Oh right. Yes, I liked your earlier post about love for one's home, and patriotism/nationalism being different things. That's exactly what my husband believes. As an American it took me a little while to get used to this, it really gets programmed into you, but I think this way too now.

You don't get any British politicians claiming they are "patriotic." Nationalism leaves a bad taste in the mouth here in Europe; there have been too many wars fought in its name. There's a lot of uncertainty about what it even means to be British, or English. There's such a colourful history here. There were the Celts, the Romans, the Anglo-Saxons, the Vikings, the French . . . lots of different people fancied some conquest on these islands at one time or another, and there are so many layers of history and heritage. And now of course there are immigrants from Asia, Afria, eastern Europe . . . things change all the time. I think these changes are accommodated well here, and there's a strong sense of the value of multiculturalism on the whole. Though you do always get right-wing parties and newspapers raving about how we should kick the immigrants out.

I think this may be rather liberal for many of the tastes on this forum. It's a dirty word to lots of people. If I still lived in the USA I think I'd seek out my local branch of the ACLU and join them, and I'm not at all ashamed of that. Someone has to stand up for tolerance and human rights.