so don't sing them - just enjoy listening to Scots sing them, and Scots and others can enjoy listening to your American songs, some of which are, as you've said, variations of songs from the nations of these isles. Again: "nationalism with conquest is bad; but nationalism with eco-travel and fair-trade is good for humanity" (above link).

How is singing a Scottish or American song IMPERIALISM?
ENOUGH WITH THE MINDLESS REPETITION OF POINTLESS PHRASES.


"Your problem, WAV, is that you imagine that there was a time when a "pure" English culture existed, free from nasty foreign influences. It never did, whether you go back 50 years or 500."
He has had it pointed out to him that morris dancing came from Northern Iberia, which in turn probably came from North Africa. It has also been pointed out that the recorder did not originate in England, and neither did the cittern, a GERMAN instrument, popular in France and probably brought to England by Italian musicians playing popular European music.
The reason he is so partial to these instruments is not really because he enjoys the sound, but because they had the term English in their names once.