The rise of national socialism

Last week I was looking at the card range of a small greeting card publisher. She publishes high quality, tasteful cards based on top quality photos. They retail at £2.50 to £3.00. One of her new cards is a photo of a wall bedecked with End glish flags - Cross of St George, Union Jack etc. She introduced this into her card range some while back and guess what, it has become a top seller.

I doubt if any of the buyers or recipients of this card are tattooed skinheads; it is highly likley that they are respectable middle-class taxpaying citizens, so it is apparent to me that this is an illustration of a latent desire amongst a majority to reassert Englishness.

It is not nasty virulent racism, although it will be characterized as such by those with an axe to grind, but it is a reflection of a kind of bewilderment that people have become marginalized in their own native land. It was only two generations ago that the prevailing English attitude was one of pride. We were proud to have come through some of the 20th century fights against tyranny, we were proud of our industrial and trade accomplishments and we were proud of the empire. We could therefore afford the generosity of being tolerant and understanding.

Since then the prevailing opinion is that we must view our imperial past with shame, to see our industrial achievements through the lens of exploitation of workers and to reinterpret the twentieth century as a century of totalitarian aggression against selected groups. While none of these historical occurrences can be denied we do end up with a wholly unbalanced view and reasonable, moderate people are beginning to question the wisdom of skewing everything against our history.

The BNP are undoubtedly led by a group of nutters who believe they can turn the tide of human history, but people are voting for them because they are addressing some issues that the mainstream parties refuse to touch with a bargepole. When that changes voters will no longer feel compelled to place their x beside the name of a BNP candidate. The hysterical reaction of some commentators and politicians will only feed their supporters and convince their recent supporters that they were rig ht to vote this way.