[anigbrowl]

It’s as if British people belong to their government.

Legally speaking, British people are subjects, not citizens.

[dghf]

This myth keeps getting repeated. It hasn't been true since 1949, when British subjects in the UK became Citizens of the United Kingdom and Colonies.

In 1983, the status of CUKC was renamed to British citizen (for those CUKCs resident in or closely connected with the UK: the situation in the remaining colonies was more complicated). At the same time, the status of British subject was officially restricted to those few British subjects who didn't qualify for citizenship of the UK or of any other Commonwealth country in 1949, and who were formerly known as "British subjects without citizenship".

So we are officially and legally citizens, not subjects.

[anigbrowl]

I was unaware of this. Thanks for the correction.

[dijit]

Ironic, because I feel like they’re the same, it’s semantic feely words that are different.

Right to vote was already established before the change of the name (subject->citizen).

So, what changed? Well subjects have “privileges” that are afforded from the monarch, and citizens have “rights” which are given from the state.

Except:

1) In olde english law, the monarch and the state are literally the same thing.

2) Rights seem to be pretty loosely followed if they’re actually, you know, RIGHTS, and not privileges afforded from the state.

I’d say that semantically the difference is how the words make you feel, not the actual applicability of the terms to anything that has been realised.

[dghf]

I think I've heard something similar -- that subjects have duties while citizens have rights.

But of course, citizens typically also have duties -- commonly, the duty to take up arms to defend the state -- and subjects can legitimately expect a reciprocity of obligations from the sovereign (e.g. the enforcement of the "King's Peace"), which sounds quite a bit like rights to me.

(All of which is a verbose and not very coherent way of saying that I agree with you.)

[shellac]

Then somebody needs to let the government know, because the relevant 1981 act is "[a]n Act to make fresh provision about citizenship and nationality". In that 'British subjects' are a quite limited subset of citizens. Most British people are citizens, not subjects.

https://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/1981/61/contents

[lovich]

What’s the difference? I’m not knowledgeable enough about English law to parse this

[shellac]

My (really limited) understanding is that 'British subject' was the status of people in the British empire. It's now reduced to just some people born pre-1949 in Ireland and India. They have many of the rights of citizens, and can become citizens via a simpler route than other non-nationals.