Thinking about British 'culture', how far back should we go?
Three examples in my lifetime:
In 1967 the Sexual Offences Act was passed which decriminalised private homosexual acts between men aged over 21. Before that it was a punishable offence, including chemical castration as happened to Alan Turing to avoid imprisonment.
The common law offence of blasphemy was repealed in 2008; before this, in 1977, Denis Lemon was given a nine-month suspended sentence and a £500 fine for blasphemy.
Britain outlawed the practice of corporal punishment in 1987 for state schools and more recently, in 1998, for all private schools; before that it was legal to hit children in schools.
All three examples could be called part of British 'culture', but were outlawed. Should we bring them back?
My mother was brought up by Victorians and so much of the way they and she lived (e.g. not being seen out without a hat or head-covering; the rejection of women who became pregnant when not married; the snobbery of the class system) was the 'cultural norm' in those days. Should we bring these back?
I think it's very difficult to define or even describe accurately what a country's or a continent's culture is.
If I picked just the worse examples of, say, activities by extreme Muslims, perhaps I would see their culture as violent and extreme. If I picked just the worst examples of activities of British people (e.g. the Moors murderers, James Lee, Scarlett Jenkinson and Eddie Ratcliffe) perhaps I would see UK culture as violent and extreme.
Of course I know that neither of these examples are typical of either people of the Muslim faith or the UK population. Please look beyond the headlines.
