The national symbol

@LeopoldBloom Or perhaps to hide the action of black people who were equally guilty - past and present?
The English were pretty ugly to all their neighbours, Welsh, Scots, Irish and French. That is pretty much acknowledged by most anyway. The city where I currently live was razed by invading English more than once, most notably in 1650, but we have a history of fighting back - as have the Irish and Welsh of course. Such is the reality of the situation.
I am not sure how British history is taught in the US - judging by the Americans I have met and worked with - not with any accuracy, for sure.

Not sure what you view as special privileges, though. Must be an American thing. The ordinary people here had to fight for everything from freedom from serfdom, to semi-decent housing and the right to vote. I won't bore you with hundrdeds of details, but most of us would scoff at the notion that we were privileged in any way. The idea is ludicrous. Presumably in the US all white folk were given a free pass to an easy life? I know that is not true and there are many government incentives to promote the very opposite.

@helensusanswift No, it's not like all white people had a pass to the easy life. But white people were never enslaved, didn't endure Jim Crow or convict leasing, and were not subjected to genocide in the U.S. As a white man, when I see a cop behind me, my first thought is "I hope I don't get a ticket," not "I hope I survive this encounter." I also didn't have to choose between giving up the remnants of my culture or escaping poverty.

Many Americans don't understand the effect race has had on our history and still does today, so I wouldn't expect someone from the UK to understand it. I have no idea how American history is taught over there.

Do you think the current wealth of the UK has anything to do with how resources were extracted from your former colonies? Or that's just a coincidence, and it's really just the fault of "guilty Black people."

@LeopoldBloom As I said, must be an American thing. We had to fight for all our 'privileges', from the end of (white) slavery in this country, to the right to decent working conditions to the right to vote. Every step was taken against the opposition of the upper classes who held the whip-hand. There was genocide against the Gaels, and my ancestors were slaves until 1799 (Black slavery in Scotland ended in the 1770s, more than 20 years before)

The current wealth of some of the UK was created on the backs of the working class UK people. The working conditions in factories, farms, mills, ships, mines etc were horrendous. The UK paid out millions to some of the colonies, particularly the African ones, trying to make them viable.

The whole world does not revolve around the USA. Other nations were and are far more socially advanced. So blaming all white people for the backwardness of one raw , still evolving, country is palpably silly.

@Thevy29 I know the Dundee whaling men, and maybe others, called the Narwhal a 'unicorn', so there could be a connection.