Yes I love England. It's rolling countryside, its people, its culture and heritage, its achievements and its civilization.
A nation of firsts, of standing up to tyranny, sheltering the oppressed, building the modern world, uniting the world with a common language... oh England.
Shame about the bloody weather ;)
[Truth is the first casualty in Hollywood's war]
I think the weather is beautiful in England. (I got the best tan while in Somerset). I love the rain on cobbled streets and in the forests. I love how the weather can change so quickly.
shareSomerset is one place, the North East where I am is another kettle of fish, pretty hard to get a tan when you're constantly lashed with cold wind coming down fron the Baltic.... it is indeed Grim up North :)
[Truth is the first casualty in Hollywood's war]
The north east has its own beauty, as every region of England has. Besides, a tan isn't all that great - your skin dries, cracks and eventually turns leathery.
The landscape and weather of the north east is unique and quite breathtaking. So rugged, grand, even awe-inspiring. You've got the Pennines to the west and the sea to the east, and in between some of the most beautiful valleys and dales in all of Britain.
Sounds pretty good to me!
Let me moan about the weather, I'm British it's expected... we're reknowned complainers :), but yeah you're right, the Northumbrian coastline is ruggedly beautiful, and we also have more castles up here than any other county in England, a county of great photo opportunities :D
[Truth is the first casualty in Hollywood's war]
Love your country, protect and cherish it, for it can all to easily slip from your grasp. If that ever happens, then you'll have something to complain about...
shareEngland also have something else that's very rare, and all the more beautiful because of it: moorland.
I live in New Jersey. No moors here. :(
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English countryside, yes. Its people, mostly yes. Its many achievements, sure, I suppose. Many great things have come out of England.
But you can stuff that standing up to tyranny line, boyo. As an Irish American, I have written proof of the tyranny practiced by your government, your crown, your tentacled beast, all against my people in Dublin, Donegal, and Meath. Against Ireland. I could easily add Scotland and Wales, Cornwall and the Isle of Man, but then, I'd be out of my area.
Sheltering the oppressed? WTF are you talking about? You make England/Britain/Whatever you call yourself sound like Oprah, some banal goody-good who never stepped on a poor man's chest, took his home away, and raped his woman. I'm sure you're proud of your heritage, but smell yourself, huh?
My family has a long memory, too. We came to the U.S. in 1803 before you tried to starve Ireland to death. Our options were to watch absentee landowners take our family's lands or put us to work for them under their swords and cannons. We came here with diaries and records of the efforts of various English/British soldiers, landlords, and brigands who attempted to wipe us, and all of Catholic Ireland, off the map permanently. Your list might be long, but mine is bloodier ... and it's even longer.
I love Shakespeare and Chaucer. I read and teach almost every Brit poet and writer since Henry VIII, and even before him. Edmund Spenser, Lord Byron, Andrew Marvell ... great artists all! I have met hundreds of British citizens, shared dozens of pints with them, talked politics and life with the lot of them. God makes great people in all colors. I like people. Nations? I don't like so much. England (and the U.S.) has some bloody footprints it's stomped out. I see no "sheltering" in that path.
But as an Irish remnant-survivor of THEIR holocaust against MY people, I can't read this "England ... my England" claptrap without the taste of bile in my throat.
Try foisting Germany's great past on Jewish ears, and you'll understand why I had to post this. Or maybe you won't. But I posted it anyway.
Fin the Fenian & Hibernian
My family has a long memory, too. We came to the U.S. in 1803 before you tried to starve Ireland to death.
But as an Irish remnant-survivor of THEIR holocaust against MY people, I can't read this "England ... my England" claptrap without the taste of bile in my throat.
It's true that the history of England and Great Britain hasn't been essentially saintly, but there have been far far worse out there.
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The french spring to mind.
I love Shakespeare and Chaucer. (...) God makes great people in all colors. I like people. Nations? I don't like so much.
My family has a long memory, too. We came to the U.S. in 1803 before you tried to starve Ireland to death.
Try foisting Germany's great past on Jewish ears, and you'll understand why I had to post this.
that a very valuable point. howver perhaps that be should remind each other that history is all MY/YOUR silliness.
its is after all the winners who write it.
and all of us are proud of our heritage, ignoring the less than desirable points in many cases. if we care to remember, in defence of england, and the irish famine, that the irish were terrorising britain in years long past. its a circle, and part of the nature of mob theory and the collective ego of a group of people with power.
but if we could get back on to praising englands beautiful countyside i would be much obliged.
"But you can stuff that standing up to tyranny line, boyo. As an Irish American, I have written proof of the tyranny practiced by your government, your crown, your tentacled beast, all against my people in Dublin, Donegal, and Meath. Against Ireland. I could easily add Scotland and Wales, Cornwall and the Isle of Man, but then, I'd be out of my area."
The English didn't take over Wales, Isle of Man, or Scotland that was the Normans, who conquered England and pretty much destroyed the place, made the people slaves (or serfs...it's more or less the same), forced the Welsh enemy of the early English, King Arthur onto the country as an insult, decided god had given kings power over the land (the English traditionally elected their kings or cyninges as they were in Old English).
I think most of the British Isles had it bad under the Normans with England and Ireland suffering the most. And if anyone wishes to argue please read up on what happened to the rebels at Ely or in Northumbria (Harrying of The North). A good book to start woulod be 'Hereward: The Last Englishman' by Peter Rex, and though I haven't read it also Peter Rex's 'The English Resistance'.
I think England takes a lot of the blame for what it's oppresors have done...not exactly fair.
Oh, and by the way I am part Irish! Being an Irishman doesn't give you the right to be an Anglophobe without a knowledge of the history of England. The English hardly wanted the Normans to take over their country, and before that they were hardly united nevermind "imperialists".
P.S. The Welsh can be slightly bitter as most of what is now England was populated by Brythonic/Welsh peoples before the English settled there. However the English (under Wild Edric) were allied with the Welsh against the Normans shortly after the conquest of 1066.
"Nothings gonna change my world!"
For crying out loud. Your family moved to America in 1803? You're about as Irish as I am. And I'm not Irish. Someone in your family years ago was. You're not.
shareYou're a remnant survivor? How ridiculous. Your family emigrated in 1803. In 200 years you're still bitter about something that happened to people so far in your past it's laughable? Members of my family are Scottish (a lot closer that 1803 I assure you) but I don't feel any comical bile against England. Rather it's my home, and the actions of 2 centuries ago might as well have happened on the friggin' moon
shareI'm so glad I'm not the only one who is sick to the back teeth about Americans banging on about being 'Irish American' and the like. Bollocks! I realise as a nation they are still in infancy and want to scrape together some semblance of a past but really..
shareThat guy got put in his place. Well done lads.
My mother is Irish making me more Irish than Finski yet I am English and am DAMN PROUD OF IT. Go moan on the 'Wind that shakes the Barley' forums or something.
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"standing up to tyranny, sheltering the oppressed"
Much like the film, this is a distorted view of history.
I think you need to pick up a history book
share