Not Getting All Patriotic Are We Dave?

[anotheoldgit]

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/david-cameron-responds-to-russias-alleged-small-island-jibe-at-g20-summit-with-impassioned-defence-of-britain-8801673.html

Better be careful Dave or you will be classed a 'Little Englander' or at the very worse assuming that we are 'Superior' to others.

/// Giving mention of Britain's fight against fascism during the 20th century and the abolition of slavery in the 19th, he said the country "has invented most of the things worth inventing, including every sport currently played around the world." ///

Oh dear Dave, have you not learnt anything from your Liberal partners, you should know that the tend these days is to cry ourselves down.

[thatsmethatis]

What ARE you on about?

[jim360]

It's possible (and indeed vital) to recognise your country's mistakes, but that doesn't make its successes any less important. Example: while the abolition of Slavery was important, we'd also been involved in the Slave Trade for well over one hundred years before that. While we may have fought against fascism, we tolerated its rise for far too long beforehand. While we may have invented most sports, we also never seem to take them seriously enough to be successful, at least until relatively recently. And so on.

A balance, anyway, is important. One way or another our country has been involved in the stories of most countries in the world. Very often, that involvement has brought much suffering -- and we mustn't forget that, any more than we should forget all the good things we've done for the world.

[Baldric]

///including every sport currently played around the world///

I'd like to see him explain that ^^^ one!

[naomi24]

Me too Baldric - but that aside, I can think of worse places to live.

[ludwig]

^ Russia for example

[youngmafbog]

There must have been a lot of Muesli splatted across the hemp this morning !!

[Zeuhl]

/ the tend these days is to cry ourselves down. /

aog

what did you put into babelfish to get that? LOL

[jno]

Marxism was invented here, you'd think Britain would get some credit for that. Major export.

[thatsmethatis]

Whoops! Just seen that this thread involves me (1st post) I seem to have posted in wrong thread, sorry.

[mikey4444]

I can't help feeling sorry for Dave here. I know this is a mess of his own making, what with recalling Parliament too early, but its not nice for our Prime Minister to be laughed at by Jonny Foreigner you know !

Never mind, it won't be long before he returns to the back benches.

[janbee]

Double Dip Dave is only patriotic about ONE thing and that is his beloved Brussels and his EU masters. He doesn't give a rat's sweet backside about Britain and/or the British people.....well, maybe a few in Witney and Chipping Norton.!

[Brenden]

Did we have a double dip janbee, i thought they said no it was a mistake.

[ichkeria]

The comment says more about Russian complexes than anything else and would have been best ignored, particularly as even they now seem to be embarrassed by it.
By responding to it Mr Cameron is merely giving credibility and publicity to jealous little nobodies

[viv38]

Not a fan of Dave's, but I agree with him here.

[anotheoldgit]

jim360

You fit my last paragraph precisely.

That should have read 'TREND' by the way.

[Old_Geezer]

One must beware when judging the past. Different beliefs held sway then, and different ones from those predominant today will hold sway in the future.

For example we may have been involved in the Slave Trade for ages but the world view during that time would have been that there was nothing wrong with it. It wasn't as if those at the time were deliberately doing what they considered wrong. If God hadn't mean the slaves to be slaves then he would have prevented it.

[sp1814]

"If God hadn't mean the slaves to be slaves then he would have prevented it."


???????

[Gromit]

// the tend these days is to cry ourselves down. //

That is only a trend with nostalgic right whingers who constantly bleat about the state of the country and its people. And compare it to some ficticious utopic period fifty years ago, that never existed.

[jim360]

Whatever AOG, you can think of me as ashamed of being British but it's completely untrue. I just don't think we should pretend that the mistakes never happened -- nor am I a fan of some some of American "greatest country in the World" patriotism that is untrue for them, and for anyone here who might think it. It is not "crying yourself down" to be aware of your mistakes, or your limits, and the same is true of your country.

sp -- I think (hope!) that Old Geezer was expressing a view people had back then, that is that slavery was not thought of as wrong on religious grounds. for a while.

[anotheoldgit]

Slavery was not specifically an African thing, most of all the World's races have been subjected to slavery at one time or another.