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The Inclusivity Policy of a British School

—on a 12-year-old student in Britain being barred from making
a speech about being British on Culture Celebration Day

Celebrate your race with jubilation.
Flaunt your flag with fervent glee and grit.
Revel with elation in your nation—
But not if you’re a lousy little Brit.

Crow about your customs with conviction.
Your culture is a captivating hit—
Unless of course you’re cursed with the affliction
Of being born a boring, two-bit Brit.

Gleam in garb that hollers patriotic.
Prance with pride and shimmer in your kit.
Such swagger will be lauded as exotic—
But only if you’re not a lowly Brit.

Blast your roaring anthem of devotion
In notes that soar where scores of angels flit.
Praise with haughty warbles of emotion—
But not if you’re a worthless, wretched Brit.

You have the front to wave a Union Jack?
Make sure you watch your treasonous British back!

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Susan Jarvis Bryant is a poet originally from the U.K., now living on the Gulf Coast of Texas.

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2 Responses

  1. Mark Stellinga

    Susan, Connie & I, too, are extremely disheartened by the surge of ‘anti-American’ born-an’-raised-Americans (??) we now encounter so much more often than when we were in our teens (the 60s) – and am not at all surprised that you, as well, are feeling so rejected, so alienated by, and so resentful of a rapidly growing number of your fellow Brits. Thankfully, what’s most important is that we poets know that we’re right about what we write about – as YOU’ve always been and are with this little fireball.

    Reply
  2. Joseph S. Salemi

    The plain fact is this: If you are a white British subject of English or other European descent, you are a third-class citizen in your native land, with carefully circumscribed rights. Anyone who denies this is a bare-faced liar.

    This situation does not change, no matter what political party rules in the House of Commons. And if you make any kind of public stink about it all, you will be visited by the constabulary, arrested, hit with a fine and/or imprisonment, and sacked from your employment. The British Deep State makes use of the police for ideological enforcement, just as Heinrich Himmler made use of the Gestapo in Nazi Germany.

    Does anyone even remember what Enoch Powell said would happen to Britain? Well, it has happened. And the entire educational, cultural, and journalistic establishment of the U.K. is completely at home with it all.

    If Susan had published this piece in the British Isles, she would have been vilified, cancelled, and perhaps worse.

    Winston Churchill must be turning over in his grave.

    Reply

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