It can hardly be doubted that Britain is currently in the grips of a revolutionary government, even if its revolution is protracted and in comparison with those of the last century. As with any such historic upheaval there has been an exodus of those who have found their social standing in rapid yet constant decline. According to recent reports nearly a million “Britons” have left in the last seven years, with most heading to Australia, New Zealand, and Canada. Most of these emigrants are middle class, yet the White working classes – who have no such possibility of escape abroad – also feel that their position in society has declined further, if it were possible, from bottom to being buried far beneath the surface. As BBC boss Richard Klein has remarked in a recent article for the Daily Mail, “many of the white working class see themselves as an oppressed ethnic minority too, and lower down the ladder than other groups on the hierarchy of victimhood.”

But, do terms such as “Briton” and even “White” really apply in British politics today? No doubt many Pakistani-British and Chinese-British are emigrating with the economic growth of their familial countries, yet reports seem to suggest that the majority are British in the traditional, or ethnic sense of the word, which provokes another question. Do these emigrants, then, consider themselves British first, or Northern Irish, Scottish, Welsh, or English?

Over the last decade Britain’s Labour government and its so-called “multicultural” ideology has facilitated mass immigration from Eastern Europe and the Middle East and the rise of Islam as a political force within the country, in part by continually obscuring “Britishness”, British traditions, laws, etc., and in many cases portraying them as outdated or simply bad. Notably the government’s own website for promoting the country to U.S. citizens has a section entitled “multicultural Britain” which is almost entirely devoted to the Muslim community (and most especially to praising it) though supposedly representative of contemporary society. In the subsection on “Politics”, for example, do we find the rather one-sided view that “Muslims promote universal values and champion the causes of peace, justice, tolerance, human rights, democracy and co-existence” and for this reason have entered British politics.

The same multicultural section also boasts – among many other achievements – that the many different communities of Britain feel they belong and have shared values – an assertion that flies in the face of the exodus of British people from the country. The viewer is led to the Citizenship Survey where bureaucratic fudging is apparent. Notably, while South-East Asians are broken down into Pakistani, Bangladeshi, and Indian, and Black categorized as either Black African or Black Caribbean, there is only a single category for White people, so it is impossible to say what percentage is actually British-White. As Britain seems increasingly fragmented even among the traditional Welsh, Scottish, and English, it is also impossible to say what percentage each takes up in this inadequate category.

In every question asked Whites are either in the middle or lower, and thus far below the South East Asian groups who nearly always come top. (No doubt if Whites had been broken down along similar lines, White-British, White English, etc., would have been lower still.) Asked whether they felt able to “influence decisions in their local area and Great Britain”, however, Whites actually came bottom, with only 19 percent saying that they felt they were able to influence decision in the country, as compared to most other ethnic groups which were each in the 30 percentiles, with Bangladeshi the highest at 36 percent. Asked whether they felt able to affect decisions in their local are Whites were again by far the lowest at 37 percent, while Black Caribbean came out top, with 51 percent saying that they felt able.

In Britain indigenous ethnic nationalism is on the ascendant, with Scotland debating devolution and English nationalists calling for an English parliament and for St. George’s Day (the nation’s saint’s day) to be a national holiday in England. The rise of indigenous nationalism has undoubtedly been provoked by the government’s multicultural ideology which, it might be remarked, is really one of multi-nationalism, in which persons of every national and racial background are encouraged to speak and read their native language rather than to learn English, and to retain their customs, way of life, fly their native flag, etc. Consequently Britain is now a country composed of micro-nations, and for the first time in a millennium seems to exist in a near tribal state. But, it is also undoubtedly a reaction to the homogenization of the indigenous English, Irish, Scottish, Welsh, etc. under the category ‘White’, or perhaps even ‘British’, which, under Labour, is supposed to give way to other ethnic groups and their cultures. British nationalism is thus taboo. Any suggestion by an MP that the British might have some legitimate concern about mass immigration, jobs, or housing is met with the mantra that he or she is “speaking the language of the BNP [British National Party]”, which is supposed to infer that the speaker has said something beyond the pale, rather than as endorsement of the nationalist party.

However, as England has historically been the center of power for the United Kingdom, and is often used as a synonym for Britain, English nationalism has come under fire from some politicians, even though Scottish and Welsh nationalism generally does not, and, as mentioned, ethnic nationalism of other, non-British communities within Britain, has been encouraged. Home Secretary Jack Straw has said – in the kind of language that would have got him fired if he had said it about any other ethnic group – the English are “potentially very aggressive, very violent”, and that they have historically “subjugated” the Irish, Welsh, and Scottish.

Of all of Britain’s ethnic groups, the English seem have been made increasingly politically invisible or helpless – a point that English nationalism has clearly meant to challenge. In 2007 the Steadfast Trust (then known as the Ethnic English Trust. The Steadfast Trust is Britain’s only registered charity for the ethnic English, and aims to educate young ethnic English children about their heritage, and to fight discrimination against the English) sued the Commission for Racial Equality alleging that it had:

(a) issued guidance in its codes for employers and public bodies which is wrong in law so as to conceal the legal recognition awarded to the English racial group;
(b) acted outside its legal powers by seeking to redefine the English racial group, and
(c) maintained, contrary to the Race Relations Act 1976, a policy, practice or rule of racial discrimination against the English racial group.

In fact it would seem that it is legal for employers to discriminate against an applicant on this basis, for, notably, in 2007 Abigail Howarth was barred for applying to the Environmental Agency for a trainee position because she was specifically “White English” (the indigenous White Scottish and White Welsh were nonetheless eligible to apply, as were those of every other ethnicity, of course).

Discrimination comes in more subtle forms also, and most especially in blanket labeling of different groups. It is remarkable indeed, that while the British government is able to break down Black into two groups and Asian into three it speaks only of Britons in regard to emigration and Whites in regard to problems of the youth of that large and ambiguous group. Notably, then according to several government and academic reports, poor ‘White’ boys are now the nation’s lowest achievers, coming far below those of other ethnic groups of similar income, though the Steadfast Trust contends that the poor ‘English’ boys account for the vast majority.

“British” and “White” seem now to be employed by the government in order to obscure the facts: the Bangladeshi is British and the Polish immigrant White. Or else – along with “English” – these terms are used as terms of disempowerment. The same government that champions ethnic groups from every other country seems to want to deny the indigenous ethnic groups of Britain not only their identity, history, and sense of worth, but even their right to be considered as ethnic groups. Notably, with the furor against mass immigration the Labour government has proposed closing down the ancestral visa scheme in which young people (largely from Australia and New Zealand) can apply to live and work in Britain if their father or grandfather was British. It is as if the government is saying to the near million Brits that have left, “and don’t come back”, and to those who have remained, “don’t think you are entitled to be thought of as an ethnic group or groups with historical ties and legitimate rights to this country; it’s not yours”.