Taking back control of patriotism

As usual, accept the fact that the New Statesman is an angry ranty blog rather than proper journalism and move on. Because sometimes angry ranty blogs are correct.

If ministers really wanted us to believe it’s on our side, they probably should have spent less time calling us saboteurs, citizens of nowhere, terrorist sympathisers or whatever else it thought might get the Daily Mail and its readers to start frantically fanning themselves on any given day.

The government would have a stronger claim to be “us” if it actually had a mandate, of course, but, for entirely hilarious reasons, it doesn’t. Leave keep demanding we respect the will of the people, and fair enough – but if June’s election taught us anything, it’s that the will of the people was very specifically not to give the government a blank cheque to do whatever the hell it wants. Alas, however, Theresa May views political opposition with the mixture of bafflement, scorn and blind terror that tech bros reserve for women, so instead of reasoned argument intended to bring the country together, we get a bunch of nonsense like this.

Here’s the thing, though – even if Remain supporters were actively supporting the EU in negotiations in some way, that would be completely and utterly fine. Partly because this is still a free country, at least for the moment; partly because patriotism isn’t mandatory. But mostly because patriotism does not in fact mean “my country, right or wrong”, it just means wanting the best for it.