British MP Resigns Over ‘Snobby’ Tweet

A British politician has resigned after she posted what critics described as a “sneering” photograph of a working-class home bedecked in flags of St. George, the patron saint of England. The flags of St. George, white with a red cross, were hung on a home in the constituency of Rochester and Strood, where the anti-immigration, anti-European Union party UKIP won a sweeping victory in a by-election, returning its second MP to the British Parliament. Emily Thornberry, the shadow attorney general, tweeted an image of the home accompanied by the caption “image from #Rochester.” The St. George flag is often used as a rallying icon for xenophobic groups in the United Kingdom; it is also the national flag of England and the English football team. It subsequently transpired that the flags had been covering the house since this summer’s World Cup.