Flags of conquest

A flag is a badge of conquest and possession. The first act of the discoverer on landing in a strange land is to plant the Union Jack and claim the land for the King. The flag may be a patriotic display when it flies in the sovereign land it represents, but even there it is saying “this is ours, fixed fast in the land, and we defy all others”.

What are we to think of the plethora of flags seen about our cities today? Parliament Square at the moment has a colourful display of the flags of the overseas territories and crown dependencies. They are there for a state visit; to overawe the visiting potentate by showing the breadth of our dominion. Equally they can mark claims by each territory: “These lands are just as British as you and have as much a claim on Westminster’s attention as the lone Union Flag”. On Historic County Flags day later in July, the square is ringed with county flags, which essentially says the same thing: “Each of these counties claims a place here”.

The growth of county flags over the last decade or two has been a colourful phenomenon. It is in a way a reconquest: they are not badges of bureaucracies but of historic counties and of their people. County flags are a way to thumb the nose at bureaucratic arrogance and to say “Do what you will to your own petty officialdoms, but here stand real people in our ancestral real places, and we claim our land by planting our flag”. This is why the first to arise included Yorkshire, Huntingdonshire, Middlesex and Westmorland, which you can see flying keenly in their home counties. To those bringing flattening uniformity; we stand and hold our ancient shires by right.

A powerful symbol of conquest then. If you doubt it, visit Ulster and see where communities plant their flags as badges of dominance. There, flags are not artistic flourishes, but profound politics. In the world outside the Anglosphere, flags are the cause of wars.

Just last week a motion before the Commons raised profound questions about flags that government and councils have started to fly.

The rainbow flag is a mark of conquest. A campaigner demanding of government or council that a multicoloured flag be flown when he says, is commanding that government or council. The flag represents the campaigner’s party or his ideology, and must be flown to show that party as being sovereign over the nominally public body, and dissent is to be crushed as rebellion. The outrage expressed when a public body refuses is incandescent. It is the reaction of the master vanquished from his domain.

Public bodies must be politically neutral. They may follow an ideology in practice, but when dealing with the public, it is vital, for our confidence in them, that they be neutral. No flag showing conquest by private interest or ideology should every be flown.