An island of strangers? The facts are more nuanced

You know those surveys where they ask you to tick optional boxes at the end to describe your personal characteristics? The boxes I tick are: White British (always a long way down the list, which I view as a micro aggression); Male (same as assigned at birth); No Religion (used to be Roman Catholic); Heterosexual; and now, sadly, 65+.

The facts are more nuanced. My grandparents were, like the Afghan interpreters, in danger in their country of birth in the civil war that followed British withdrawal because of their perceived collaboration with the colonisers. One grandfather had been a policeman while the other had fought on the British side in World War 1. Neither activity was likely to win a medal from the leaders of post-independence Eire. The policemen were deported en masse to Crewe, from where they dispersed throughout, mainly North West, England.

Apart from their nationality, these refugees were distinguished by their Roman Catholicism. Since Henry VIII, the British have been suspicious of ‘Papists’. The ‘No politics, No Religion’ rules of discussion at English dinner parties stem from a time when dissenters from the established religion (whatever that was at the time) risked being burned alive. Until 1778, Catholics (apart from a few covert aristocratic families) were not allowed to own property, inherit land or join the army, a reform which sparked the Gordon riots. It was not until the Roman Catholic Relief Act of 1829 that most anti-Catholic legislation was repealed, in the teeth of opposition from King George IVth.

From 1969 until 1997, during my adolescence and young to middle aged adult life, the IRA conducted a campaign of violence against the British state, leading to many deaths on the English mainland. Looking back, I find it curious that, as a third generation Irish immigrant attending a Roman Catholic school, I can recall no instance in which I felt in danger of reprisals on the basis of my roots or religion. The only time I was so threatened was because my aggressors had taken a black haired, bespectacled boy from South Manchester for a Jew. An understandable mistake.

This comes to mind because of a discussion about immigration between Konstatin Kisin, a podcaster, and Fraser Nelson, who used to be editor of the Spectator. Nelson insisted that Rishi Sunak was English, to which Kisin responded “He’s a brown Hindu, how is he English?” Kisin says he was drawing a distinction between nationality and ethnic identity.

I feel English. Apart from a year abroad, I have never lived anywhere else. Of course I am white, but I do tan easily for a Celt. But then Spanish sailors were shipwrecked on the Mayo coast in the aftermath of the Armada…

Michael Clarke