Are you proud to be British ?

OK

OK, but I didn't notice many 'Rule Britannia' posts on this thread, most people seem to be rather more cautiously 'patriotic' - and no wonder, given that it seems to be un-PC at the moment!

rendering rendition

Ana I think most nations, cultures, tribes probably have something to be ashamed of. I'm just trying to introduce a reality check to those who are about to burst into a rendering of Rule Britannia.

Your quote is by Samual Johnson in 1775, just a tad earlier than Cecil Rhodes!

Perhaps there should be a new thread: 'Are you ashamed to be British?'

Europeans in the 1950's only had access to one version of the story, the one that showed triumphant British soldiers seizing those wild, bloodthirsty and cannibal black terrorists. But this version always forgot to show the deep desperation of the Kikuyu people, the hunger, misery, illness, and exploitation, the usurpation of their farming lands to be colonized. Many years of humiliation were required for a people that was never a warring people to rebel into a violent guerrilla war.

Remember that Nelson Mandela was also a freedom fighter or was he masquerading too?

Doubtless there was violence in both sides, but it was only last year that the British government has had to offer an apology to the Kikuya and a more truthful picture emerged.

Durhamjen - I did not realise that a child born in this country could not be registered here as British.
It is only fairly recently that a child born to British mother abroad could have a British passport; previously they were only eligible if the father was British! I am surlrised they did not change all the silly rules at the same time.

I've enjoyed catching up with this thread. I feel lucky to have been born in the UK, and it's good to see so many interesting and grounded contributions to the costs and benefits of the British Empire. This thread, like the one on Scottish Independence, is so informative

I was in Kenya at the time of the Mau Mau, Aka, and it wasn't pretty, especially for the thousands of innocent Africans butchered and terrorised by the Mau Mau thugs masquerading as freedom fighters. Jomo Kenyatta, the first President of independent Kenya, who was a very tough cookie indeed, bore no grudges and was very harsh with his own people when he thought it necessary. It's not nice and not right but it happens that way, especially in Africa.

I can't remember who said something like...Patriotism is the last refuge of the scoundrel..was it Cecil Rhodes, perhaps? There is an element of truth there somewhere, I'm sure, but not the certainty of being proud of the nation's resistance during say, the Battle of Britain.

A very good set of maps to show you where people in London can afford to live on benefits.
www.londonspovertyprofile.org.uk/indicators/

The people who are forcing them out of their homes are British!
Of course it's British.
https://www.google.com/url?q=http://www.theguardian.com/society/2014/mar/05/families-priced-out-london-homes-benefit-cap&sa=U&ei=nFtNU8zPBoaI7Aa7gYGoDw&ved=0CAkQFjAB&client=internal-uds-cse&usg=AFQjCNEBdIVF4kp4DbS4ok8DkUB_6Y0LPA
It's IDS who is making the British rules to cap benefits, isn't it?

But the situation of those people is not specifically British, DurhamJen.

This makes me not proud to be British.
www.bbc.com/news/uk-26924411

Thatbags, with regard to my Danish grandson, you said all it needs is a change in the law. The law has been changed, and changed back again.
He was born in 2002 and cannot consider himself British legally. His sister was born in 2007 and she has a British passport and is British.
Same circumstances, different year. He was born in York, she was born in Norfolk.

Oh, man, presumably.
I'm not sure about that. I think a lot of women would say they are patriotic, possibly even more of them than men.

'mam'?

One can be happily British (proud is the wrong word, as others have said) without being damagingly patriotic. I'm happily British but I'm not sure I could say I'm patriotic; that would depend on circumstances. Never "my country right or wrong" but it is my country and my homeland. That counts for a lot.

Must be a 'mam' thing, this rallying to the flag. I think you've soaked up the propaganda put out at the time PA; the Mau Mau were more sinned against than sinners. And that was only one small example of the way the Brits and others treated other less developed nations.

Yes, we can acknowledge the past Jack but who said anything about living our lives there?

But then I suppose we 'had god on our side'

"The greater the state, the more wrong and cruel its patriotism, and the greater is the sum of suffering upon which its power is founded."

Leo Tolstoy

Minibags thinks Britain is fab. She has acquaintances abroad who agree with her and wonder why Brits talk down their country so much. Is Britain's history any worse than other colonial powers (not just European ones), or is it better in some respects?

I found the book Guns, Germs and Steel by Jared Diamond illuminating about why Europe (the West) dominated world development for so long. It has nothing to do with the people there being any better or worse than people elsewhere in the world. I recommend it.

Is it a case of ignoring the crimes or is it a case of them being put in context and realising, Britain was, and never has been, the only nation to behave in that fashion at that time?

There have been some horrendous acts against humanity - some of which are listed here:

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Genocides_in_history#Africa

It is one thing to feel saddened about your country's past behaviour but it needs to be kept in context and there is, after all, nothing that can be done to change history. Changing today's atrocities, however, is another matter altogether.

What if our children had to stand up and swear allegiance to the flag as they do in the USA? Would that inculcate pride in their nation?

Aka We can't live our lives on what happened yesterday. There is more than enough nastiness to go around happening now no matter where you chose to set up home. Having made your choice and settled in that place you should do all in your power to make it the best you can and not keep looking over your shoulder at what was. It is the here and now that has the most impact on your life.

Sadly, Aka, the abuses of Empire receive far more coverage than the good things. For whatever reason, the Mau Mau were murdering savages repressed by a harsh colonial regime that was typical of the time. Who do you blame for the much later terrible Rwanda inter-tribal massacres? There is no excuse for any of these horrors, but they still happened. I regard the mis-treatment of Boer prisoners by the British in the Boer war as bad, and the forced repatriation of the Cossacks and White Russians by us after WW2.

But when considering the legacy of the British Empire ask yourself how many black people owed their lives to the determined and successful efforts of the Royal Navy to eliminate the maritime slave trade after it was finally abolished in the nineteenth century. Probably hundreds of thousands, whilst the number of RN sailors who died of disease etc. doing that was appalling. Sadly, history is full of dark and nasty places, but on balance I am still proud to be British.

No I'm not particularly proud to be British, and I'm certainly disgusted by the atrocities committed in the name of the British Empire.

British Empire Crimes