To Be British Is About Your BLOOD l Prove Me Wrong

Added: 2026-05-05

[00:00:00]Hello. What's your name? My name's Reuben, nice to meet you. I'm Monty. I just first want to kind of gauge what you think like what is this British culture that people hear so much about.

[00:00:11]As you can maybe tell from my accent, right? Like I am born in Northern Ireland, right? Okay.

[00:00:17]And I'm not born to a Catholic family either, you know, I'm born Okay. in a unionist family and I've lived in Northern Ireland till I was 14 and then I moved here, right? I moved I moved and I live in Devon.

[00:00:30]Yet I was raised for a very long time in this kind of abstract construct of Christian Britishness which you know, I feel like you've been talking a little bit about today.

[00:00:40]>> Yes.

[00:00:41]And then you know, when you then move to Devon as a young man there is a lot of naivety in the schools and there's a lot of kind of there are perceptions of Britishness which even someone like myself whose family's been involved in the armed forces for example.

[00:00:57]I still exist on the periphery of and you know I'm saying this as a white man.

[00:01:02]So I want to know what you think British culture is and what it should be and not in some kind of like we should all have 20 kids kind of way like really like on a on a on a day-to-day basis what does that culture look like?

[00:01:15]Great great question. Okay, so what I would say is reducing what it is to be British down to a set of purely values is is a very modern idea, okay? To say that you know, these days you ask people what it is to be British they might say oh it's democracy, it's acceptance, it's it's being very progressive and and open to to different cultures, multicultural. Loads of people have a different notion and that's a problem because you can't actually establish what it is to be British. I say that that is a I don't I don't subscribe to all those particular values but I would say that democracy and freedom and traditional liberalism are all symptoms of what it is to be British. But the actual essence of Britishness is about ancestry and lineage and history and and everything that we have built over the past 1500 years starting with the Anglo-Saxons. So so I would say that what it is to be British is about continuity. So every value has been passed down generation to generation to generation to generation to in my family it goes back generation to generation. So I've inherited what it is to be British. I don't need to define it for a set of values explicitly. I've naturally inherited and had that passed down in my country in the same way they have that in Bangladesh or China or Vietnam. They all have their own nuances, intricacies, parts of history, wars, conflicts, death, famines.

[00:02:37]Everything has been passed down generation to generation. We inherit that. Every generation creates something new. That's what establishes a homeland.

[00:02:43]Same applies to all the other countries too.

[00:02:47]I'm kind of inclined to disagree. Okay.

[00:02:50]Mainly because you know, you can talk about inheritance of of of culture but if if that's applied to me then what what do I inherit? What do I inherit sectarianism, right? Then I inherit like this hatred of of the other and I don't feel like that's that's fair because you know, we can talk about this kind of like past and what it means because you know, oh yeah, we had World War II or we fought the Crimean War or whatever.

[00:03:13]Yeah.

[00:03:15]Is I think what is so absent from these discussions and it kind of even touches on migration as well. Yes, right. Is that at the core of it we have been put into boxes where [snorts] culture real culture like community has been completely degraded and you know, there's arguments which say that this is this is because of mass migration. But what I think is that it's more accurately is that the more this rhetoric is pushed that you know, mass migration is this killer of the country and that you know, this diversity is is the ruin of Britain. I find that quite hard to believe for example because Okay. I have a couple friends you know, third fourth generation immigrants now Yeah. and they still exist in this space where they find it incredibly difficult to be able to associate with a national culture and I think >> Then they should marry if they're fourth generation migrants, you're saying that for four generations none of them have married somebody who's English.

[00:04:17]>> They have. Well then they're not they're not making sense. But in my place it you know >> Yeah, so they do so so they have inherited our our values and our ideas.

[00:04:24]>> you know, and and I think this is exactly the problem is that these people can't actually have the values of Britishness, right? They can walk down the street. Yeah, they'll still be racially profiled. Yeah, they'll still be kind of pushed to the periphery of national discussion and they will still find themselves under attack from narratives of what real white Britishness is. And you know I don't say white Britishness just to say. I don't bring up skin colors. I I'm not saying that that is what you're saying. No, okay. But let's be for real. A lot of the current rhetoric that is getting pushed about what Britishness is kind of is calling upon this historical kind of invocation of what what Britain is.

[00:05:02]Like for example, would you say that in the 1850s or the 1840s we were a particularly united cohesive society?

[00:05:10]Uh I would say well, what in in in in terms of the whole of Great Britain or you're talking about let's say United Kingdom. United Kingdom.

[00:05:19]Not completely I'd say England was was pretty united historically. Yeah, it's I In the 1840s you know, this the largest movement called the Chartists which is the largest people's led movement which was a push against against the establishment effectively >> Yeah. occurred in this period. You know, 30 years before that in Manchester the British government is killing people in in in Peterloo, right?

[00:05:44]Everybody but this is very interesting.

[00:05:46]So we all have we have historically divides and fractures like the War of the Roses. We have historically in our own country all sorts of civil conflicts. I mean even Northern Ireland.

[00:05:55]Yeah, of course but but but that's part of what I identify as our culture.

[00:06:00]That's that's what I'm trying to say is it is about taking that on board and having that been passed down generation and you inherit that. There isn't some abstract word that can define what it is to be British and it doesn't work because when you go to Whitechapel And you live in Whitechapel. Okay, is there is there like some kind of are they British? You know, I think that's a very difficult question to answer. You know, actually you see No, they'd say oh hang on, sorry I really don't mean to cut you but if you ask them that question, they'll say no, I'm I'm from Bangladesh.

[00:06:30]Of course I'm not English. They have an idea of what their culture is. They can identify it but we're not allowed to identify our culture. Why is that?

[00:06:35]>> I think first off I don't know that's true. Like I think you we can identify with with with elements of British culture for sure. And secondly, you know, I do live in Whitechapel and I often find myself walking around these streets and you see you know cohorts of school children you know, which are incredibly diverse and upon initial reaction a lot of people would be like oh wow look what's happened to the country. But what I think is that if we cannot get to a point where these kids who have been born in this country can grow up and feel British then we have failed.

[00:07:07]>> won't feel British if both of their parents aren't from from from Britain.

[00:07:10]>> is No, what is Britishness, right?

[00:07:12]Britishness as we are designing this flag everywhere was created in 1800. Why was it created? To literally create an an opposing identity to revolutionary France, right? So Britishness isn't an ethnicity. Britishness Being Well, would you agree for example England is So so yeah, okay. So would you say that you know, England, Scotland, Wales, Northern Ireland, even Southern Ireland to an extent, would you say that they each individually have their own ancestral identity?

[00:07:42]>> Yes. Yeah, so so would I. So so let's take the Britishness out of it because you could You can't take the Britishness out of it. This is the mistake.

[00:07:48]>> well, we can because I if you want to just talk about what it is to be English or what it is to be Welsh or you for example, I will never be an Irishman, right?

[00:07:58]Though though my my my great my great grandmother's surname was O'Connor. So there's a little bit of Irish blood in me. So lovely to meet you. But but nevertheless >> I don't have Irish blood.

[00:08:08]So where were you you're not you're not Irish?

[00:08:10]I'm not See, this is exactly the problem, right? You know, you point out this kind of Oh, it's a bit of an assumption. Yes, it is because you told me you were born in Ireland. born in Northern Ireland, right? I don't know clearly you don't have a very wide understanding of what happened in this country.

[00:08:26]>> No, I do have a wide understanding of the issues in Northern Ireland.

[00:08:29]>> white Christians in Northern Ireland were blowing each other up. Oh, I didn't realize that. No, I didn't realize that at all. Obviously that happened. But what's that got to do with you identifying What what what are you then?

[00:08:40]What am I? Exactly. Well, this is exactly the problem.

[00:08:42]>> So we don't have an identity. No, because my family, right? Is a family that has literally been in the Troubles, fought for the British Army and yet you keep I still cannot stand here as someone with English grandparents, English family and say yes, I'm British.

[00:08:56]I cannot say that. So what are you? I want to be British, right? And I will tell you right now that there are people right across this country and especially young people who do want to be British and this kind of narrative does not help. Does not help anyone, right? Where does this lead us? This leads us to somewhere like Belfast. This leads us to something like the Troubles. You know what we actually need to do is understand that Britishness in itself is something that has always So what is Britishness?

[00:09:23]What's your What's your answer then?

[00:09:24]Britishness is progress, right? The idea of Britishness has been built on a history of people unifying and resisting the exact same kinds of radicalisms which are driving wedges across our society. Britishness is actually people coming together to fight for better causes. Britishness is the one identity that people from no matter their background should be able to identify with. People can't really just be English.

[00:09:51]>> But you're saying okay and you're say so so let's just chill, all right? I get the passion is great but I just want to establish some key things, right? How can you establish what it is to be British when it's not backed by any form of ethnicity from from other other countries such as England, Scotland, and Wales. What is being British in your opinion? If it's not ethnicity, if it's not history >> How can it be ethnicity, right? For example, my own ethnicity >> So, what is it? Please answer that question.

[00:10:19]>> I'm trying to tell you if you give me the chance. First off, it can't be ethnicity because, you know, my family has German heritage, has French heritage, has Scottish heritage, has English heritage, and we've got this whole kind of broad thing.

[00:10:35]To me, what Britishness can be is people who come together and talk and get to know each other, who actually get to talk to their neighbors, who aren't scared because there's people telling them through mainstream media, through propaganda saying that, "Oh, if you talk to this person, they're really scary.

[00:10:51]They're really different from you. If you talk to them, like, you know, you might get >> media promote that at all.

[00:10:56]>> But I hate See, this is where I disagree.

[00:10:59]>> But but I I want to understand You've said that you want to be British and you have friends that want to be British.

[00:11:05]So, that sounds lovely, and I think that's great. I want to ask you, what about the millions of people who don't want to be British, who don't want to subscribe to our culture? Should we embrace those because it's our responsibility to do so? Like, that's crazy. You go to Whitechapel, I can guarantee I live in Whitechapel. I know the majority of people to which I have and I turn around and ask them where what where they're from, they laugh at me at the notion that because they have a British passport, it makes them British. They think it's hilarious. They actually laugh in my face and say, "If I'm born in a stable, does that make me a horse?" That's what they tell me.

[00:11:38]It's not the other way around. So, my experience is very different to what you're saying, my friend. You want to find something to identify with. I I've given you a I've talked to you about lineage and what is important. You disagree with that. We can't We're not going to We're going to keep, you know, looking horns on that front. But what I can tell you is those people that do come here, who come from Bangladesh, China, India, Pakistan, or come from wherever, they don't recognize themselves to being British, not because they can't, but because they don't want to, because they actively hate our culture. They don't like us. That's my experience.

[00:12:11]Again, I live in Whitechapel.

[00:12:12]>> We'll have to wrap up. You get the last word.

[00:12:13]>> a lot of my neighbors, right? And first generation people that come over don't try and pretend that they they're British because, you know, they are from Pakistan, they are from Asia, they are from these different countries.

[00:12:25]But what I really disagree with you on is that just because these parents are from different countries to neglect the young people that are born here, to neglect their children that are in our education system is a failure. There needs to be far more tangible, community-orientated action.

[00:12:43]>> They don't want it, though. That's not true. That's not my experience, mate.

[00:12:46]>> Well, it's not my experience, either.

[00:12:47]And if we can both go back and forth and say >> do. No, no, no.

[00:12:50]>> That's the end of the conversation, isn't it?

[00:12:52]It was a pleasure, nonetheless. Thank you very much. Have a lovely day. Enjoy your lecture.