Please Stop Waving Your Stupid Flags

And put your shirts back on too — it’s not very English!

From time to time, the UK gets wrapped up (sometimes literally) in bouts of flag-waving. Unlike our American cousins or even our European neighbours, we’ve never indulged in flying the flag, apart from when the national football team is playing or on state occasions. Even on St George's Day, you can walk down a street and forget it was the 23rd April (St George’s Day).

I’m talking about England, where I grew up. In Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland, flag flying is more widespread. The Celtic countries annexed by the English over the centuries feel their need to assert their independence.

England, on the other hand, always felt embarrassed. Centuries of colonialism and death had negated the need to prove Britannia ruled the waves anymore. We were part of a bigger world order now — the EU for one— and the need for rampant patriotism was over.

Until ten years ago.

The Brexit referendum in 2016 and subsequent disastrous exit from the EU reignited old hatred, if in truth, they had ever gone away. That dislike of anyone foreign: anyone from Europe or anyone who had slightly brown skin or a funny accent.

I remember reports the day after the referendum where people were going up to bewildered European workers, who had been here for years, telling them that they had to go home — a full five years before Britain even left the EU!

This hatred has never gone away. Once Brexit didn’t achieve its aims of stopping immigrants (it was never going to), the wrath of the right was directed at asylum seekers and Small Boats.

The English Channel at its narrowest point is 21 miles. And while the channel is dangerous, both from shipping and currents, people make the crossing from France to try and gain asylum in the UK. These are the Small Boats.

Those daily crossings that have had the right-wingers' knickers in a twist for years. While failing to understand that these people aren’t doing these crossings for fun, it’s not a watersport. They are doing it out of necessity. They aren’t coming here to spend a night in a free hotel.

One of the reasons for the current bout of flag flying is that, due to overcrowding in the detention centres, asylum seekers are being housed in hotels. The current dispute centres around the ‘glamorous’ Bell Hotel in Epping. An ugly place, which the right-wingers think is the reason people come to the country.

“Come to England and get a free meal and bed at The Bell Hotel! Whoopee!”

There’s nothing wrong with being patriotic. England has produced some of the finest writers, artists, musicians, engineers, and scientists on the planet. But these people aren’t celebrating English invention or creativity. The flag is a thinly veiled prop for prejudice. In short, they may as well fly the swastika.

The flag of St. George or the Union Jack is a way out. No one can accuse them of being racist or prejudiced.

“I’m English — I’m just flying the flag. Americans do it all the time.”

Which is the problem.

Not Americans, but this idea that if Americans can do it, then so can we. But it’s not in our culture. We don’t wave flags. Whenever you see an English person waving a flag, they look awkward, as though they don’t know what to do with it.

It’s for this reason, whenever bouts of flag waving have appeared before — normally in August as people are on holiday — it generally passes by September when people realise they’ve got to go back to work.

But this isn’t any other time. This is now. This is Trump Time. And in Britain, Trump is morphing into Nigel Farage. The leader of Reform UK, the self-styled death child of MAGA: Make Britain Great Again. Kick out foreigners.

Recent opinion polls, frighteningly suggest, if an Election were held today, Nigel Farage would be Prime Minister with a sizable majority. A majority big enough to enact policies that even the Tories might find egregious.

Many have pointed out that an election is four years away, and a week is a long time in politics. However, people said that about Trump. History is a powerful tool to see how things may play out in the UK.

The British people in the past have always rejected the far right. While there are plenty who were racist, there were many, even traditional conservatives like my parents, who baulked at the idea of a far-right power grab.

Unfortunately, the attention span and intelligence of the British population have clearly waned. Social media and clowns like Farage, backed up by the right-wing press, can whip up a storm in minutes if there is a perceived attack on our freedoms from foreigners.

In the past, people would reject Farage. I don’t believe that now, as the idiotic flag-waving has shown. Even moderate people seem to be joining in. Even liberals from my own family have said, “Enough is enough, we need to stop immigration.” Without ever actually asking who cleans the asses of all the old people in care homes and hospitals, or picks all those vegetables in summer.

It’s not the people coming in on the Small Boats who are taking your jobs or paying you low wages; it’s big business and the politicians who cosy up to them.

They are the ones you should be shouting at, not innocent people who have probably walked on foot from Syria or Afghanistan. Christ, most of these protesters probably can’t even walk to the pub and back without a taxi.

It’s so easy to stand on the street with your flags, shouting at immigrants. But they aren’t the ones who are going to change government policy or make sure you’ve got a decent pension or living wage. The only people who can do that are the politicians. So maybe they should be shouting at Nigel Farage and asking him what he’s going to do when he gets into power.

People may point to the fact that I don’t even live in the UK. So what’s it to me?

But it is still my home country. A country I care for and that has a lot of very good people in it. People who are being constantly told to shut up or called Loony Lefties, because they don’t support the deportation of women and children.

I don’t support it, and neither should you. I mean, if you really loved your life and your country, wouldn’t you have more meaningful things to do than standing on street corners with a flag or covering a hundred lamp posts with them?

Think about it?

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