A sea of blue and yellow
I have been to nearly all the anti-Brexit protests in London in the past few years. The large collection of European flags has often been a feature of these events but it was only today that I really caught myself to reflect on the significance of this demonstration of passion and identity.
Walking through one of the main arteries of central London, surrounded by the crowd and noise of any large scale demonstration, I looked at the flags all around me and saw perhaps for the first time not just the blue field and 12 yellow stars but the feelings of the people carrying them. Flags are not everyday items that most people have handy. To get some card and write an anti-Brexit or pro-EU message is one thing (and no bad thing either) but to go out of your way to buy a flag and to fly it high is a distinctly different kind of protest. While a placard can be a reflection of individual beliefs, the flag is powerful precisely because it is common to all who choose to identify with it. A flag represents solidarity and shared purpose.
Before the referendum, I was still as strongly pro-EU as I am now but the European flag itself was something that I gave little thought to. At the time there was no obvious reason to me why I would ever buy that flag, just as I had no reason to buy any other flag. And yet a few months after the referendum I did precisely that. For me the trigger was Theresa May's conference speech where supporters of internationalism were branded as 'citizens of nowhere'. What might have been the decisive moment for all these others? The act that convinced them to bring a piece of Europe into their home?
Whatever the motivation, the explosion in the visibility of the European flag, driven almost entirely by ordinary people, reflects that the flag has taken on a deep significance for many people in Britain. It has been transformed from the symbol of an institution, no more emotional than the NATO or UNICEF flags, to an expression of two essential things: personal identity and European values.
On a personal level, it is a reflection of someone's belief that they are European. My EU passport is the only one I have ever owned and I have no desire to surrender my birthright. The ability to express this kind of identity through a visual symbol is all the more important when people feel that this identity is under threat.
And it also shows how people are seeing the flag as something more than the EU. Now, this may seem surprising, given that it is the EU flag, but the point to be made is that a flag gains emotional value precisely when it transcends the narrow confines of physical institutions. Though the flag is flown outside the Commission, the European Parliament and various other official buildings throughout Europe, it is not an attachment to these places that people are declaring when they fly the flag. Instead they are showing a commitment to a common set of values, to the idea that the future we should fight for is one where Europe is united, that whatever the challenges we face, we will be best placed if we face them together as Europeans.
Patriotism and nationalism are not the right words to explain the sentiment evoked by the European flag, for the EU is not a nation or a country, but they are similar in intensity. People now see the flag and they do not simply see the European Union. They see themselves. They see their experiences, their friends and family. Importantly they also see strangers, people they have never met and will never meet and still nonetheless feel a connection because those people also identify with this flag, because they are also people who would also fly it and march with it.
For many years after its original introduction, the European flag had little value to many people. Today, however, if we are seeing a sea of blue and yellow at our marches, if people across the country are deciding that they need to own this flag, if the flag has come to truly mean something then it is because something has changed. The flag now features in popular demonstrations in all parts of Europe, not just those protests that are explicitly to defend EU membership but also those that are in defence of the rule of law and democracy. The flag has moved from simply being the flag of institutions to becoming the flag of people.
Some Brexiteers have accused the EU 'elites' of trying to force Europe on ordinary citizens by imposing the flag, by trying to reverse engineer an idea of statehood. Yet the real experience shows that this is the wrong way round. Without ordinary people to defend it and fight for it, the European flag would have remained an indifferent piece of blue cloth. The flag has certainly not made any Europeans, but Europeans have made the flag.
Image via Flickr
Walking through one of the main arteries of central London, surrounded by the crowd and noise of any large scale demonstration, I looked at the flags all around me and saw perhaps for the first time not just the blue field and 12 yellow stars but the feelings of the people carrying them. Flags are not everyday items that most people have handy. To get some card and write an anti-Brexit or pro-EU message is one thing (and no bad thing either) but to go out of your way to buy a flag and to fly it high is a distinctly different kind of protest. While a placard can be a reflection of individual beliefs, the flag is powerful precisely because it is common to all who choose to identify with it. A flag represents solidarity and shared purpose.
Before the referendum, I was still as strongly pro-EU as I am now but the European flag itself was something that I gave little thought to. At the time there was no obvious reason to me why I would ever buy that flag, just as I had no reason to buy any other flag. And yet a few months after the referendum I did precisely that. For me the trigger was Theresa May's conference speech where supporters of internationalism were branded as 'citizens of nowhere'. What might have been the decisive moment for all these others? The act that convinced them to bring a piece of Europe into their home?
Whatever the motivation, the explosion in the visibility of the European flag, driven almost entirely by ordinary people, reflects that the flag has taken on a deep significance for many people in Britain. It has been transformed from the symbol of an institution, no more emotional than the NATO or UNICEF flags, to an expression of two essential things: personal identity and European values.
On a personal level, it is a reflection of someone's belief that they are European. My EU passport is the only one I have ever owned and I have no desire to surrender my birthright. The ability to express this kind of identity through a visual symbol is all the more important when people feel that this identity is under threat.
And it also shows how people are seeing the flag as something more than the EU. Now, this may seem surprising, given that it is the EU flag, but the point to be made is that a flag gains emotional value precisely when it transcends the narrow confines of physical institutions. Though the flag is flown outside the Commission, the European Parliament and various other official buildings throughout Europe, it is not an attachment to these places that people are declaring when they fly the flag. Instead they are showing a commitment to a common set of values, to the idea that the future we should fight for is one where Europe is united, that whatever the challenges we face, we will be best placed if we face them together as Europeans.
Patriotism and nationalism are not the right words to explain the sentiment evoked by the European flag, for the EU is not a nation or a country, but they are similar in intensity. People now see the flag and they do not simply see the European Union. They see themselves. They see their experiences, their friends and family. Importantly they also see strangers, people they have never met and will never meet and still nonetheless feel a connection because those people also identify with this flag, because they are also people who would also fly it and march with it.
For many years after its original introduction, the European flag had little value to many people. Today, however, if we are seeing a sea of blue and yellow at our marches, if people across the country are deciding that they need to own this flag, if the flag has come to truly mean something then it is because something has changed. The flag now features in popular demonstrations in all parts of Europe, not just those protests that are explicitly to defend EU membership but also those that are in defence of the rule of law and democracy. The flag has moved from simply being the flag of institutions to becoming the flag of people.
Some Brexiteers have accused the EU 'elites' of trying to force Europe on ordinary citizens by imposing the flag, by trying to reverse engineer an idea of statehood. Yet the real experience shows that this is the wrong way round. Without ordinary people to defend it and fight for it, the European flag would have remained an indifferent piece of blue cloth. The flag has certainly not made any Europeans, but Europeans have made the flag.
Image via Flickr
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