Ballad of the Union Jack
Quick: Picture the English flag in your mind. That’s it – the one with the blue background and red lines in every which direction. Right? That’s what I thought. The Union Jack was as much a part of England for me as warm bitter, fish & chips, and the Queen Mum.

Except that the Union Jack isn’t the flag of England at all. I learned this a couple weekends ago when I took the train to London to spend a few days, catch England’s first World Cup match, against Paraguay, and take advantage of the type of sunshine London rarely sees.

Everywhere I looked, there was a flag I had never encountered -- white with a red cross – in shop windows, wedged into car doors, in the hands of young children. I can be slow, but it hit me immediately, huh, this is the English flag. (Actually, it was more like, “This is the English flag?”) I can’t say it turned my world upside down; the Union Jack has never played a huge role in my life. But it was kind of like hearing that, oh, I don’t know, that Tunisia is actually in Africa when the whole time you thought it was somewhere near Singapore. Or that no actual milk was used to make this milkshake. Let’s call it mildly disconcerting.

Then last night, I flipped on the telly (notice my newfound Britishisms. You should hear my accent) to catch some World Cup highlights and instead got caught up in a BBC special on this very subject. I tuned in about halfway through and tuned out 20 minutes later, but I learned some interesting factoids along the way. The Union Jack was originally conceived as a melding of the English and Scottish flags. There was much back and forth about whether the Scottish X should overlay the English + or vice versa. Of course the English won, and the cross of St Patrick was later added to represent the Irish – making up the United Kingdom.

What about Wales? Good question. The Welsh are still pissed about this fiasco. They’re not even represented. And besides, this stupid Union Jack is a banner to oppression and Imperialism. (The English, who don’t seem to like the Union Jack much, either, were nonetheless quick to tell the Welsh to shut the bloody hell up, because Wales isn’t even a real country; they’re lucky the English even let them have their own rugby team!) The only one who seemed content with the status quo was this guy from Northern Ireland. Northern Ireland has no flag other than the Union Jack, nor do they see the need for one. How's that for a classic case of Stockholm Syndrome?

I guess the whole thing is pretty analogous to the Confederate flag controversy that was raging in South Carolina and Georgia a few years ago. Except for the boiled peanuts.

Go England!