Hundreds of flags have gone up across York in recent weeks – but they’ve all been English or British.
Now a new initiative is underway to fly our flags alongside those of nations from around the world to show that York is a global city.
A group called the International Flagging Committee is behind the vision.
The committee includes people from all walks of life, from students to a retired engineer to a stay-at-home mum of toddlers.
A spokesperson for the committee told YorkMix: “We understand that many people feel they can’t fly the British flag without being labelled as racist, and that’s a shame.
“We should be able to fly our flag without being accused of racism or isolationism.
“We agree that anyone should be allowed to fly their flag and feel proud of it. And to that end, we feel that flying as many other nations flags alongside our own signals the unity that the Union flag represents.
“We’re a multicultural city, and we should all be able to feel proud of our origins, sexualities, religions and so on.”
By flying our flags with those of other countries “is the best way to show that we are inclusive and show that we do respect other cultures”.
There is a fundraiser underway to buy the flags – you can find it here.
The organisers want to put up an avenue of global flags, possibly on University Road, where it curves round to the University of York’s library.
“We know the international students will will all be arriving soon. We want them to feel welcome.”
They have asked both the university and City of York Council for permission to do this. And as the council is allowing most of the St George’s flags to stay in place, “there should be no reason for them to not allow us to put ours up”.
The committee was set up in direct response to all the St George’s and Union flags being installed on lampposts.
“The majority of people who are putting up these flags don’t want to make anyone feel intimidated, and don’t want to make anyone feel that they’re not welcome,” the spokesperson said.
“I think they just have a sense of national pride, and they want to show that.”
By contrast, the racist vandalism at the Dragon House Chinese takeaway in Foxwood included daubed St George’s flags.
The committee spokesperson said that most would agree that “using the flag in this context, to graffiti it onto a Chinese takeout and to write ‘go home’, is not how we want our flag used, not how we want our flag represented”.
“We also plan to buy some gay flags to support the trans community, because obviously they’re being marginalised at the moment. We’ll show that it is actually a flag that represents unity and not a flag that represents division.”
They added: “We’re contacting shops throughout the city to ask if they want to adopt a flag so they can represent, for example, Trinidad and Tobago, for a week.
“We’ll give you the flag and you can hang it in the window.” If you’re interested you can contact the International Flagging Committee via the GoFundMe page.
They also cited the recent work of the Australian women’s rugby team helping to spruce up York while they’re here for the Rugby World Cup.
“So it’d be nice to see their flag flying so they know that we appreciate them in the same way they’ve been appreciating our city.”
They added: “I just want to make it really clear, we have no interest in taking down any of the flags that are currently up.
“So if anyone is going around and removing or defacing the flags, it is not us. We’re more than happy to leave those flags up. We’re just going to put up some more.”
