One must admit that whoever wrote the following song did not know much about the history or the politics of the Celtic fringe. And maybe there's a touch of hypocrisy about it.
WE WANT OUR ENGLAND BACK
Goodbye to my England, So long my old friend
Your days are numbered, being brought to an end
To be Scottish, Irish or Welsh that's fine
But don't say you're English, that's way out of line.
The French and the Germans may call themselves such
So may Norwegians, the Swedes and the Dutch
You can say you are Russian or maybe a Dane
But don't say you're English ever again.
At Broadcasting House the word is taboo
In Brussels it's scrapped, in Parliament too
Even schools are affected, staff do as they're told
They must not teach children about England of old.
Writers like Shakespeare, Milton and Shaw
The pupils don't learn about them anymore
How about Agincourt, Hastings, Arnhem or Mons?
When England lost hosts of her very brave sons.
We are not Europeans, how can we be?
Europe is miles away over the sea
We're the English from England, let's all be proud
Stand up and be counted - Shout it out loud!
Let's tell our Government and Brussels too
We're proud of our heritage and the Red, White and Blue
Fly the flag of Saint George or the Union Jack
Let the world know - WE WANT OUR ENGLAND BACK !!!!
In this respect the English have not been much different from the Europeans and London, like Brussels, has rode roughshod for many centuries over all attempts by the Celtic countries to retain some vestige of independence
The following statements are well known facts which I have obtained from various sources and are easily confirmed by all who have access to the internet.
We should not forget that it was the English who first forced the Welsh, then the Scots and finally the Irish into the political union of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland. This was achieved by the application of overwhelming force against the wishes of the majority of the Celtic peoples by the more numerous and agressive English. It has also left an enduring bitterness amongst the Celtic peoples of the Isles.
Wales was incorporated into England by the English Parliament, with the Laws in Wales Acts 1535–1542, creating the legal entity known today as England and Wales. The Kingdom of Scotland was an independent state until 1 May 1707 when it joined in a political union with the Kingdom of England to create a united Kingdom of Great Britain. There were widespread protest across Scotland against this action. In 1800, the British and Irish Parliaments passed the Act of Union which, in 1801, merged the Kingdom of Ireland and the Kingdom of Great Britain to create the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland, (now the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland). This was done at the insistence of the English Parliament , to whom the Irish Parliament was subservient and it was done against the wishes of the vast majority of the Irish people.
We should also remember that it was the forcible imposition of English laws over the past 900 years that led to the almost total destruction of the Celtic languages and cultures of Wales, Scotland and Ireland. Laws, by the way, that were not only anti Celtic but which declared that the practice of Celtic culture would be an illegal act. Not a great deal different from what Brussels have been doing to the English over recent years and who are also showing as much a dislike to such legal coersions as the Celts did to the imposition of coersive English laws. All that remains, is for us to see if the English are willing to fight as long and as hard against overwhelming odds, as did the Scots and Irish.
It was only in the latter half of the last century that the advent of a human rights culture and at the behest of the European Union, which has allowed the Celtic countries to express their pride and re-emphasise their own unique and un-English cultures.
And all this should help explain why "To be Scottish, Irish or Welsh that's fine". It was at the insistence of the English that there is an United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland in the first place and therefore the line "But don't say you're English, that's way out of line" is of their own making.
It would be right for the English to "Fly the flag of Saint George" but if they really mean to express their Englishness, they should not fly "the Union Jack", as it's made up of the cross not only of St. George, but also the crosses of St. Andrew and St. Patrick.
I think that the only way for England to be recognised as an separate entity and to be officially known as England, is to start dissolving the various acts of union which originally set the United Kingdom up.
But then maybe one should expect the Cornish to demand their independence. One may also have Cumbria and Cumberland joining on the bandwagon. And I can't count the number of times that the good men of Yorkshire have informed me that they are not Englishmen but Yorkshiremen.
Oh! and by the way, if we're to believe Professors Sykes and Oppenheimer, both geneticists at Oxford University, the ancestry of the people of the Isles mainly traces back to the prehistoric Palaeolithic Iberian people. In fact the Celts, Romans, Anglo Saxons, Vikings and Normans are all relative newcomers to the Isles and their genes, which we all share in differing amounts, are only a very small part of our genetic inheritance. Much as some may not like it, we are much more closely related then you think.
In Origins of the British (2006), Stephen Oppenheimer states (pages 375 and 378):
"By far the majority of male gene types in the British Isles derive from Iberia (Spain and Portugal), ranging from a low of 59% in Fakenham, Norfolk to highs of 96% in Llangefni, north Wales and 93% Castlerea, Ireland. On average only 30% of gene types in England derive from north-west Europe. Even without dating the earlier waves of north-west European immigration, this invalidates the Anglo-Saxon wipeout theory..."
"...75-95% of British Isles (genetic) matches derive from Iberia... Ireland, coastal Wales, and central and west-coast Scotland are almost entirely made up from Iberian founders, while the rest of the non-English parts of the British Isles have similarly high rates. England has rather lower rates of Iberian types with marked heterogeneity, but no English sample has less than 58% of Iberian samples..."
WE WANT OUR ENGLAND BACK
Goodbye to my England, So long my old friend
Your days are numbered, being brought to an end
To be Scottish, Irish or Welsh that's fine
But don't say you're English, that's way out of line.
The French and the Germans may call themselves such
So may Norwegians, the Swedes and the Dutch
You can say you are Russian or maybe a Dane
But don't say you're English ever again.
At Broadcasting House the word is taboo
In Brussels it's scrapped, in Parliament too
Even schools are affected, staff do as they're told
They must not teach children about England of old.
Writers like Shakespeare, Milton and Shaw
The pupils don't learn about them anymore
How about Agincourt, Hastings, Arnhem or Mons?
When England lost hosts of her very brave sons.
We are not Europeans, how can we be?
Europe is miles away over the sea
We're the English from England, let's all be proud
Stand up and be counted - Shout it out loud!
Let's tell our Government and Brussels too
We're proud of our heritage and the Red, White and Blue
Fly the flag of Saint George or the Union Jack
Let the world know - WE WANT OUR ENGLAND BACK !!!!
In this respect the English have not been much different from the Europeans and London, like Brussels, has rode roughshod for many centuries over all attempts by the Celtic countries to retain some vestige of independence
The following statements are well known facts which I have obtained from various sources and are easily confirmed by all who have access to the internet.
We should not forget that it was the English who first forced the Welsh, then the Scots and finally the Irish into the political union of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland. This was achieved by the application of overwhelming force against the wishes of the majority of the Celtic peoples by the more numerous and agressive English. It has also left an enduring bitterness amongst the Celtic peoples of the Isles.
Wales was incorporated into England by the English Parliament, with the Laws in Wales Acts 1535–1542, creating the legal entity known today as England and Wales. The Kingdom of Scotland was an independent state until 1 May 1707 when it joined in a political union with the Kingdom of England to create a united Kingdom of Great Britain. There were widespread protest across Scotland against this action. In 1800, the British and Irish Parliaments passed the Act of Union which, in 1801, merged the Kingdom of Ireland and the Kingdom of Great Britain to create the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland, (now the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland). This was done at the insistence of the English Parliament , to whom the Irish Parliament was subservient and it was done against the wishes of the vast majority of the Irish people.
We should also remember that it was the forcible imposition of English laws over the past 900 years that led to the almost total destruction of the Celtic languages and cultures of Wales, Scotland and Ireland. Laws, by the way, that were not only anti Celtic but which declared that the practice of Celtic culture would be an illegal act. Not a great deal different from what Brussels have been doing to the English over recent years and who are also showing as much a dislike to such legal coersions as the Celts did to the imposition of coersive English laws. All that remains, is for us to see if the English are willing to fight as long and as hard against overwhelming odds, as did the Scots and Irish.
It was only in the latter half of the last century that the advent of a human rights culture and at the behest of the European Union, which has allowed the Celtic countries to express their pride and re-emphasise their own unique and un-English cultures.
And all this should help explain why "To be Scottish, Irish or Welsh that's fine". It was at the insistence of the English that there is an United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland in the first place and therefore the line "But don't say you're English, that's way out of line" is of their own making.
It would be right for the English to "Fly the flag of Saint George" but if they really mean to express their Englishness, they should not fly "the Union Jack", as it's made up of the cross not only of St. George, but also the crosses of St. Andrew and St. Patrick.
I think that the only way for England to be recognised as an separate entity and to be officially known as England, is to start dissolving the various acts of union which originally set the United Kingdom up.
But then maybe one should expect the Cornish to demand their independence. One may also have Cumbria and Cumberland joining on the bandwagon. And I can't count the number of times that the good men of Yorkshire have informed me that they are not Englishmen but Yorkshiremen.
Oh! and by the way, if we're to believe Professors Sykes and Oppenheimer, both geneticists at Oxford University, the ancestry of the people of the Isles mainly traces back to the prehistoric Palaeolithic Iberian people. In fact the Celts, Romans, Anglo Saxons, Vikings and Normans are all relative newcomers to the Isles and their genes, which we all share in differing amounts, are only a very small part of our genetic inheritance. Much as some may not like it, we are much more closely related then you think.
In Origins of the British (2006), Stephen Oppenheimer states (pages 375 and 378):
"By far the majority of male gene types in the British Isles derive from Iberia (Spain and Portugal), ranging from a low of 59% in Fakenham, Norfolk to highs of 96% in Llangefni, north Wales and 93% Castlerea, Ireland. On average only 30% of gene types in England derive from north-west Europe. Even without dating the earlier waves of north-west European immigration, this invalidates the Anglo-Saxon wipeout theory..."
"...75-95% of British Isles (genetic) matches derive from Iberia... Ireland, coastal Wales, and central and west-coast Scotland are almost entirely made up from Iberian founders, while the rest of the non-English parts of the British Isles have similarly high rates. England has rather lower rates of Iberian types with marked heterogeneity, but no English sample has less than 58% of Iberian samples..."
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