True patriotism is making this country a better place to live

Some people think that any Englishman who doesn't get a lump in his throat during the king's coronation hates his country

Some people seem determined to impose their definition of patriotism on us (

Image: Getty Images)

You'll be hearing a lot of people playing Patriotism Top Trumps over the next two weeks.

Churchill quoters who believe that any Englishman who does not raise a glass of cask bitters at St George's on Sunday or who does not get a lump in the throat during the king's coronation, hates his country.

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Well, I personally won't be celebrating St. George's - but if dancing around a pole in tribute to the patron saint of Bulgaria, Portugal and syphilis is your thing, then go for it .

Nor will I be watching King Charles drive away from Westminster Abbey in his golden carriage next month, as I have no interest in a stranger who has amassed a personal wealth of 1.82 billion after spending nine months in the Queen's ex-womb 74 years ago.

That doesn't mean I hate this country. But I hate what seems to have become the accepted definition of loving this country (let's call it putting a Union Jack in your Twitter bio) and the people who seem increasingly determined to impose that definition on us - people who label those who do not buy their patriotic vision from traitors. And woke people up to this.

Brexit backer Jacob Rees-Mogg has moved part of his investment company to Ireland (

Picture:

PENNSYLVANIA)

It doesn't make you unpatriotic to think that the royal family is a medieval farce and all that pomp and circumstance, and elevation through the birthright, in a time of growing poverty and inequality, is a insult to our intelligence. Especially when we're spending £100m on the stuffing, with a few hand-picked members of the lower orders crammed into the cheap seats to make Charles look like a man of the people.

It doesn't make you unpatriotic to think that sending asylum seekers to Rwanda is a degrading and impractical thing devoid of any trace of decency for which the British were once famous.

Just as it doesn't make you patriotic to stand up in the Commons, write in a right-wing newspaper or call GB News to denounce anyone lamenting the Brexit disaster as a Brit-hating Remoaner.

Especially when many of the leading, beating-chested patriots who invented the fictions that persuaded voters to leave the EU were gutter-level hypocrites. I'm talking about Jacob...