Protecting Our Culture
A minor member of the caretaker administration which tried to preside over the declining seven years of the Thatcher government has urged that those who "literally spit hate at our country" should be deported. I couldn't agree more. Our country has enough problems without people literally spitting hate, although I must confess I've never literally seen it done myself.
The gentleman in question, whose name escapes my memory, also proposed a handy new name for the so-called "shoot to kill policy", that protective safety measure whereby a certain Officer Five-Rounds became an unwitting instrument of terrorist policy. "I rather prefer the expression shoot-to-protect rather than shoot-to-kill," the gentleman said. "I think that is a more accurate description of what happened."
Well, I'm glad we agree on the shooting part. Shots were certainly fired. Aside from the single member of the foreign, visa-expired, suspiciously-dressed public who was protected with extreme prejudice, Stockwell station was full of collaterally-protected members of the British public who saw what happened; so it cannot very well be denied. Calling it "shoot to protect" also helps differentiate the act of shooting from the act of permitting a suspected suicide bomber to climb unhindered onto a bus, which in light of the events of 7 July can hardly be construed as protective of anyone. Perhaps they thought the bus was suspiciously roofed.
Terrorism "as a generality" (a literal one?) has been growing for thirty years and threatens not only the west. This explains, once again, why Iraq cannot be relevant to the matter. The real problem, according to the gentleman in question, whose name escapes my memory, is that there are many people who "for reasons that are irrational, dislike the Anglo-Saxon way of life". The gentleman seems obsessed with strange, hardcore minorities who do strange, hardcore things - one wonders how he and the Tories ever managed to fall out. First people who literally spit hate at our country, now people who dislike wattle-and-daub living accommodation and getting pluckily thrashed at the Battle of Hastings - what is the world coming to?
This may seem a trivial matter, but I do have a personal stake in it. Though I was born in this country, I come of foreign stock. I have Scandinavian features and a French surname, which presumably means that my dominant genes are Norman. As the more pure-blooded among you may be aware, the Normans invaded this country, on grounds of dubious legality and with very little convincing evidence in their favour, only nine hundred and thirty-nine years ago this autumn. I wonder if this is long enough for satisfactory assimilation to have taken place.
It appears not. Many of us who were born here and live here still somehow contrive to hate the culture of the UK, according to the gentleman in question, whose name escapes my memory. Some of us (myself included) don't even know what that culture is supposed to consist in; although if it has anything to do with cricket, warm beer or the good old Blitz spirit, I cheerfully admit to a literal urge to spit chilled Heineken at it.
The gentleman in question, whose name escapes my memory, also proposed a handy new name for the so-called "shoot to kill policy", that protective safety measure whereby a certain Officer Five-Rounds became an unwitting instrument of terrorist policy. "I rather prefer the expression shoot-to-protect rather than shoot-to-kill," the gentleman said. "I think that is a more accurate description of what happened."
Well, I'm glad we agree on the shooting part. Shots were certainly fired. Aside from the single member of the foreign, visa-expired, suspiciously-dressed public who was protected with extreme prejudice, Stockwell station was full of collaterally-protected members of the British public who saw what happened; so it cannot very well be denied. Calling it "shoot to protect" also helps differentiate the act of shooting from the act of permitting a suspected suicide bomber to climb unhindered onto a bus, which in light of the events of 7 July can hardly be construed as protective of anyone. Perhaps they thought the bus was suspiciously roofed.
Terrorism "as a generality" (a literal one?) has been growing for thirty years and threatens not only the west. This explains, once again, why Iraq cannot be relevant to the matter. The real problem, according to the gentleman in question, whose name escapes my memory, is that there are many people who "for reasons that are irrational, dislike the Anglo-Saxon way of life". The gentleman seems obsessed with strange, hardcore minorities who do strange, hardcore things - one wonders how he and the Tories ever managed to fall out. First people who literally spit hate at our country, now people who dislike wattle-and-daub living accommodation and getting pluckily thrashed at the Battle of Hastings - what is the world coming to?
This may seem a trivial matter, but I do have a personal stake in it. Though I was born in this country, I come of foreign stock. I have Scandinavian features and a French surname, which presumably means that my dominant genes are Norman. As the more pure-blooded among you may be aware, the Normans invaded this country, on grounds of dubious legality and with very little convincing evidence in their favour, only nine hundred and thirty-nine years ago this autumn. I wonder if this is long enough for satisfactory assimilation to have taken place.
It appears not. Many of us who were born here and live here still somehow contrive to hate the culture of the UK, according to the gentleman in question, whose name escapes my memory. Some of us (myself included) don't even know what that culture is supposed to consist in; although if it has anything to do with cricket, warm beer or the good old Blitz spirit, I cheerfully admit to a literal urge to spit chilled Heineken at it.
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