"Proud to be British"?

I thought this might merit inclusion in its own thread after it was raised briefly in another. Im struggling to understand the attitude that people of ethnic heritage demonstrate when they declare themselves to be "proud to be British".

The history of the British Empire just seems to loom ominously over all such claims. This is an empire which hewed great tracts of blood and gore out of indigenous cultures. The British museum still stands as testimony to this. The national anthem proudly states "Britons never ever ever will be slaves".

I also think that to be truly British one has to truly integrate. Im not sure that overall Brtons have overcome the natural assumption of ethnic individuals as "other". Its human nature

Reply 1

BobbieShamrock

Original post by phaedron

To be 'truly British' you have to have British parents. It's just a label for your nationality and has no further meaning.
I agree though, I'm not particularly proud to be British, we're kind of a useless country imo.

Posted from TSR Mobile

Reply 2

phaedron

Original post by BobbieShamrock

I see what you mean there but to some people being British or Irish or Iranian is a major part of their identity. They have a mental image of the ideal Irishman or Iranian woman.

Reply 3

Izzyyyyy

I don't know, I mean I guess Britain is not the best group of countries to be proud of but then most countries have had issues etc

Reply 4

Observatory

Original post by phaedron

The national anthem proudly states "Britons never ever ever will be slaves".
I guess this is a troll thread, but...

The history of the British Empire just seems to loom ominously over all such claims. This is an empire which hewed great tracts of blood and gore out of indigenous cultures.

This is far overstating the case. The British Empire was a heterogeneous collection of fifty of so client states, some of which were democratic (or became so while still within the Empire and not part of a planned withdrawal), and most of which were authoritarian but not totalitarian, replacing other authoritarian but not totalitarian states. The British Empire was not fuelled by blood lust and by and large only used official violence to preserve its own rule, just as all states in all times and places have done.

Now I can accept an argument that these authoritarian states were not very effective. They were not necessarily worse than what would have existed otherwise, and may even have been better, but I accept that is a weak defence of them. What I do not understand is why, given that the legitimacy of owning authoritarian client states has been repudiated by almost everyone, it's any worse than being a patriot for France, Spain, Italy, and so forth, all of which have been dictatorships and two within living memory. Is it because the empire ruled people who were sometimes of a different race to the British government? Why is that morally significant? It might be different if people today advocated imposing authoritarian governments on foreign countries, particularly foreign countries which are not currently authoritarian, but that is a very marginal opinion to the extent it exists at all.

Have you watched the Jeremy Kyle show?

Reply 7

ckfeister

Britain is fine, we're one of the only countries which give tax back and are a highly developed country we formed... USA, Canada and Austrila alongside with more that all was when humans were developing into more orginzed species so quit hating on past your country probably tries that now