Fisrt post when i almost started a blog a couple of years back...

Day 1

The British spirit, what is it?

In the course of looking at what men need, who we are I’m starting to question what is British, as I uncover my own identity I find myself less British, less English as I define what that might be. I am and always will be a Yorkshire-man, that pride and bloody-minded passion for direct speech is yet to be refined.

The game of the English is that of the critic it’s like a national spirit of deconstruction. Built on the edifice of a history of invention and creation which is old and tired, like the second year undergrad we know what it is to be enthusiastic and find ourselves superior to that enthusiasm. We look down our nose at Americanism, religious fervour, political passion, action, our sporting teams are supported with a singular fervour.

In them alone do we allow a true fervour, a passion, an intensity to build. Here we let go all our inhibitions and fly in the face of who we are. And yet where is our critical spirit most clearly seen and articulately voiced as when we fail, as teams must from time to time, the bloodletting, the putsches, the vilification and destruction of the messiahs built only days before is our, British, offering to the world of virtue.

I am not calling up a nationalist spirit to rival the American, Zionist and Islamic imperialism of our global political climate but I am seeking to let us be happy, free and unashamed, to no longer be the confused teenage boy of the world, born to a privileged family but guilty in his own success, fearful of all things yet protected by historical veneers of responsibility and an all pervading cynicism and irony which works both as defence mechanism and prison.

So here I find myself quoting an American president who’s politics I might not entirely endorse but this quote will resound in my head at least, impacting every muscle from blood pump to brain through every sinew until I can say I’ve lived it.

I will not lead from insecurity.

‘It is not the critic who counts, not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood. He who strives valiantly; who errs and comes short again and again; because there is not effort without error and shortcomings; but who does actually strive to do the deed; who knows the great enthusiasm, the great devotion, who spends himself in a worthy cause, who at best knows in the end the triumph of high achievement and at worst, if he fails, at least he fails while daring greatly. So that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who knew neither victory nor defeat.’ Theodore Roosevelt, 1910.

Recently a friend told me about a prophetic ministry that sees the First World War and the blind sending of our youth to slaughter as still having effective power over the nation. Does this somehow keep people in apathetic poverty, and blind affluence? I don’t know if I agree, but I do believe that the legacy of the death of an empire through the death of millions and the correct deconstruction of the politics of power and nationalism has left us inept and confused. The nation state is dying, yet as it rails against the dying of the light in the Middle East and Middle America we Brits are susceptible to both the old excesses and extremes, and the apathy to the modern abuse of power through materialism.

Our deconstruction of the past brings no bearing on the present, no global action on the blights of poverty and the true causes of war and terrorism. We sit in the worlds corner, knowing some prophetic answers yet like that petulant young man we sit and keep them to ourselves for fear of failure and ridicule.

Hey cheer up, it might never happen!