Am I Proud To Be British?
That’s a complicated question for a left-leaning Penguin.
A recent survey from the National Centre for Social Research has revealed fewer Britons today are happy identifying as ‘over the moon’ about our history, cultural achievements, and role in the world. The survey has angered many of the British political right who psychologically hold Britain up as the pinnacle of civilised society. They do this despite buckets of evidence to the contrary and a big button marked ‘historical nuance’ on the wall.
A decade ago, 86% of the people who responded to the same questions were very proud of British history; this year there’s been a drop down to 64%. That’s a pretty significant drop.
We can dig into the stats and find some interesting quirks in the data.
Firstly, this is a generational thing, and as someone with parents who furiously believe in the sanctity of Britishness, I can attest to the veracity of these statistics. Only around half of those born in the 1990s believe it’s important to be born in the UK; comparatively almost three-quarters of Britons born in the 1940s believe the same.
Every 8 in 10 Brexit voters believe being born within the shores of the United Kingdom is what makes someone genuinely British.
