@mrmhead Said
Re: Offended by Brit Flag - Well, it represents a country that suppressed our colonies, and that we had to fight to be free ...
And the Anglophiles admire our former suppressors.
... irregardless (
) that my ancestors were somewhere in Europe at the time ...
Hmmmm..... OK.... so..... Elizabeth I gave Raleigh his charter to establish colonies in the new world in 1584. He never actually visited Virginia but he did send some of his expedition to the Americas and they established their first colony on Roanoke Island around 1585
I'm not too up on quite how Virginia really did come to be named after Good Queen Bess (it's getting late here and I'm a tad tired) but let's just agree that it did.
Firstly, the Union Flag didn't exist in 1584. James I didn't come to the throne until 1603 and the flag was designed in 1606 so for the first 20 or so years it couldn't possibly have oppressed any of the settlers of Virginia.... who were all of British extraction anyway and were quite happy to be recognised as such.... until at the very least the early 18th century.
There weren't really any "Americans" (even the name is of Italian origin. Just as well nobody named the country after Leif Eriksson. You'd all be calling yourselves 'leaves' now*. lol) as such until after the revolution. Everybody was a colonist of one kind or another and all identified either with Britain or France or whoever.
I guess you're just getting a bit full of revolutionary fervour and hey, that's cool around 4 July. It's to be expected. But it's worth remembering that for the best part of 200 years, from 1585 to 1776 or thereabouts, nobody complained about British rule at all. It was only after some daft stamp act and a tax on tea that things got all emotional and revolutionary.
But anyway, thanks for the advice about the flags. All tucked into the old memory banks now.
*The United States of Leif. Doesn't have quite the same ring to it, does it...?