Not sure there's anything inherently wrong with "flag waving". And in grouping everyone who is patriotic together with nationalists, racists and xenophobes you are making unfair judgments on the majority of patriots who aren't, just like those that are nationalistic, racist or xenophobic are making unfair judgments on people because of their nationality or race.
Yes...and yet, no. If you look at our Northern European near neighbours, the Scandinavians, Dutch, Irish and even the modern Germany, they seem to be nations and people who have adjusted to today's, global society far more easily than 'we' have. I'm sure that their populations are as patriotic as any, but they don't seem to need to express that by being as hostile to others as the British (possibly largely the English?) do.
It depends where you look. There is always an undercurrent of extreme right wing nationalists in Germany supporting Voldermort or whoever that Chancellor was. There matches against the Netherlands are often not pretty. And while I don't disagree we have a particularly obnoxious minority in this country that champion nationalism for all the wrong reasons, we should be careful to attribute those traits to anyone who is simply patriotic. Also we should be careful in seeing other nations as bastions of goodwill to all. My general feeling is that whilst we go so far in this country, we have a notable record of not descending into a country-wide movement that could lead to, say, a fascist government. That is not to say everything has been good, nor is good, just that other countries have gone down that path to the detriment of millions.
I've never really understood the need to be patriotic. Or why it might be a good thing. It doesn't do much harm when restricted to sport. But I can't find much good it has done. It is often used as an excuse to overlook obnoxious acts by countries. The sooner everyone realises that all humans on the planet are equally deserving of respect and equally deserving of being held to account for bad behaviour, the better. I think our electoral system has prevented a rise of fascism so far. However it causes extremists to hide in mainstream parties and there is an ever present danger of them gaining control by stealth. If you look at the recent actions of the current government the path they are on is clear.
The social attitudes survey has continually found that between 30% and 40% of the UK self identify has having racist beliefs. That didn't use to have much affect on politics as their votes were quite evenly split amongst the main parties. But following Brexit most of those are voting Conservative and the Tories seem very happy to pander to them.
I want to look at this nationalistic and patriotic argument from a purely footballing point of view. I am a football fan from England therefore I want England to win and I wear my shirt with pride. As I do my Spurs shirt when I am supporting my club, and as such as this is an international tournament I don't support any other country, the same as I would I never support the Goons (or any other English club that are likely to qualify) in Europe. I do hate the fact that a small section of our fans boo the national anthems, but I equally have never seen the point in booing players who have previously served the club well, (I will make an exception for Judas), in fact I find the whole booing thing is generally counter productive as it just serves to motivate those being booed. The best example of this that I have seen was whilst I was at a match at Gillingham, in the 90s they had a bit of rivalry with Preston, they were promoted from League 2 together, and went toe to toe for the title and both enjoyed good seasons over the next few years including a play off semi final in 1999. Preston had a CB called Sean Gregan a good old fashioned lower league centre half who was always the best player on the pitch when we played them, but his style was always antagonistic so he would get the full treatment from the home fans and he revelled in it. One season the stadium announcer when reading out the teams during the warm up welcomed 'our old friend Sean Gregan' the chorus of boos was as loud as ever and he visibly grew as he conducted the crowd and then didn't put a foot wrong in the game.
Schmeichel told the ref about the laser pointer earlier in the match, apparently. That was why he stopped for a bit and went over to speak the the 4th official. How didn't they catch the bloke, if that's the case? Would've been pretty easy to work out where he was.
Calls grow for extra bank holiday if England win: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-57774782 I think there's going to be one for a lot of people anyway, win or lose!
Now I've seen headlines calling the Danish coach "bitter" This from a country preparing to blame the EU for sending over rain that allowed Italy to win...
That’s a real shame. I struggle to grasp that any English person wouldn’t want the national team to succeed. Yes they have followers who are idiots but then so do Spurs? Would you root against Spurs just of an idiot minority?
Remind me when the government has exploited us in order to keep the plebs distracted from the very real threats against their lives and freedoms that the government are responsible for? It's like the 1978 World Cup at this point, and it's better to have the people pissed off than slapping their fins together like trained sealions
He is bitter. Not as much as the Danish journalist that was gloating over British covid deaths, admittedly.
Isn't that what 60,000 are going to be singing with their maskless faces on Sunday? We're going to die We're going to die We're going...
So every England supporter voted Tory? Or supporting England means implicit support for the government? I don’t see what point you’re trying to make that actually holds up because neither of these are true. We all know governments exploit sporting events and nobody is fooled by this. While I agree that raising the capacity to what it is now is foolish, and the lack of mask wearing in close proximity doesn’t sit well with me, they are at least trying to take precautions around requesting proof of a negative test within 48hrs, proof of vaccination, or proof of antibodies before allowing entry to the stadium. I’d be happier with them restricting it to fully vaccinated folk only though, although I recognise that doing so would limit who could actually attend massively as you in the UK have had to wait so long between doses, unlike here in the US. https://www.uefa.com/uefaeuro-2020/event-guide/london/stadium/
Can't you separate the two? I have no difficulty separating my hatred of the Govt and some of the behaviour from the people they represent and wanting sporting glory for the country.
Plenty of people are fooled, as demonstrated by Dier Hard's "We don't care about the government, we're happy!" comments, which only underlined the point I was making about it becoming the exact same thing as the bread and circuses method of controlling the rabble in Roman times. The fact that Orban has been doing the exact same thing in Hungary, with Hungary's game against France downright terrifying to look at, just makes it more obvious that the circuses are being provided, so now all we have to do is wait for the Eat Out To Help Out to return and the bread is sorted with a £10 voucher at Nandos (and, yes, the Tories have floated bringing that one back...) In terms of the stadiums, expanding Wembley's capacity so quickly is downright reckless, but I also think it exposes a flaw in UEFA's planning: UEFA no doubt remember Euro 96, where outside of handful of teams (England, Scotland, Italy, Holland) the stadiums were routinely half full, and that does beg the question of whether UEFA expected that, even though they made Wembley 60,000 capacity for the final, as England weren't in the final the fans would be socially distanced by default, as demonstrated by Italy/Austria drawing 18,000 to Wembley even though the capacity was upped to 40,000 or some of the other embarrassing attendances in the round of 16 (11,000 for Belgium/Portugal in Seville, 9000 for Sweden/Ukraine at Hampden, and basically every match in St Petersburg)
