On the Right and for some in the political center, the Union Jack is an emblem of patriotism and national pride. But for many on the Left, the United Kingdom flag is seen as a symbol of intolerance, xenophobia, and right-wing extremism.
One source of the disparate perception is the still gaping wounds of Brexit, Britain’s departure from the European Union.
The political leveraging of the Union Jack was a key campaign tool of certain pro-Brexit movements such as Nigel Farage’s U.K. Independence Party. This speaks to the Union Jack’s increasing use by right-wing social media users as a motif for their broader political interests. But considering that Farage and other right-wing officials are associated with anti-immigration policies, the “waving of the flag” takes on a more political tenor in Britain than it does in the United States. Certainly, the U.K. Left does not share its American counterpart’s shared appropriation of the national flag. It might seem trite, but many on the Left are now donning the EU flag in their social media photos instead of Union Jack or St. George’s Cross flags (England’s flag).
These ideational differences are best encapsulated on Twitter.
The @UnionJackClub, for example, takes on the flag as its very identity. A members club for former British service personnel, the club’s flag appreciation would appear to be less partisan than that applied by others. Still, the left-wing Green Party believes it can find political opportunity in refusing to wave the flag. It says that “politics is more than a union jack. That problems are best solved by the communities facing them. That collaboration is better than competition.” Note, here, the Green Party’s open identification of the flag as a dividing, rather than uniting, force.
This is not to say that there is a simple “Union Jack, bad” sentiment on the Left.
A recently leaked report from the center-left/left Labour Party revealed a push to embrace the flag in order to win back lost voters in the traditional northern English heartlands. Unfortunately for Labour leader Keir Starmer, the strategy has been labeled by many in his own party as unoriginal and a weak attempt to emulate Boris Johnson’s Conservative Party. Labour parliamentarians on the party’s left wing also fear that the plans will alienate young and minority voters who do not identify with the flag.
The central takeaway, then, seems to be that where patriotism and hostility are interchangeable terms on the Left, the Right views the Union Jack as an innate prism to patriotism and shared purpose. But if a flag is supposed to represent all the nation in all its diversity, the Union Jack is currently failing to meet the mark.
Nikki Peach is a freelance journalist based in London. She recently graduated from City, University of London with a master’s in broadcast journalism and writes about culture and current affairs.
