Posted on 12/01/2007 11:28:40 AM PST by Pikamax
As the nation settled down on Wednesday night to watch England play Croatia, I sensed an air of optimism in the land. A feeling that all would be well. I mean hey, England were holding their own against Brazil when Croatia didn’t even exist as a nation state. So what chance would these swarthy-looking Yugo-ruffians have? They were minnows in a tank of sharks. They weren’t going to be beaten. They were going to be eaten.
Hmmm. I’m afraid I knew we were going to lose moments before the match began. I looked at our players mumbling their way through the national anthem and realised they didn’t really care about playing for England. Because they don’t really know what England is. And truth be told, neither do I.
When I was their age it was crystal clear. Newspapers would report: “Fog in the Channel: Europe cut off.” Peter Ustinov would arrive at JFK airport and, having studied the signs saying “US citizens” and “Aliens”, he’d ask a security guard where the British should go. We were separate, different, better.
We had hardback dark blue passports with a personal message from the Queen on the inside cover “requiring” that foreign border guards allow the bearer to do whatever he or she pleased without let or hindrance. Slap one of those down on a Frenchman’s desk and the crack of invitation grade cardboard would have the greasy little oik sitting up straight; that’s for sure.
We had saved the world from tyranny so often we’d lost count; we’d brought decency, truth and cricket to every continent and every coral pinprick. We’d sailed iron steamships into America when they were still using coracles. We were defined by our brilliance, our superiority, our technical know-how.
Today, things are rather different. Mention the war and you’ll be told by an outreach counsellor that we must empathise with the Germans, who are coming to terms with their mistakes of the past. “And you know, children, it was actually the British who invented concentration camps . . .”
Empire? When I was at school, teachers spoke with pride about how a little island in the north Atlantic turned a quarter of the world pink, but now all teachers talk about is the slave trade and how we must hang our heads in shame.
Right. So we must forgive Germany for invading Poland. But I must beat myself to death every night because my great-great-great-grandad moved some chap from a hellhole in Ghana to Barbados. In fact I can’t even say we’re British any more because then all of Scotland would rush over the border, pour porridge down my trousers and push a thistle up my bottom.
I believe people need to feel like they’re part of a gang, part of a tribe. And I also believe we need to feel pride in our gang. But all we ever hear now is that we in England have nothing to be proud about. In a world of righteousness we are the child molesters and rapists.
Our soldiers were murderers. Our empire builders were thieves. Our class system was ridiculous and our industrial revolution set in motion a chain of events that, eventually, will kill every polar bear in the Arctic.
And it gets so much worse. Because if you say you are a patriot, men with beards and sandals will come round to your house in the night and daub BNP slogans on your front door. This is the only country in the world where the national flag is deemed offensive. Small wonder the England players were disinclined to sing the national anthem with any gusto. It’s in English and that’s offensive too. Unless it’s simultaneously translated into Urdu, for the deaf.
Then there’s our national character. In the past, boys were told in school assembly that their mothers had died and were expected to get over it in a nice game of rugby. Crying only happened abroad. Not any more. We were ordered to weep like Americans when Diana died, and no local news report is complete today without some fat oik sobbing because his house has fallen over. I sometimes get the impression Kate McCann is being hounded precisely because she has a stiff upper lip.
Every day we read obituaries about men who pressed on with the attack on a German machinegun nest even though their arms and legs had been blown off. Today disabled people get a statue in Trafalgar Square just because they got pregnant. Tomorrow all the obituaries will be for those who saved others from certain death by insisting they wear high visibility jackets. Cowardice is the new bravery.
As for that wounded soldier seen recently sporting a T-shirt that said: “I went to Afghanistan and all I got was this crappy false leg,” I call that typically English. But not any more. It’s appalling. A slight on disabled people. And you shouldn’t have been in Afghanistan in the first place, you baby killer.
Do you see? We can’t be proud of our past because it’s all bad, we can’t use British humour because it’s offensive and we can’t use understatement to deal with a crisis because the army of state-sponsored counsellors say we’ve got to sob uncontrollably at every small thing.
I want to end with a question. It’s addressed to all the equal opportunity, human rights, diet carbon, back room, bleeding heart liberals who advise the government: “I am English. Why is that a good thing?”
I bet they don’t have an answer. And until they can come up with one, chances are we’ll never win at football again.
Not the only one.
Clarkson’s usually funnier. Some shots on target though (unlike the mentioned England football team).
The problem with the national anthem is (a) it’s not a good song and (b) we don’t have an English national anthem.
English sporting teams should sign Jerusalem.
Ummm...me too?
"We’ve been robbed of our Englishness"
Nope, you gave it away willingly. Not all of you, but enough of you.
Sure sounds familiar...
The commies want America to go down the same road. I smell burning revolution coming from that path.
I remember Wembley used to reverberate to 100,000 voices singing "Land of Hope and Glory" at England matches in the 60's and 70's, and of course, "The Dambusters Theme" when they played (and beat) the Germans....
Coral pinprick? Is that what he thinks of my little home in the Keys? Why, I bet the Lady Dolphins HS team could whup the UK! Ha!
Spot on. The Marxists trod on...
At least we’ve got our RINOs to save us. ;-<
We’re all multiculti now — except for the cultures who want to kill us.
Yes, in October 14, 1066. Everything else is a prologue.
As of British Civilization, Gandhi answered it the most succintly. (I think it would be a very good idea)
.
...so we can be turned into one ungodly formed piece of Mohammed (I mean sh*t) culture.
He fails to point out that multi-culturalism in the English Premier League has robbed English players of the chance to develop their skills. League leading Arsenal is coached by a Frenchman and has no English players in its starting formation. How pathetic was it that during the 2006 WC England’s main scoring threat was a Liverpool benchwarmer (Peter Crouch) ?
“He fails to point out that multi-culturalism in the English Premier League has robbed English players of the chance to develop their skills.”
Err, that’s down to market forces mate, not multiculturalism.
Unlike, say, the NFL that has an almost communist ethos with wages caps, a draft system and fixture scheduling designed to give all teams an equal chance, English football has always been driven by money and survival of the fittest.
Correct, English players have priced themselves out of the market for the most part. The English game has foreign players for thirty years. Spurs had Ardiles and Villa, Ipswich had Thyssen and Muhren etc, etc back in the late 70’s. Liverpool were the first to field a team with no English players in the mid 80’s (they were mainly Scots, Irish and Welsh players).
Careful with your admiration for the guy. clarkson is a rabid anti-American. He wrote a while back in his column in The Sun, I think, that Americans were so backwards that they could hardly walk on their back legs, something like that.
The NFL didn’t have future scheduling until 2002, but I see your point.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.