NB: Initially I was asking imperial core comrades due to some potential common experiences that I was looking for but it was suggested that I widen the scope and I agree.
Coming from England where 90% of our culture is consumerism or lifted from America (so more consumerism) I have no affinity for what “makes me english”.
The only real culture or tradition in the England is bourgeois propaganda/bread and circuses nonsense like the opening of parliament or the queen’s platty joobs or bank holidays (lol).
As the proletariat/lumpen there is no culture outside of football and consumerism.
So to that end, what exactly makes one English? Chauvinism and imperialism? Two things that only really benefit the aristocracy.
We aren’t even “english”. We are mostly Anglo saxon but most of us have parts gaelic, celtic, norse, germanic etc history. We aren’t Anglo saxons really, we are just mongrels with white skin and no culture so I don’t get what the fucking nationalists are so proud of. Lol our fucking royal family is less Anglo than we are!!
I have no cultural ties to England, this country has only hurt me and millions of others. We have no beautiful cultural events, music, art etc. Its just homogenised capitalist culture shared with most of the imperial core. The same can be found in every country apart from Brit pop. Get in what a claim to fame.
I speak from an English perspective as scotland, Ireland and Wales DO have culture. But in England we’ve lost any we might have had. I even have Irish mostly and some Welsh and Scottish in me but I’ve never gotten to embrace or experience those cultures, it’s stomped out of you and erased through engloid chauvinism growing up.
As a country we’ve became a shell, white people existing to exist, no love or respect for our history because we have none. Its just rich people fighting other rich.
People might say knights and Kings etc but how is that my history? It’s the history of the aristocracy battling for their wants. As a “serf” we’ve just existed. They try to teach us English history in school and its just slaughter and exploitation. There’s nothing good. It’s all just murder and death and it’s not “we need to be better than our history”, it’s “this history allowed us to be better than everyone else” and that makes me sick.
So with this in mind, why would I care if another country took over? Say china came and ripped England from the royals grip, why would I worry provided I trusted them to look after the citizens better than our own government?
My allegiance isn’t to my country or some nostalgic memory of history, its to human beings. To the workers of this world and to that end what do I care of national identity and my non existent culture?
It’s struck me as a thought, does this exemplify why leftist or more accurately communist thought is such a threat to governments. Its not constrained by national pride or identity so those mechanisms and means of control fail right?
The only reason I see anyone for having any loyalty to England is because we are trapped here, and as traumatised workers without an escape we are doomed to just scrape some existence out of this wretched nation, living in fear that if we don’t swear loyalty to our flag we will die in hunger and pain.
I dunno I’m just sundowning I guess. Depressed and chatting shit.
Edit: I think I just need a hug lol 🤣
White USian here.
Culturally I have nothing to really be proud of. My recent ancestors (recent in the grand scheme of human history) were settlers. Did a DNA test because my family name could’ve either been Irish or German, and I wanted to know. Nope. It came out 70% English and 20% Scottish, and statistically insignificant spatterings of Swedish and Aegean, which would make sense since at some point the Romans occupied what is modern England, and the Vikings raided the coasts occasionally later. The DNA results also specified that it is very common for people of English heritage to have about 20% Scottish, and I suspect that is the DNA left over from the Celtic inhabitants pre-Rome.
So an English descendant living in the US. Wonderful. I don’t feel inclined to go into genealogy because my mental health likely can’t handle knowing the atrocities my specific ancestors personally did, and thus the events which led to my existence.
I once read a piece about whiteness, and one point I got out of it was that to combat whiteness, you need to find out what your ancestors were before they were “white”, since whiteness is a construct that was and is used to create a sort of “elite club” with exclusive membership and thus exclude and “be better” than the “others”. Even the Irish were excluded from this “elite club” until it became convenient to use them to help keep slaves “in line” and the whites didn’t want the Irish to join the slaves in solidarity. So I did this DNA test and it didn’t help. The “English” (read as “the whites” of the British Isles) have effectively destroyed the cultures of the Anglo-Saxons before, and the Ango-Saxons were invaders themselves who erased the Roman-Celtic groups before them. The Romans tried to erase the Celtic peoples before that. So trying to revert back to what “my people” were before they were full-time oppressors leads me to the Celtic peoples. Looking those up you find the Celtic Britons.
Information on the Celtic Britons is… scarce to put it mildly (I fucking wonder why, couldn’t possibly be because the Romans, Anglo-Saxons, and English systematically erased them). It is nigh impossibly to find information on how to read, write, and speak “Common Britonic”, the language and dialectic group of the Britons. There are no surviving festivals, religious practices, foods, music, or anything of the sort. The closest you can get is by observing the Cornish, but the English have stolen so much from them that to emulate them, even in the name of finding my pre-oppressor roots, would 100% be appropriation. Same with the Scots who’ve managed to keep a lot of Pictish heritage, but the Picts were pretty different from the Britons culturally.
As for contemporary culture, I’m a foodie, but my family’s food is bland, so nothing to be proud of there. Not interested in Brit-pop, American football, or soccer. American pop is soul-less.
Deviating from nation or ethnic culture and to lifestyle and hobby cultures… well I love DnD, but the culture and history is loaded in misogyny and racism, which as a DM I try my best to keep away from my table. I’m a techie, but the tech culture is all rise-and-grind, misogyny, and libertarianism. I’m a gamer, but the toxicity of the gamer community is infamous and the reason I generally hate multiplayer experiences.
I guess from all this the only culture I belong to that I can be proud of unequivocally is the BDSM/kinkster community. Despite having to fight each and every year to be allowed at Pride, we are revolutionaries. The “leather-daddies” of Stonewall, our very serious consent culture, and the nigh-absolute sexual empowerment of any and all gender identities to be who or what you want, when you want, with whatever relationship you want with your fellow humans (so long as they consent), that is revolutionary.
Tldr; I’m a white USian with English blood, nothing to be proud of there, despite my desperate and likely misguided attempts to eek something out of it to escape my deep self loathing (world’s smallest violin in comparison to what my people are doing every day to everyone else, I know). Most of the communities to which I belong have shit cultures, save one, despite the efforts by so so so many people, even those we are in solidarity with, to keep us hidden.
Before you downvote or rip into me!: I know full well I touched on some delicate topics, and that I said a lot here. Please empathize, I am trying my best to expand my understanding of colonialism, feminism, and the various oppressive systems we live in, but as a white person in the US my understanding can only ever be complete shit at best. If there are bad takes in here, I welcome clarification and education. The things I discussed here I have only discussed in depth with my spouse and therapist about, so please be understanding that I am trying to be real and revealing some serious vulnerabilities in my own life I am dealing with.
Not at all, thank you for feeling comfortable enough to open up and share!
I can relate a lot to what you said especially with naturally gravitating to traditionally “nerdy” interests only to feel isolated because of rampant misogyny, racism and chauvinism of these groups.
I was huge into anime growing up but I can’t even bring myself to watch it anymore, a big part of that is depression/adhd killing hobbies and interests but also the degeneracy of certain groups of the fandom make me ashamed. I know it’s not representative of everyone at all but remembering back to the community before I dropped out and the toxicity just makes me recoil.
Same with gaming, what a sorry group of people which is weird me saying this as someone who spends hours a day playing video games. It’s why I enjoy the memes about video game enjoyer vs Gamer. The later represents essentially the core issues with a lot of traditionally male dominated and elitist communities. The former representing the positive shift by members of the community to open ot up to others whether they be female or lgbt+ etc.