Saint Patrick's Day (17/3/21) : Part 4 : In Which Mr Muggins Digs An Even Deeper Hole For Himself by Mr A.N.Muggins

(only read this section if you are genuinely open minded and don’t mind playing about with things like borders and political or national identity etc. Mr Muggins says this is not necessarily to be taken too seriously.)

     Alfred could see himself moving closer now to the concept of British Isles Unity, including the whole of the Republic of Eire, as well as the fully United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, as if he were actually a politician himself!

     If the Irish wanted a better title to reflect their altogether inclusion what about the Commonwealth of Great Britain and Ireland? Surely that wouldn’t upset anybody or make them feel left out? Perhaps they should put Ireland first? :- The Commonwealth of Ireland and Great Britain! Yes, that sounded good to him, but he could well imagine the Welsh or the Scots, and even the uncomplaining English, complaining for not being specifically mentioned. These days they would have to put dragons and lions back in the flag somehow, with leprechauns or something. The Union would actually be very hard to recreate!

And then, “Oh No!” he remembered the Irish wouldn’t like the word Commonwealth any more because they didn’t like our (English) Oliver Cromwell (The Man Who Would Not Wear A Crown!) after some of the nasty things he did in Ireland. (Although which English monarch, or pseudo monarch, didn’t do nasty things in Ireland? He would have to look up what Henry VIII did in Ireland, but it couldn’t have been good whatever it was! He knew his daughter Elizabeth had done a lot of bad things (or maybe good things? – if you were Protestant! – like replanting the Protestant Scots in Ulster!) including sending the hapless Earl Of Leicester to sort out the problems of Ireland!

     And then there were the many people of Danish, Jamaican, Jewish, Bangladeshi, Polish, Pakistani, Nigerian, Norman, Indian, French Hugeunot, Slovak and Somali ancestry to include too these days. (If I have left anyone out please do not be offended, it was not my intention, but you might need to start waving your origin or ancestral origin flag around a bit more prominently please in the modern media jungle! Or you might not get noticed, particularly when your sons, daughters and grandchildren stop being able to speak any of your origin languages!) Maybe Commonwealth wasn’t such a bad word after all? (The word had been used to great effect after the disbanding of the British Empire, after the Second World War, to include all those newly Independent States, Dominions and Dependencies made out of the erstwhile Empire.) It could actually include virtually everyone and everybody, which was actually a very modern concept. (In fact why didn’t they change the name of the United Nations to the Commonwealth of Nations while they were at it? Just another idea!)

     (One of these days Alfred was going to do an alphabetical journey through the modern population of England (or Britain?) (or Great Britain and Northern Ireland? Or the Commonwealth of Ireland and Great Britain?), finding resident communities for every letter of the alphabet! He just knew he would struggle with the letter Z? – possibly Zebras (although there were only a few of them in the zoos, and they were not actually voters with residential or national human status!) or maybe ZZ Top fans? Then he had a sudden revelation. There were quite a few Zambians here surely, as it had been in the British Empire and must still be in the Commonwealth, and of course Zimbabweans (Zambia styled Northern Rhodesia at one time, and Zimbabwe just Rhodesia). He had even worked with one or two Zimbabweans in his time, so he should have remembered more quickly!

     What about the letter X? That would truly be impossible? What about X Factor fans? (They were a race apart surely? Only joking! Don’t quote me, please!!) or the Children of Generation X? Could they count as real communities?

    It was time to stop. He had probably upset enough people for one day. But really he only wanted them to hold hands, at least for one day!

P.S. Polarization – What does it mean?

   My suggestions :- The colonisation of England by the Poles.

                          Or  The Invasion of the Polar Bears, as the ice caps melt.

You may have your own suggestions. On this occasion I shall desist from asking Lady Alexa! (the kitchen music computer and fount of all knowledge)