England softens up
They’re fluttering everywhere — on apartment balconies, from car antennas, in shop windows.
While the English soccer team members scrambled Wednesday to save face in the World Cup after an embarrassing opening run, their compatriots were busy expressing support here at home by flying the national colors.
But don’t look for the Union Jack, the familiar red-white-and-blue symbol of British might that once lorded it over far-flung outposts of empire. The flags on display now are peculiar to England only, as is the World Cup team.
Just as Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland, the other parts of the United Kingdom, have their own national banners, so does England: a red cross on a white field in honor of St. George, the nation’s patron saint. Fittingly, he was a slayer of dragons.
To avoid a humiliating early exit from the tournament, the English World Cup squad had to triumph Wednesday over Slovenia, the smallest nation to field a team, whose players had gone on an impressive run and loomed large nonetheless.
To the relief of millions here, England prevailed, 1-0.
But the ubiquity of the English flag these days isn’t just about victory on the soccer pitch. In many ways, the flag-waving is as much a story about slaying some inner demons as well as external ones.
For many years, an attempt has been underway to exorcise an ugly, violent nationalism in favor of a kinder, gentler one; to replace an image of bared teeth with a smile, even if the dental hygiene remains questionable.
Because England is the dominant force within Great Britain, accounting for about 85% of the population, pride in being English, unfairly or no, has long been conflated with unsavory British jingoism: racist, in-your-face and thuggish. (British soccer hooliganism often drinks from this poisonous well.)
Such attitudes are in part a hangover from the days of empire, when browbeating “colonials” and subjugating entire peoples was as much a national pastime as cricket.
But a more benign sense of English identity, detached from aggressive British nativism, has been brewing, especially in the last decade. Nationalism is no longer a dirty word, and flashing some English pride no longer comes freighted only with perceptions of a bullying arrogance.
Surprisingly, the left-of-center Labor Party, which was given the heave-ho last month after 13 years in power, is responsible for some of this shift, if indirectly. When Labor won in a landslide under Tony Blair in 1997, many voters were rejecting a Conservative Party that they felt had become nastily nationalistic, excessive in its anti-Europe and anti-immigrant views.
Soon afterward, the Labor government granted greater law-making powers to Wales and Scotland, where nationalist parties and pride in indigenous Celtic culture are a force.
That left the English with a bit of an identity crisis, wondering who they were in the British scheme of things and what set them apart from the western and northern inhabitants of this rainy island.
There still isn’t a definitive answer, in spite of a cottage industry of books that has sprung up examining what it means to be English. Whether in terms of culture or psychology, “Englishness” remains a fuzzy concept.
Various stabs at description have included habitual complaining about beastly weather and maintaining a stiff upper lip. There’s also nostalgia for certain TV programs, love of the monarchy, a talent for sardonic self-deprecation, an instinctive understanding of the complex class system and the unfathomable appeal of a yeast concoction known as Marmite.
But one thing Englishness isn’t: It’s not as threatening or intimidating as it once was.
Times have changed when even leftists can find something lovable about English pride, which these days has made room for people of different ages, races and sexual orientations. The flag may still be red and white, but those who wrap themselves in it come in a lot more colors.
“There is an England-ness that is emerging which is actually quite a nice England-ness,” writer Yasmin Alibhai-Brown said on the BBC recently. “In the last few years, the flag has become a much more temperate, kind of joyful symbol, and I don’t see any reason why the English shouldn’t enjoy that moment.”
She said, though, that the ugly side hasn’t altogether vanished.
Indeed, last year saw the birth of the far-right English Defense League, devoted to preventing what it considers the Islamicization of England. The group has held protests throughout Britain, with the St. George flag a common sight, leading to occasional violent clashes with anti-fascists.
Less belligerent but still uncharitable are the attitudes some English folk harbor toward their European neighbors. There was plenty of gloating over France’s elimination from the tournament this week and the poor performance of the German team.
To be fair, that rudeness extends to England’s own squad. When the team only managed to draw in its first two matches against the United States and Algeria, English fans started heckling their own men.
“Nice to see your home fans booing,” said Wayne Rooney, England’s star striker.
Incredibly, he felt the need to apologize for the statement, which in itself only served to illustrate another bit of Englishness: the tendency to say “sorry” all the time, even if it’s neither necessary nor sincere.
Few are apologizing for the flowering of English consciousness and pride. And whether the national team wins or loses, a new reality has taken hold that’s also an old one: There’ll always be an England.
