Can we now all get on and be proud of our Nation and its history?

[youngmafbog]

With the final parade today through London Great Britain has shown that we are a proud nation. Proud of our flag, proud of our heritage and proud of success.

The BBC and guadianista's must be choking on their Muesli, but have the people finally spoken? Success, Union jacks a display of our heritage in front of the world, whatever next eh?

I'd like to take the opportunity to thank our athletes for such a stunning performance, well done and here's to Brazil in four years time.

[anotheoldgit]

Yes such a breath of fresh air to see a little patriotism come flooding back to our country, a country we have witnessed slowly being diluted into insignificance over a number of years.

However during the staging of The Last Night of the Proms, what I did notice was that there was an audience that did not support our multi ethnic society that we now live amongst.

[sp1814]

youngmafbog

Perhaps the real choking will be amongst certain right wing papers, who slated everything to do with the Olympics before the opening ceremony, then realised that they were totally out of step with the whole country.

Remember how they gleefully predicted traffic chaos? Security blunders. Ticket allocation issues etc?

What the Olympics have proved to me is that a) the BBC is absolutely world class in sports coverage (not only on TV, but through iPlayer, radio and digital) and b) despite the complaints of 'too much multicultural cr*p' by members of some parties, it was a great showcase for what Britons (ALL Britons) can achieve.

[jake-the-peg]

Since when are patriotism and multi-ethnicity mutually exclusive?

http://1.bp.blogspot....on%2Bjack%2Bhijab.jpg

[sp1814]

AOG

Why do you think that so few blacks and Asians attend the last night of the Proms?

Do you think, perhaps, it's because classical music, like heavy metal and country and western isn't big amongst ethnic minorities?

Do you also find it odd that there are very few black/Asian/Chinese etc faces at an Iron Maiden concert?

Isn't the Proms about music, rather than ethnic identity?

Also, referring back to one of your earlier posts - why would black people (who by your definition aren't 'English') go to a concert which is so very very English?

[jake-the-peg]

Will you congratulate these Great British Athletes too AOG?


http://i4.mirror.co.u...uring+the+London+2012


http://i.telegraph.co...mpic-boxi_795360c.jpg

http://i1.mirror.co.u...on+2012+Olympic+Games

[sp1814]

Hang on - doesn't it sound as if all of a sudden, people are showing their patriotism as if they haven't been allowed to for decades.

Weird that...seeing as I'm pretty sure I saw signs of it at:

The Queen's Diamond Jubilee celebrations
The Royal Wedding or William and Kate
The Queen's Golden Jubilee celebrations
The Queen Mother's hundredth birthday celebrations

Or did one just imagine these events...and the flags...and the painted faces of the children...?

We're they all dreams?

[FredPuli43]

In what way did the Last Night of the Proms audience not support our multi ethnic society, aog? Or, alternatively, how was it evidently against that society? To take but one example,the woman in a hijab, standing about three rows in among the Promenaders, might not agree with you! It is not even uniquely attended by the British nowadays, as you may judge from the number of foreign flags unfurled by those attending and by the number of foreigners in the stalls and circle. That has been so for some years.

[sandyRoe]

And it should be remembered that one of the private companies involved, to do with security, made a right mess of it.

[Baldric]

It's great to see the large numbers of people celebrating The Games, Last Night of the Proms etc, at the same time it's sad to see an awful lot of them who are displaying our Union Flag (it's not a Jack) with pride, have no idea which way up it goes!

[AB Editor]

I've always been proud of this country.

I found the Olympics to be good fun (if a little tiring - the coverage was wall to wall after all).

I don't know about you but I found the opening ceremony good fun, but a little sanitized. I prefer my heritage warts and all.

I don't really think you should be lumping the BBC with the Guardian. The Gruniad is terrible - the BBC merely hamstrung by an odd sense of "balance".

[Kerosene]

Here we go: Loads of nations proud of what they are. See? We're not all that different after all.

[Nibble]

Always thought it's easy to tell which way our Unon Flag should fly -- Toggle to the top & rope to bottom, at least with properly made flags, i.e made for an actual flag pole. Not having ever bought a "tourist/footy" type flag.

[Baldric]

It would appear a lot of people find it confusing.

[sp1814]

Japan have the right idea.

Upside down, right way up - doesn't really matter.

[FredPuli43]

Confusing? The Chinese (?) makers of the individuals' flags for the Last Night last year certainly thought so; these were all made 'wrong way up' ! This year they got it right.The sellers outside the Hall normally sell flags of other nations too, with an eye to the international contingent. This year there were quite a number of Maltese flags being waved, because the star tenor at the last night was Maltese. One group had Isle of Man flags; damn tax dodgers, what are they doing coming to it !LOL

[pdq1]

The parade through London today also showed a very small minority of black faces. The coloured British Olympics black faces did us proud but support from the black community was abysmal. Don't they feel they can share the success?

[andy-hughes]

AOG - I utterly fail to understand how you can assume - and assumoption it is - that a white-majority audience infers that the said audience does not support our multi-ethnic society.

As sp1814 so eloquently points out - heavy metal concerts are virtually bereft of non-white audiences - and indeed female participants - but that is simply here - anywhere else in the word, and indiginous populations sell out the gigs year in year out.

Applying your perverse logic - almost any morris dance must be entirely populated by Klan members, since black people routinely do not attend.

The more i think about your worrying tendency to twist a point about one things into a point about another - which is not valid - the more i worry about your happiness in our ethnic society.

[craft1948]

I'm proud of our nation and think this pride has been magnified through the wonderful Games.......................oh hang on, the unions are calling for a general strike.

[mushroom25]

during the coverage for today's parade, Huw Edwards announced:-

"and something we didn't tellyou, as a bit of a surprise for the finale of this parade....."

at which point, hearts sank and collectively thought "oh no! they've invited Coldplay back for a 15-song encore!!!"

but it was OK, it was a flypast. :-)

[sp1814]

We saw the Red Arrows fly past our office windows 30 minutes ago.

Didn't realise until now, how much their smoke trails look like Signal toothpaste.