I read an article in the London Metro this morning that said that Morrissey suggested that "England" was no more than a memory. Now seems he may have been misquoted, but the premise of my argument is the same)
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The question is; is he correct? Has the concept of England and Englishness been, or is being, consigned to the dustbin of history?
Is our culture going the way of the Roman culture? I have no doubt that a Roman citizen in the time of Hadrian stood on some street rightly proud that he was a Roman, and rightly proud of what the notion of being a Roman represented. Proud of his country, his culture, his military history and what they as a nation have contributed to "civilisation".
A hundred years ago I could imagine a scene where an Englishman would be stood on a street, just like the aforementioned roman, and would have had exactly the same thoughts. I could imagine it today. But could I imagine it in say 200 years time?
Towards the end of the Roman Empire the cultural identity of the Romans was totally unrecognisable from that which existed during the time of the Republic or the early emperors. The changes to the Roman culture did not begin because of military defeats and the subsequent influx of victorious tribes into Roman cities. The change began because Roman economic success and relatively high standards of living compared with the rest of the known world. And these factors began economic migration that lead to a complete change in the cultural identity of Rome.
The European Union currently finds itself subject to similar economic migration and for the same reasons. Why would a child from a Polish, or Indian, or Pakistani, or Somali family for example, give two hoots about, or identify with, the likes of Lord Nelson, or the Duke of Wellington or Queen Victoria or Winston Churchill? Why should they have any connection to the likes of Charles Darwin or Sir Isaac Newton or Shakespeare or Dickens. They don't. And this low level change within our society, which while being very slow, is happening and changing the whole idea of what it means to be British.
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But is it possible or desirable to stop such change? I believe that as a country we need to make that decision now. We need to explain the long term consequences of the current situation to the population, and give them the opportunity to decide how they want their nation and culture to evolve over the next 200 years. And we must be able to discuss such matters without the fear of being labled a racist, or a right winger or whatever.
I for one would not like to see the Cenotaph on remembrance Sunday deserted because the population no longer associates itself, or is no longer connected through a common history and culture, with such events.
I think Morrissey was probably misquoted. The NME need all the publicity they can get.
Since Morrissey is the son of Irish immigrants it's hard to imagine that he has a problem with it. Morrissey lives in Rome now - so what's the difference?
But then again - he is Northern. And Northern boys like gravy....
Sorry to keep bugging people about this, but extra long links are becoming a real nuisance on this site because they force the page to extend out to the right making it difficult to read without having to resort to the horizontal scroll bar.
To stop this happening is easy...
1) Copy your link location.
2) Type: [ url=
(Without the space after the [ )
3) Paste in your link location after the = sign with no spaces.
4) Type: ] Link Here [ /url ]
(Again without the spaces next to the ] and [ )
This will create an embedded link with the words "Link Here" highlighted and make life much easier for everyone.
Societies have always been subject to change. What's different this time is the rate at which it's happening and, as you say, political correctness is stifling debate about the issue.
Will England be recognisable in 200 years time? I suspect not, but I think we should be more concerned about the changes that we face over the next 30 years or so.
I think we should accept the fact that change is inevitable - it's just part of human history. But we should be very concerned about the extraordinary rate at which it is happening and, in particular, the contribution that the EU is making to the problem.
I agree. You can't change a natural phenomena, and in 1000 years people then will not give a monkeys about the concerns we have today. To them and their society at that time, what happened in our time will be an irrelevance. As it is for us when we think about British society 1000 years ago. I bet there was some dude stood in the mud 1000 years ago, watching the Normans marching through his village thinking "how is the presence of this lot going to affect my way of life, my culture" etc. But to us, now in 2007, it is an irrelevance.
And that is why all our bitching and complaining today about immigration will be lost in the mists of time, and a total irrelevance to those who live here 1000 years from now, because they will have their own people movement problems to deal with and the effects of our current immigration will not even register with them. Their society will have been influenced by it no doubt, but just as our society today was influenced by the Norman conquest, we don't talk about it as an issue. It will be the same for them in 1000 years time.
The problem is that there is only so much space on this island, not to mention the Earth. I mean imagine the UK with 100 million people, or 200 million people, that is simply not possible. So with that in mind at some point somebody has to say "STOP enough is enough we simply can't take anymore". There should be no racial element to it, STOP means STOP to everybody whether you are from Australia or Somalia. At that point there will have to be a 1 in 1 out policy. Or due to reproduction in the population already here at that time a 3 out 1 in policy in order to maintain a constant population that can be sustained on this island.
"Englishness is not dependent on going to Knightsbridge".
Absolutely. But the point about the way the country is changing is still valid.
Unfortunately few politicians think much beyond the current government and the next election. They are, presumably, a fairly random selection of people, so you'd imagine that some of them would feel the same way as you and I obviously do Tony, but there are few that are prepared to voice their opinions, despite the evidence that the same concerns are held by quite large numbers of the electorate.
It has always been the downfall of our parliamentary style of government that the objectives and strategies never seem to stretch beyond the next ballot and of course perceived short term political advantage.
But Englishness is, I suspect, far deeper than that.
It is more than Gallons of tea, Cricket, a sense of fair play and a support for the underdog.
It is the sense of belonging to the island, the past, the traditions and so on. Scones and tweeds and sports jackets and sensible brogues and church on high days and holy days (Christmas and Easter at least) and an innate sense that one is ENGLISH and we are the best!!! (Flanders and Swann sung it all so well).
It takes more than a lot of immigrants and a bunch of yobs to destroy that.
But much is being eroded nonetheless. Drugs and the destruction of our manufacturing and technical skills, which used to rule, the erosion of our education means we have lost that sense of excellence which built the Rolls Royce and the Spitfire.
It all comes down to the lamentable quality of our rulers - our MPs and unelected cronies - most of whom ought to be consigned to the dustbin as they are lacking in morals, perception and judgement... and are so easily bought. They have, without public permission, loosened the constraints and values that were in place for the good of public wellbeing and national pride.
I agree, jonjii. Much of it has been eroded - irreversibly - by deranged pinko loonies who have smarmed and sleazed their way into power.
Morrissey is going to sue the NME. Rightly so.
He's not scared of litigation (history proves that).
Looks like he thinks the NME misquoted him.
thought so.........
The assessment that our current political system is not suitable for this point in our history is correct. The shortsightedness and selfishness of all politicians and political parties in their thirst for power is most certainly going to lead to the slow, but inevitable change of the sense of British / Scottish / Welsh / Irish identity, into something that those who live here in 300 years time will not understand, let alone care about.
All parties and their policies are totally focussed on the next election, and will do anything and everything to pull in as many votes as possible. I feel that the time is right for all parties to come together and formulate a long term plan of how to engineer our Britain, to remain Britain. And that means thinking 100, 200 years ahead. Such blue water thinking would transcend the present selfish short termism that we currently see. It might even engage a new generation to participate in politics and forge a new unity that we simply don't have anymore.
But I fear that this is all way, way to much to ask from our present leaders.
Morrissey is going to sue the NME .... Looks like he thinks the NME misquoted him.
Are you sure about that? The news reports I heard said Morrissey accepts NME have given a fair and accurate report of what he actually said but they have then misrepresented those words as meaning something else, something more than they actually are.
Looks like it'll keep lawyers in clover and fine wine until the other side of easter at least.
I would post a new thread on this but it is Saturday and such a thread would not get listed till Monday.
So
How would you improve the British Parliamentary system?
Part of the hassle is always the Punch and Judy politics going on seemingly on every issue. DC when he first became Leader said he wanted to get away from that.. but ... well TB was very unaccommodating to anything the Tories said... and the glowering Flypaper Brown is less welcoming.
But the difficulty with the current system, especially as it has evolved lately, is that of long term vision. If he goes on his current course Brown will effectively dismantle our unwritten constitution centralising a huge amount of power on himself. (Stalin like)
So what are the better alternatives.. Do we go for a executive divorced from the legislature and the legislature mostly wheeling and dealing in cross party committees getting business done.. (ala the States)
But the States has shortcomings. Too much power is centered on the President who is elected for a fixed term re-electable once. So a first term pres is devoting a lot of his energy in making sure he gets a second term.. then the second term is devoted to providing a legacy.
Also the committee systems have lobbyists and dealers and are hugely open to corruption (I am told)
The French system similarly is unwieldy.. The president of France kind of gets in there and seems to last forever with lots of power. (7 years recently cut to five I think.. let me check wiki.. yes right. Chirac had his second term cut by 2 years) anyway we have a monarch so we don't need a president.
This is a discussion thread so let us see any ideas how we can improve the system we have. Think Big, Think Internet voting, think direct governmental participation.
I believe that they UK should have a federal system, similar to Australia, with England, N Ireland, Scotland and Wales each having their own government with separate powers. There should then be a Federal Government with its areas of responsibility.
Each national government would be responsible for its own policies on Health, Education, Transport, social policy etc, and would have to raise its own taxes.
The Federal Government would have responsibility for Defence, Foreign Relations etc, and there would also be a Federal Tax that would be split evenly around the country depending on population size. Such a system would make it each national parliaments responsibility to make their area competitive in the globalised world since most of their tax revenue would be raised by them.
This would do away with the West Lothian question and other constitutional anomalies. It would allow each nation to develop how it chooses all under the protection of the federal government umbrella.
My great great grandfather a telegraphist and later a journalist for a London newspaper is my idea of an englishman, always fighting for the truth so difficult then because the 'wire' was slow with world news. Truth died in this country under Blair, Labour and the 'special relationship' a partnership with America based on Zionism (a truth kept from the British people for years).
Britain lost it when she caused the deaths of million of kids in Iraq.
So now is the time for sorrow, forgiveness and cultural bereavement Tony, maybe after some brave apologies we might get The 'English Statesmanship' back so admired by the Indian people in the days of the Raj. Rule Britannia!
Brilliant. But you can't blame yourself; you are obviously the product of the last 10 years of the Labour education system, taught simply to pass exams, with no ability to think critically or imaginatively.
