Danishfurniturelover
the prettiest spice girl
What is Englishness?
Well I think it should be able to incorporate many different areas and cultures as we have a long standing history of welcoming other nationals and cultures here.
But I think specifically in this sense you need to think about what riles the metropolitan elite so much. So think mainly about things that would be described as old or specifically white traditions.
Now and again the MP's and civil servants let slip how much they despise it, think the labour politician in essex at the last election who saw the union jack hanging from a house and said "that says it all really"
Hell even on here in the past 6 months we have had posters a few of them tell us that people should hate the British or more specifically the English (as the Welsh and Scots never seem to make mistakes, they also more commonly vote left by coincidence) because of the Empire something that all of us on here were born after it ended.
At the heart of the remoaners criticising of the people who voted to leave a corrupt political union was a sneering hatred of the people of the North and the Midlands. Of all the people I have met and known that voted out all said they did not think the EU treated as fairly and all referenced a sense of fair play.
Now some national characteristics can be played up to. The English stiff upper lip(no one who was her after princess diana died would agree with that) or the rather offensive one of all Irush liking a drink (my wife's family is Irish and a few of them dont drink)
But I know many people who consider a sense of fairness to be an English characteristic and a defining attribute to Englishness. The has been an almost constant campaign to undermine it, notably with people spending 4 years trying to over turn a democratic referendum.