PATRIOT GAMES: Patriotism Tommy Robinson and The English Working Class
‘True patriotism hates
injustice in its own land more than anywhere else.’
Clarence Darrow
I
On the council estate on
which I grew up I can never remember anyone flying the union flag, let alone
the cross of St George. Though having been born in Dr Johnson’s statement that ‘patriotism is the last refuge of the scoundrel,’ is much quoted because it is funny and contains within it a truth that many recognise, though it is not the truth; what is the case however is that those who shout how patriotic they are often concealing something rather unpleasant. We are right to have a instinctive distrust of the flag wavers and Land of Hope and Glory merchants who, for all there claims to love their country, by their actions are seeking to exclude and abrogate anybody else’s rights to membership of the club.
I have always found the Conservative Party’s claimed ownership of the flag as dishonest as it was nauseating. Unfortunately the Labour Party has now started to wave the union flag in our face as well. Though in the formers case declared attachment to the red white and blue, with its explicit statement that ‘we are all patriots here,’may be designed to reassure voters that a party that has sold off most of the 'family silver', including the countries key energy sector, to foreign companies, does not have other loyalties.
II
Those working class
estates in which the union flag and increasingly the flag of St George are
flying from multiple windows are sending out a very different message, these
are communities that now feel themselves, like the ‘loyalist’ communities in
Belfast, under siege. The white working class on these estates feel themselves,
correctly, to be despised.
There interests, concerns
and loyalties are all derided by the liberal elite, when they complain that
their town centres and communities have been changed beyond recognition by mass
immigration they are accused of racism. Marginalised and despised they fall
back on old symbols of common identity and loyalty and arrogate to themselves
the flag of St George; it is the patriotism of the dispossessed. |
| Tommy Robinson Founder of the English Defence League |
Tommy Robinson and the English Defence League EDL
emerged out of this culture. Those who quickly attacked the EDL as being a neo fascist
outfit, which it soon became, obscured the real sense of pain and insult out of
which it was born; they too could be offended. This offence was generated by Islamacist groups like Muslims
Against Crusades, whose actions such as the burning of poppies were designed to
provoke just such a reaction.
The ‘anti fascist’
warriors of the left quickly mobilised against the EDL whilst completely ignoring
the theocratic fascism of Islamism; the result was predictable, street confrontation
between the tattooed braying thugs of the EDL and the braying incoherence of a
variety of SWP front organisations.
I always felt, and it is
to my discredit that I have not said so openly before, that I never found Tommy
Robinson credible as a demagogue and do not believe he is a racist.[1]
I believe he was blinded by a loathing for Islamism that led him to conflate issues
of culture and religion and much of what he said was framed in bigoted
terminology, though I do think he was speaking for many in those same working
class communities, marginalised and despised by the liberal elite. Triggered by
a confident, bullying, bragging branch of Islam the response was the solidarity
of the football terraces.
Robinson is bigoted, naïve and ill
informed but he is not a fascist, which could not be said for all of those
attracted to the standard he raised. Hanging out with thuggish louts wearing
union jack shorts was guaranteed to invite the full venom of the liberal elite,
uninterested in what he was seeking to articulate, whilst the street fighting
morons who sided with him had no time for more nuanced argument.
Tommy Robinson paid a
heavy price for voicing the mix of prejudice and legitimate grievance. He has
been arrested several times, once on clearly trumped up charges, his bank
account has been frozen as his tax affairs are examined in detail. He has been
assaulted on numerous occasions and he and his family face credible death
threats; he served his prison time in solitary confinement, lest he be attacked
by Muslim gangs within the prison. Now he emerges from the wreckage, having sought to distance him self from the monster he helped create,[2] and there is a veritable queue of commentators from the liberal left waiting to stick the boot in now that he is down on the floor were they always wanted him, - few of whom have ever faced physical threat themselves and have never taken on anyone who might pose a real physical threat.[3]
It is not my purpose here to defend Robinson; I am merely seeking to draw attention to the fact that he has been voicing the concerns felt in many working class communities about the direction in which they feel the country is taking, a country in which their concerns no longer count. You can take issue with some of the ideas expressed, but the concerns are real. Robinson truly believed he was standing up for his community, that he was being patriotic.[4]
III
Working class patriotism
has always been despised by the Marxist left, who traditionally brushed it away
with the dismissive concept ‘false consciousness.’ Whilst the right have
learned how to play upon working class sensibilities for their own ends; the
classic example being the John Bull phenomenon. Though as George Orwell
contested:-
“Patriotism has nothing to do with
Conservatism. It is actually the opposite of Conservatism, since it is a
devotion to something that is always changing and yet is felt to be mystically
the same.”
He also sought to
differentiate between patriotism and nationalism the former he saw as being
simply ‘a devotion to a particular place and a particular way of life, which
one believes to be the best in the world but does not wish to force upon other
people.’[5]
Every nationalist on the other hand aims ‘… to secure more power and more
prestige, not for himself but for the nation or any other unit in which
he seeks to sink his own individuality.’ [6]
One can instantly see some
problems with Orwell’s distinction, since the kind of patriotism found within
the working class communities which I am talking about here can be both
bombastic and aggressive. That said I believe that he identifies something very
important that lies at the heart of patriotism, which is its parochialism; in
truth patriotic feeling of this kind it is not much concerned with other
countries.
“The English, the English, the English are best,
I wouldn’t give tuppence for all of the rest.”
And it is now primarily the
English, the Scottish, or Welsh with which people identify
themselves; the death of a distinctly British identity possibly being one of
the casualties of ever greater devolution.
If you want to see this
kind of patriotism on display the best place is, what used to be called, the
football terraces. Go to Wembley when England
Ask your average liberal
leftie whether they are patriotic or not and they will start to feel definitely
queasy, some will rubbish the whole concept as a con trick performed upon the
masses. That there is some truth in this latter point fails to address the real
feelings that many English people experience. I would argue that a strong
element in this feeling is a sense of solidarity and common identity without
which any notion of community simply isn't possible. This English working class
culture, as David Edgar points out ‘is what survived a largely English
government's assault on its workplaces, its institutions and its communities.’[7]
The ‘patriotic solidarity expressed in such communities is not an
identification with government or nation state but is as often a reaction to
it. The mood being “fuck the government and Guardian reading tossers, we are
English and proud and we don’t care!”This patriotic feeling is also very much part of a hierarchy of loyalties, loyalty often being much greater to district, town, region or even football club. One interesting phenomenon about London is the numbers of people who have settled here from overseas who might struggle in identifying themselves as British or English but feel completely at ease in identifying as being ‘a Londoner.’
IV
In this country we are witnessing
a decline in the macro patriotism of Britishness, which is being replaced by
more local loyalties, to community, city before component country of the UK
As for those working class
communities over which the flag of St George flutters, those who live in houses
cluttered with tacky royal memorabilia and who drink in pubs festooned with
bunting and balloons during the seemingly endless parade of royal weddings and
jubilee celebrations, one does not have to share their passions to understand
if their concerns continue to be derided, belittled and ignored they will turn
they will turn to others to voice their concerns. UKIP[8]
or even more ominously the BNP[9]
are waiting in the wings only to eager to play patriot games, belt out the
national anthem and wave the flag.
V.
Patriotism is a complex
phenomenon, rooted I believe in group and tribal solidarity. When it simply
becomes an excuse for bombast and flag waving it disconnects from that root. At
its best it is about belonging and caring about other members of your tribe.
For my self I can feel the
allure of this solidarity from time to time, am pleased for example when England
[1] To witness a display of
the failure to engage with Robinson and
level of verbal incontinence on a playground scale see http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FtA21eiSmT8
One of the panel seems to think screaming endless repetitions of you’re a
racist at Robinson constitutes debate.
[2] http://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/oct/19/my-journey-with-edl-tommy-robinson
One must read Answar piece with care, it is cleverly crafted to present him in
the best possible light, the master to Robinsons seeker after truth. The truth
about all such encounters is far more complex.
[3] It is precisely this type
of ‘liberal’ journalist who bent over
backwards to explain away the braying mobs calling for the fatwa against Salmon
Rushdie to be carried out..
[4] One doesn’t have to me a
member of UKIP, or share its xenophobic world view to draw attention to the
fact that mass immigration into this country occurred without the communities
who would have to cope with the consequences being consulted. A case can be
made for the free movement of peoples, and as an internationalist I have made
it on a number of occasions; this case was never made to the British people. The
ruling elite made policy decisions and anyone who raised concerns was quickly
branded a racist.
[5] Notes on Nationalism The
Decline of the English Murder and other Essays, Penguin books 1968, p156.
[6] Ibid. It is also worth
noting how well this definition fits the current phenomenon of Islamism.
[8] Right wing, free market,
anti European and anti immigration party
[9] British National Party, an
extreme right wing Fascist party.
[10] Though I must admit to
feeling similarly delighted when Bulgaria
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