HEre’s a thing: Black and brown people can be born and thick in England, can do and be almost anything in and for England (including making real sacrifices for their country). But for some, we can be of England, we just can’t be English. Capisce? Because, as they see and say it, the main ingredient of being English is white.
For wisdom about this, as in all things, let’s turn to the former secretary of the house, will be once-a-time leader of conservative party Suella Braverman. Defining non-white, mainly non-Christian communities in England, where he appears to disagree, Braverman said: “Some of these communities can hold British passports and be born here. But are they doing English?”
According to most people, it does. When Yougov asked the British a few years ago, 81% of canvassed ones said that was born in England was a bit done. Fifty-seven percent said the growth in England was enough, 29% thought to “consider themselves English” was enough. Who leads the Braverman. All well.“Remember that you are an Englishman and therefore won the first prize in the life lottery,” stop The genocidal coloniser cecil rhodes. You doubt he has Maro Itje, captain of the Rugby team of England or young Archie Mountbatten-Windsor, mixed son of an English prince, or either their mind when he announced it.
The desire to be driven by the property to prove yourself that English is “worthy” is part of why we have this debate today. Perhaps why Braverman’s preferences argue with themselves to project a doubtful -an image of who they are and who they are and what they think of other minors -or should.
Poor Rishi Sunak, his English “Lottery Winnings” was asked to the right of the host’s Triggernometry Podcast, citing unqualified facts that the former PM, former English Right champion, was a “Brown Hindu”. Of course, Sunak won the lottery before marrying an heir, but the money was not all. In this regard, it has nothing. Poor sunak. So, fast Pop Quiz: What was a black boy born in London to Nigerian parents and grew up in an English village by a (white emerging) German mother and a (white) Scottish father to consider her nationality? The correct answer is, of course, English, even if the Braverman can have a finger.
I’m the kid. I was born in London, in the same hospital like Prince William (guess he was English), and spent most of the first decade of my life raised in England, in a small Oxfordshire village called Benson. One place I often jokes is “super white (and cold) that white people don’t know that exists” (mostly not). Although my dad was Scottish, and my mother was German, I was raised by an English child of my cousin (who passed the Yugov test). Understand, by the time I am aware of nationality there is no question about it: I am English. Furthermore, I was English to the point that I assume what the nationalist tendencies are (the conservative party or reform will love me).
I didn’t become “British”, let the British Nigerian, until I was older and subject to a series of “stay-in-your-place-isms” moments, as well as traveling the world a little. What happens overseas is interesting. When I opened my mouth, I was considered English or British (or “oyinbo” in Nigeria). But despite the polls that say that skin and English color are not linked, I have found that I am considered English practical everywhere but in the corner of the Braverman of England. I’m small.
Perhaps there are valid debates that should have about who is English and who does not. What makes an Englishman and what makes a bloody alien. What refers to English: blood and soil, birth and culture, heritage and ethnicity, which you support during a cricket match or the ability to score a penalty on World Cup-Winning? Is Englishness a liquid or a stationary concept? Who can decide: the English people for centuries, those who have the English imposed on them and/or those who choose to embrace the concept?
But even under no illusion of why we are discussing it today. It’s not about who to embrace, it’s about who to be excluded. It is part of the erosion of the firewall between the mainstream conservativism and Ethno-Supremacism. There is a disturbing racist effort to delegate the place and position of non-white people in Europe, with a tough dream “remigration” as the final result.
If you can delegitimise Rishi Sunak and mark his card for “Remigration”, then all is a fair game. Some do not require delegitimising: they are willing to do it on their own. Imagine Braverman, from his first type of one-way one-way Remigration Airways Flight: “I don’t see anything wrong with it: I’m not English. Still, Islamists are running Britain now, so what to stay? Steward, when is dinner? I’ll have anything but tofu.”
The news is bad for blowhard podcasters, desperate politicians and various racists, for English becomes more brown and more beautiful. Today’s Englishness is more and more, as Japaneseness is Naomi Osaka, because Yorubness is Ashleigh Pluptre and South Africaness is Charlize Theron. The world is emerging, and the labels? They are falling.
