool Street Station twice (both rush hours) I saw one other bloke in the colours and four - four! - flags.
The sheep have been effectively corralled. There is no spirit left in them.

Span Ows said...

adwelly said...

1215 = signing of the Magna Carta, and 1644 = ? Halfway through the English civil war ?


Battle of Marston Moor? One of the major victories (Naseby was the key but in 1645)

1215 Magna Carta
1415 Agincourt
1615...nothing happens
1815 Waterloo
2015 The English revolt.

Leg-iron said...

Yes, 1644, Marston Moor. At which Cromwell led the Ironside cavalry, then afterwards founded the New Model Army (no, not the band).

Unfortunately parliament decided not to pay their soldiers.

In other words, here we go again.

Leg-iron said...

Mrs. R. - I hope so too.

Anonymous said...

I'm with Uncle Marvo and Mrs Rigsby. It's never too late for change. By the way, are you lot time travelling? The date stamps are three days ahead! (And sorry to be pedantic but today, Saturday, is St. George's day - powerful grog you're enjoying there Leg-Iron!).

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