I know I shouldn’t cross post from a hot bed of neo-Nazism. But this is mad. Imagine the implications for sport for starters if this was true. You can play for a British team, but not for England. that’s for whites.
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Its so f***ing stupid. Wtf is different abt being English or British if you were born in England and made your home here. They should be asked to name a value that's English but not British.
1. I was clear I was talking abt ppl who were born in or made their homes in *England*.
2. Birbalsingh reckons there's a difference between the values of the English& British.I don't think there are any more than I think the *values* of the Scottish, Irish or Welsh r different to England/Britain.
But “they” were conveniently Commonwealth enough to fight and die when Westminster called them in for any war over the past 150 years, and then invited “them” to rebuild England after said wars left us short on muscle and skills. Take your racism and leave. You’re not welcome here.
How many generations before we are considered English? I have Scots, Irish, Scandinavian and Northern European in my heritage. Or am I English because ancestors came from similarly temperate climates?
It would be hard to find an ‘English’ person who couldn’t identify Scottish, Welsh, Irish, Norman and Viking ancestry somewhere in there family tree. British isles isn’t very big really and over the centuries there’s been a lot of DNA mixing. English is more of a mind set - often not a nice one.
No real "english" just white skinned Europeans who've been here varying amounts of time. It's an odd concept that you can't be English because your forebears came from somewhere else.
My guess is that who can and cannot be English changes from time to time. It can’t be defined genetically or if it can most of us will have to call ourselves something else! Most people I’ve met who want to insist on being called English are at least xenophobic if not racist - not all but most.
Following her comments I am pleased to confirm that Birmingham is no longer part of England! I am declaring it as the "Free State of Birmingham" and passport checks will be mandatory for anyone visiting. Our boundaries will be the M42 (S&E), M6 (N) and M5 (W).
Give us access to your rare earth minerals and we might do you a deal. Failing that, make the Baltic Triangle a free trade zone and we'll call it even.
I didn’t used to feel English growing up in the north of England because “English” seemed to refer to southern England while people around me thought of themselves as British.
It shouldn't need saying - but why do whites need a special team?
What defines white?
Appearance or blood?
Under her rules could a mixed race girl who looks white join the team or does her blood rule her out?
If your great granny was black are you out?
Substitute Jewish for black & what do you have?
What the hell is going on in England? I understand the whole not-wanting-to-be-English thing, but surely only blood and soil ethno-nationalists of the most vile kind would want to police it?
Use alt text, some of us have that idiot on our mute lists, and 'dunking' on her is just giving her attention. Is she your best mate? No. Do you agree with her? No. Then why are you boosting her signal?
So by this count the Yorkshire Cricket Board was entirely right to refuse to consider kids of Indian/Pakistani descent because although they were born in England (specifically Yorkshire) they couldn’t be English and therefore couldn’t be from Yorkshire which is English? Have I got that right??
Never heard such racist nonsense. To be British you have to be either English, Northern Irish, Scottish or Welsh or from one of the Crown dependencies. The colour of your skin has as much to do with your nationality as the colour of your hair, absolutely nothing.
If you have a white English parent and a non-white British parent should you stand near a shade card to decide whether you are English or British? Should a school principal be given a written warning for not keeping her dafter thoughts to herself?
And that, my Blue Sky friends, is how you tell an ethnic minority who doesn't need to prove themselves acceptable to the majority from an ethnic minority so desperate for approval they are comfortable saying the National Front worthy phrase "keep English for white English" in public. Full clownery.
It's both odd and inconsistent. There are four nations of the UK. They tend to identify as English, Welsh, Scots or N Irish. British tends to be for official purposes like the military or naturalised foreigners not born in the UK or used as a derogatory term by the Irish.
She is a deeply stupid person. Anyone living in England, born in England or of English heritage can call themselves English if they so wish. Anything else collapses under its own absurdity…
My parents are from other bits of the British Isles, I was born and grew up in England. I've had brief holidays in the lands of my fathers but I can hardly call myself Welsh or Irish. So if not English, what am I? Unless I get a free pass to Englishness on account of my skin colour? Ah, thought so..
Even if you went fully for this batshit racism, surely you'd go the other way around? Like, there isn't an English ethnicity, but you could maybe argue for a group of British ones...if you were a dick.
Sport and celebrities aside, this is the way most people think. There are similar attitudes in other west European states, which are all classic ethno-national states. That is the historic and political reality, however unpleasant she may be.
I wrote "sport and celebrities aside" for a reason. The success of anti-immigration parties in Europe, clearly indicates public support for non-immigrant societies. That is the political reality.
No, because almost all other parties also seek to restrict immigration. The absence of pro-migration parties is strong evidence for an anti-migrant consensus, in turn indicating a preference for a non-migrant ('white') society.
It's not whether such a preference exists, it's whether such a preference is widespread. What you've said does not indicate "most", "some" maybe perhaps even "a few". You're also eliding preferences for controlled migration and preferences for ethno-states.
Wow. Ethno-rascism.
If she wants to go down that path, then only people descended from the Angles (Anglisc) can truly be English?
Nobody can claim that.
Not the Saxons, Jutes and the whole raft of immigrants that came before and after the Angles.
That women is not fit to teach.
And what percentage of 'non Englishness' in a person's ancestry disqualifies them? My husband has a well documented family tree going back to William 1 but is also half Chinese.
So grim. And the mutton-headed appeal of every bigot: "other countries wouldn't do this". That's how they give themselves away entirely, since what you're getting is pure projection.
I wonder when the cross over comes from being British to being English, I have French and Spanish great great grandparents on my father’s side. Does this preclude me from being ‘proper English’ 🤔
Does the generation test get halved because I have over 6 generations in my mum’s side 🤔
My dad tells of the ‘odd’ looks he got in 1960s South Africa when his ship docked there in the summer after he’d been working on deck in the sun for several weeks beforehand. He used to tan very dark.
Did they miss the part of history where France declared Algeria to be France (not distinct from mainland France) in order to try and keep them from becoming independent.
All French overseas territories have always been part of France, and still are. It's more to do with "egalité" than anything else. ie you have full citizenship, voting rights etc. I suspect sideshow Bob isn't familiar with the concept.
I recall the integration in relation to Algeria was specifically to try and maintain control of it. I might be conflating some different level of integration than what exists for French overseas territories in general. But yeah, the point stands, its ridiculous for any former empires to do this.
Like many I am a bastard, a hotchpotch of different ethnicities swimming around in a dog's dinner of DNA soup. This explains why I've never been invited to play foot for ANY country!
The maddest thing is when I took a peek at the blue tick replies the majority of them are engaging with it from position it’s a perfectly reasonable thing to say 😳
You’re quite right - it’s completely bonkers. Wrong on every level and in every case.
I’ve said this many times before - if she had turned up to teach my kids, I’d have had them transferred to another school by morning playtime on the first day.
For me it's not so much that she is insane, it's that she is such a lightweight - she neglects basic and obvious implications of her 'logic'. But then she has always been like that IMO. At least some of her pupils will have things to say about that I am quite certain, even if the media don't.
Last week she (a non-parent) was telling people how to parent and this week she (raised in Canada) is telling English people who should be called English.
No idea how this shit squares with the British values requirements of the curriculum, or even prevent. It’s purely radicalised stuff. She shouldn’t be anywhere near children.
Ranting now: can you imagine the fall out if a white educator wrote that? Especially if they were head of a school with a a large % of minority students? You’re right, unsackable
It amazes me that people of colour like Braverman and Birbalsingh are so willing to write themselves, their own families and communities off as second class to white people, basically telling racists that they're right to judge Englishness by skin colour and religion.
It’s utter nonsense and only designed to fuel division. Of course ethnic minorities can see themselves as English and should be accepted as English, in the same way as I expect ethnic minorities are accepted as being Scottish if they have been born/lived all their lives in Scotland.
Incidentally they may also consider themselves as British, European, and identify with the heritage of their ancestors. Very few of us are “pure” in terms of our ancestors and implying that you have to be to belong, is just childish.
Englishness is an ethnicity, but it's also a national indentity. I respect Suella Braverman not wanting to identify as English, but any citizen living in England has the right to identify as English if they want to. It's funny how the right wing only like identity politics when race is involved!
“English” is not really an ethnicity… if we are getting into anthropology, the historic population of England is Celtic/Briton mixed with German/Scandiavian to varying degrees.
Race and ethnicity are social constructs based on identity. All ethnic groups are ultimately a mix of older groups, back to the dawn of humanity. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/English_people
There is, because not all ethnicities have a nation state, eg the Kurds. Or because you can consider yourself part of an ethnic group without having citizenship of that country, eg Americans like Joe Biden who identify as Irish.
The idea that political visits should align with and define ethnicity was the trigger for the nationalist revolutions of the mid 19th century and had been a cause of a great deal of bloodshed ever since!
Miss Snuffy is a crackpot. She thinks what she says is not only important but profound. Trouble is, she talks utter nonsense that's beyond the pale. None of it is true except in her head at that of the rabble who laud her. Enough of Miss Snuffy. Begone
My take on "who is English" is that it's a matter of how we see ourselves - not for others to decide.
As an English speaking former S African, I tick the box marked "other White" for ethnicity. 1/4 of my ancestry were very much from English home counties.
I'm steeped in English literature and history, and lived in England (mostly Surrey) for 20+ years - but I wouldn't call myself English. British, yes - but not English.
Others with a similar background may see things differently.
I suspect you feel a difference because there is a UK government with representatives defining what “Britishness” is, same for Scotland and Wales, but no such institution or authority exists for England.
Am I missing something in her argument about keeping English for white people “She is the daughter of Frank Birbalsingh, of Indo-Guyanese origin, and his wife, Norma, a nurse from Jamaica.” If the racists ever take over this asylum she’s on a plane to somewhere else.
I know - how do they not see that no amount of money or public school education or positions of power will ever make them British (let alone English) to the racists. They’d ship them to Rwanda in a heartbeat.
That's the hypocrisy though isn't it? A number of people I knew were sharing the racist NIMBY nonsense during the riots, some of whom were second generation Irish immigrants. Their parents would have been exposed to exactly the same xenophobia.
The problem is, some people think this discourse is important. Others have many challenges throughout their day, from mental health, to caring for loved ones. I suspect some people have too much time on their hands and nothing truer than the saying “the devil makes work for idle hands!”
No medals in the Olympics, no qualification for the Euros, World Cup football and no more test match or one day victories in cricket etc etc etc. she can stick her thoughts where the sun don’t shine.
I’m so confused by this.
It seems to be a pointless debate driven by people who by their own standards would not qualify as British or English.
I can’t understand what they are trying to achieve.
I'm white but my father was a Hungarian Jew. I'm also 20% irish on my mother's side according to my DNA. I was born in Wales but have no Welsh DNA. So what the hell am I? Almost everyone is a mix. Trying to separate people in this way is ludicrous.
You are English if you were born and raised in England. Aryan nativism can absolutely get in the sea. Are Scottish and Welsh people clutching their pearls over this, or is it just English flag shaggers?
It’s in the running for the stupidest bit of racism I’ve ever read (bear in mind the others who are running in that particular race!!) She’s a disgrace and that idea is repugnant.
What is an “English person”? - a mongrel mix of Angles, Saxons, Vikings, Romans etc, who may well have had different skin colours. Incidentally, most also have a mix of Welsh, Scottish, Irish and of nationalities from all over the world. Birbalsingh’s “English” is a mere figment of her imagination.
I sound English, am white, I am often scolded for supporting Scottish teams over English. I'm British, have mixed English/Scottish/Welsh and Maltese/Arab ancestry. I'm now really confused about what I'm allowed to be. Born in England, you're English they say. Tune would be different were I brown.
For me it’s not so much what she ends up saying (which is stupid), but the fact that as a school headteacher she finds it necessary to bang on about twatty little subjects like this in the first place.
She’s got other things, far more important, to spend her time and energy on.
Be a headteacher!!!!!
What if someone has one parent who is whitest of white English and their other parent is a slightly brown French person, making their offspring appear white. How ‘uncontaminated’ do they have to be for her? We should probably stop giving this woman so much attention. She’s just Katie Hopkins
Birbalsingh is a fascist who like so many others has been relentlessly promoted by certain media outlets in the full knowledge that doing so will damage the life chances and safety of ethnic minorities, particularly children from ethnic minorities.
Especially since so many supposed liberals now accept that at least one ethnicity can and should be exterminated by any means necessary and are in fact have spent the last 18 months happily applauding its extermination.
Equally interesting was how you could elicit much stern finger-wagging with a quiet suggestion that conservatives’ constant fear-mongering around immigration indicated they were on a slippery slope towards fascism, yet here we are…
Apart from the obvious racism, how does anyone decide who's white and who isn't? I recall a Radio 4 programme ages ago where a white English woman was surprised to discover one of her great great etc grandmothers had been indiscreet with a black neighbour. DNA test revealed it.
It's insane! Yet there remains a widespread belief that English identity is ethnically based, whereas, at least for the present, the notion that Scottish identity is ethnically based has been rejected. Assumptions about Anglo-Saxon superiority have a long and unpleasant history.
#Blood&Soil
And that is precisely why I never say I’m English (as a white woman). I don’t want to identify as something so obviously racist. I just say I’m from London, not feeling comfortable with British either
A curious thing led to the cancellation of my @thetimes.com subscription this week. I tried six times to make polite disagreement (Within guidelines) to one of KBs articles that middle class parenting was the root cause of harm to our kids, they were deleted one after the other. Bizarre
As much as my belief that she's a despicable human being, what's even more astounding to me is her eagerness to align with philosophies that would happily eradicate her existence if they had the power to.
This is mad. What are these people’s blood quantum for Englishness? Are mixed-race people English or not? Is the Windrush Briton whose ancestor was raped in slavery by her English “master” English or not?
If you keep going with this 'logic' you end up questioning how English people may or may not be, particularly anglo-irish: anglo-scots and anglo- Welsh.
I once had an Irish cousin tell me I was English when in fact I'm no less Irish than him but live in England, as I believe his son does now 🙄
Of course it is. She is doing it for clicks and by sharing it, we amplify it. The right are very good at saying or doing controversial shit for attention. Who really gives a fuck about nationality? It's all a tool to keep the proles divided whilst the rich and powerful consolidate.
Back in the 70's/80's the Fascists (NF/BNP) refused to count goals by black English players. Tories like her and Reform types want to reintroduce the colour bar. They hated Southgate for choosing on merit. Remember Hitler tried to ban Black athletes from the 1936 Berlin Olympics.
Well, there's always Wales, Scotland and Ireland.
If ethnic people are not able to claim to be English, they should refuse to play for English football, cricket, or any other English teams.
The other 3 countries will benefit from it!
The British passport makes you British, this is the law.
English (in the context of the topic!) on the other hand, is a nation. A breed, if you like. A husky never becomes a beagle. Nothing wrong with that. Saying one is "better" than the other is retarded.
It's an implicitly imperialist stance, because britain is the empire. Of course you can be part of it, because the point is to control different people and funnel their productivity towards a certain place. But the people behind that empire? No of course you are not one of them
Comments
2. Birbalsingh reckons there's a difference between the values of the English& British.I don't think there are any more than I think the *values* of the Scottish, Irish or Welsh r different to England/Britain.
Who's "we", then?
I feared something had kicked off along the Estonia/Latvia border.
What defines white?
Appearance or blood?
Under her rules could a mixed race girl who looks white join the team or does her blood rule her out?
If your great granny was black are you out?
Substitute Jewish for black & what do you have?
https://bsky.app/profile/gnrb64.bsky.social/post/3lj3ir6lnxc2j
The Census in England only allow Asian and Black citizens to identify as Asian/Black British, but not Asian/Black English.
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2022/may/24/britain-strictest-headmistress-katharine-birbalsingh-state-school?CMP=Share_iOSApp_Other
BTW, I believe nationality (not citizenship) is mostly a matter of self identification. You cannot mandate who is English - either way.
I would say no, but here we are.
Kids need protecting from this....
I’m a celt. Most of my ancestors never crossed or bred over the Tamar. Saxons are new.
Which is what I’m proud of in Britain. We are mongrels. We accept everyone and what they can bring.
Not one.
That tells you all you need to know.
If she wants to go down that path, then only people descended from the Angles (Anglisc) can truly be English?
Nobody can claim that.
Not the Saxons, Jutes and the whole raft of immigrants that came before and after the Angles.
That women is not fit to teach.
TLDR: you are who you ‘live, love and laugh’ with (with suitable apologies for deploying that crass form of words).
Mad that she thinks Nigel Farage is more English than Rishi Sunak just because of pigmentation.
It's horrifying.
https://www.ucl.ac.uk/news/sites/news/files/styles/large_image/public/cheddar_man_for_web.jpg?itok=Gv0Yojst
I appears to some I'm not English.
I wonder what proportion of people born in England can pass Baverman's six generations test?
Phil, I suspect you're fine you look white.
{pats his invisible backpack of privilege}
My dad tells of the ‘odd’ looks he got in 1960s South Africa when his ship docked there in the summer after he’d been working on deck in the sun for several weeks beforehand. He used to tan very dark.
I recommend Simon Pegg.
Can we stop with the BS fake-border lines and tribalism?
How many states should there be?
How many taxing agencies should there be?
Gets complicated when you realize so much of it is arbitrary and historic based on the governments that "rule" the people.
Has she not seen their national fucking football team?
I’ve said this many times before - if she had turned up to teach my kids, I’d have had them transferred to another school by morning playtime on the first day.
Attention seeking nonsense.
She is a known nutcase ..
By her own logic, she can't be English
#ClownsIdiots
Shoemaker, stick to your last!
Anyway agree with the rest of your post 👍
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/English_people
And this is pertinent because England isn’t actually a nation-state with citizenship..,
"Keep English for the white English".
I wonder what the cultists have planned for the nonwhite English?
For thousands of years we’ve been a nation defined by porous demographics, culture, religion & language.
We are a mongrel nation, and better for it. Long may we be so.
Christ but that’s fucked up.
We already know.
We left.
"Hello, we're doing a surv.."
*close door*
If using that makes her sound racist then it’s because what shes saying is racist, making the “white” part silent doesn’t change that.
As an English speaking former S African, I tick the box marked "other White" for ethnicity. 1/4 of my ancestry were very much from English home counties.
Others with a similar background may see things differently.
Yet they've all spewed the same, or similar rhetoric.
Badenoch in particular is on record as saying she's "practically a first generation immigrant", yet refers to others as sub human beasts.
That's the hypocrisy though isn't it? A number of people I knew were sharing the racist NIMBY nonsense during the riots, some of whom were second generation Irish immigrants. Their parents would have been exposed to exactly the same xenophobia.
It seems to be a pointless debate driven by people who by their own standards would not qualify as British or English.
I can’t understand what they are trying to achieve.
I'm white but my father was a Hungarian Jew. I'm also 20% irish on my mother's side according to my DNA. I was born in Wales but have no Welsh DNA. So what the hell am I? Almost everyone is a mix. Trying to separate people in this way is ludicrous.
We’ve never really been modern, have we 🤦♂️
Start with a racist view of "Being English" now apply it to all people living in England.
She’s got other things, far more important, to spend her time and energy on.
Be a headteacher!!!!!
No-one else can claim to be truly English.
#joke
This argument is putting race relations back 50 years !!!
Is the “white “ one English?
And what is the “black “ one?
Plus 1-3% north native and African
Why would we *want* to "keep 'English' for the white English".
Why could they be British but not English?
And of course ethnic minorities can be French or German.
What is WRONG with her??
I’m starting to wonder if the natural end point of their sea-lioning is “just questioning if ethnic minorities can be considered truly human.”
https://bsky.app/profile/gabrielmilland.bsky.social/post/3lj5pzi3mkk2s
She should try going up to Ian Wright, or Kemi Badenoch, or Sadiq Khan, or Sayeeda Warsi and telling them they aren't English.
While she's at it, tell Thierry Henry he's not French, and Leroy Sané that he's not German.
Absurd and appalling words from a professional rage merchant.
It's simply not a safe and suitable place to be sending members of the public to obtain official information.
#Blood&Soil
Why should "British" allow "ethnic minorities" but not "English"?
Can "Scottish" allow "ethnic minorities"? "Welsh" too?
Being Christian is surely now to be an "ethnic minority" in secular atheist England. Can we tell the CofE to f-off?
The English census only recognise Asian/ Black British.
As ever, England lags behind the rest of the UK.
Honestly, mind boggling.
They gave that right away with the first slave ship and the first colony
I once had an Irish cousin tell me I was English when in fact I'm no less Irish than him but live in England, as I believe his son does now 🙄
'We only won one-nil,' they chanted in their bigoted refusal to acknowledge a goal scored for this country by a black footballer."
🤬🤬🤬🤬
#NotMyCountryAnyMore
If ethnic people are not able to claim to be English, they should refuse to play for English football, cricket, or any other English teams.
The other 3 countries will benefit from it!
That woman is so bloody rascist. It oozes out of her ears!
Born in Scotland? Scottish
Born in Wales? Welsh
Born in Northern Ireland? Northern Irish
It's not that hard
English (in the context of the topic!) on the other hand, is a nation. A breed, if you like. A husky never becomes a beagle. Nothing wrong with that. Saying one is "better" than the other is retarded.