Saturday, June 10, 2006
Pinning my colours to the masthead
I have to agree with Tony Ferguson here on the topic of World Cup flag-waving.
While the "PC brigade" are usually non-existant straw men used by people who want some convenient cover behind which to be racist or intolerant, there seems to have been a higher than normal amount of jobsworthiness concerning this World Cup and the St. George's Cross.
While there is an obvious correlation between the displaying of the English flag and a certain racist/xenophobic mindset (to generalise even more crassly: white van men) - that doesn't make the flag, or the Union Flag for that matter, a racist symbol. Indeed, I'm of the view that any suggestion that it is is to allow certain proto-racist "nationalists" to misappropriate what is, after all, a symbol that we all own.
Oh, and another thing - I found William Hague's German joke funny and I don't feel the slightest animosity to the Germans as a nation. So there, Denis MacShane.
Enjoy your World Cup everyone - I'm off to Manchester to watch it on the big screen!
While the "PC brigade" are usually non-existant straw men used by people who want some convenient cover behind which to be racist or intolerant, there seems to have been a higher than normal amount of jobsworthiness concerning this World Cup and the St. George's Cross.
While there is an obvious correlation between the displaying of the English flag and a certain racist/xenophobic mindset (to generalise even more crassly: white van men) - that doesn't make the flag, or the Union Flag for that matter, a racist symbol. Indeed, I'm of the view that any suggestion that it is is to allow certain proto-racist "nationalists" to misappropriate what is, after all, a symbol that we all own.
Oh, and another thing - I found William Hague's German joke funny and I don't feel the slightest animosity to the Germans as a nation. So there, Denis MacShane.
Enjoy your World Cup everyone - I'm off to Manchester to watch it on the big screen!
# posted by Joe Taylor @ 9:50 am 
Comments:
Your comment about this sort of political correctness allowing the racists to misappropriate the flag is spot on
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