The World Cup, Patriotism and Stuff

The mighty England demolished Slovenia 1-0 this afternoon and march triumphantly into the last 16 of the World Cup. I shouldn't carp because they played far better this time and might easily have won by more. Nonetheless the last ten minutes were pretty nerve-wracking with England needing to win to progress. The country goes through the emotional wringer again on Sunday.

And very loosely the World Cup brings me to the subject of the day - patriotism. I was out running this morning and you have to find something to keep your mind off the pain and boredom. I ranged over flag-flying, Harriett Harman, Barack Obama (I know, it's an obsession) and leftiness and rightness in general. It seems to me that someone should do some research into why men don't think about sex every seven seconds when they are running. The methodology of any study would be interesting.

As is now the norm during sporting festivals the St George's flags are flying from cars, from windows, from trees. English patriotism is everywhere. I encountered an internet joke site the other day where the jibe of the day was along the lines of: how can you tell a man with a penis less than 2 inches long? By the small white flag with a red cross flying from his car. Now this offends the first rule of good jokes, namely that it should actually be funny, but we will let that pass for the purposes of the current debate. There had been a flurry of indignant comments posted on the website, mostly from outraged and over-sensitive Englishmen. The poster of the joke had responded with a confession that yes he was indeed Scottish and that the English were pathetic and ought to lighten up. Now I'm with the Scot on this one but I'm also fairly convinced that he would be a better man if he didn't think this so damned funny in the first place. As I laboured round the streets of Four Oaks I also wondered what would be the reaction if the roles in the joke were reversed. Now this would require one to imagine that Scotland had actually qualified for the World Cup, an act easier for those of my generation who remember such things happening with a cheerful frequency. But to return to my original point - I suspect the Englishman making the joke would be deemed by certain sensitive souls as ignorant, arrogant and even racist. Which makes you think. Or does when you're out running. Instead of sex I suppose.

Now as the sweat dripped down my nose (a sensation I rather enjoy, feeling as it does a signifier of virtue) I constructed a little theory, no a hypothesis. This brings me to the difficult subject of Harriet Harman. Why does she hate us all so much? Why is she so angry? I had heard her berating David Cameron in parliament, not of itself a bad thing but why so preachy and charmless? Now you know that I am distinctly underwhelmed by Barack Obama but I think there is an important difference between him and La Harman - like most Americans he is instinctively a patriot. He is comfortable in his nationality. He does that hand on heart thing during the national anthem and he means it whereas a Brit doing it can only look a bit of a prick. And there we have the distinction between the American left and the British left - our prototypical strident  lefties (Harmans) are deeply ashamed of being British. They don't approve of themselves and feel the need to apologise for all sorts of things they never did. Which is a real pity because I don't like to think of all these essentially decent people being so unhappy.

Bad news. As I have been posting this the Germans have won and England's next match will now be against them on Sunday. This cannot be a good thing. We will lose. On penalties. And on Monday all the flags will look rather sad and Scotsmen (and Harriet Harman?) will be happy. Which just sucks.