England "Self-important and irritating" according to guide book

QFT...







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Meh, I reckon you could pretty much sum up that guide on England as "Mostly harmless."

... and while we're on the subject they don't come much more British than Arthur Dent

 

After working in the states, other countries still seem to see us as tea drinking upper class toffs who say "pip pip" and "tally ho" etc.

I think as a nation we're pretty patriotic, we're just not sure what of.....

 

This thread's got to page 2 and nobody has mentioned the weather! I quite like the weather in England. It feels like home.

 

well in most places around the world you can find a shower, british weather in the comfort of your own home

 

No, we binge drink too, you haven't spent time among american high school and college kids if you don't think we binge drink.

 

And you havn't spent any time among our pre-teens if you think your "binge drinking" (OMG 18 year olds drinking themselves unconscious?) in any way compares with the sort of problems we got over here

This nation can't hold it's drink these days...

 

This thread is depressing.

Englishness can be best described as being balanced, impartial, polite and determined under difficult circumstances. These traits are quite lacking nowadays, however we are quite ignoring the complex differences between the different social groups availble in our country. I feel we are quite progressive in our acceptance of new people (i mean look at france where the average frenchman detests any moroccan migrants with avengance). The only thing we really lack is a common acceptance that we have to speak other languages, which northern europeans piss on us for.

 

I don't think the British (I'm talking about the 85-90% white [notice I don't say Caucasian] majority here) have any honest issues about people from outside of Europe, Africa, Asia and the Caribbean etc. The issue recently has been primarily with white European immigrants who have next to no intention of learning the language or integrating within British culture. Eventually we'll assimilate Polish words and food like our language has done...well...since forever, when confronted with 'foreign' influence.

I live in Crewe, which reportedly has the largest levels of Polish immigration in the United Kingdom, proportionally or percentage wise I assume. I might be a xenophobe, but I honestly cringe every time I hear a Polish conversation strike up in the middle of the supermarket or on a bus.

Language is the only concession in culture I expect from an immigrant, if you can't speak or have no intention of speaking English in the UK, then you don't deserve to be here.

 

The issue here though, it's not the general public who're pushing forward progressive policy, it's a select few in government (I know technically that's a contradiction but politicians who actually represent their constituency are few and far between.), I doubt a man in the street would have any real issues, but we're far too progressive and light handed when it comes to religion or race.

English as a language is proportionally easier to learn for Europeans (or anyone from any Indo-European) language background to learn, that's not a cop out, that's fact. English has just about every 'common sense' attribute that a language would want, and makes foreign languages seem stupid or confusing for a native English speaker to learn. Inflection really is a killer, and I don't think learning a second language is a requirement at all. We should reinforce better English skills instead of wasting time learning inferior languages.

Reasons why English is superior to other languages: (though I actually enjoy how Spanish sounds )

- Inflection really is the most horrible concept in language, English thankfully is modular and isolating. We rearrange components to create meaning, instead of modifying nouns or verbs with case affixes. Means you simplify the language and don't overload simple sentences with meaning.
- Fixed word order means there's no confusion created.
- SVO (Subject - Verb- Object) Dog bites man, whereas in Japenese it's SOV; Dog man bites.
- A noun can name a thing in any construction, this means we don't have a 'genderised' language like French for example, with multiple versions of essentially the same thing, this links back to the first point somewhat as well.
- Subject prominence, everything has a subject, even if there's nothing for the subject to refer to. It just makes sense in real world terms.

Yes I am bored.

 

Is he the intergalactic Hitchhiker?

 

Yup

 

Stiff upper lip, old boy! What what! Jenkins, have the Roller brought round the front will you? I fancy taking the good lady for a pickernick, with lashings of ginger beer.

Ah, good old Blighty.

 

I was always under the impression that English was the hardest to learn, so many words for the same thing, words spelt the same but meaning different things, I actually find inflection to be quite useful and not too hard to learn.

 

According to my classically educated gf, English is the most evolved language with the least vestigial imposed structure, multiple words for the same thing and virtually no need to worry about the gender of a word more simple sentence contstruction (her explanation was better). The other thing that makes English easy to learn is exposure, when was the last time you watched Portuguese tv (DXR asside), last time i was there a large part of the terrestrial broadcast was in english, that alone would make it easier to pick up.

 

I was about to jump to the defence of us brits and tell the rough guide to stick it where the sun dont shine (somewhere outside of england i guess) but then i realised I woulda just been a Brit fanboy. Which I'm proud of! call it patriotism!

i'm taking a step back and realising that acutally it's (depressingly) mostly true. The only thing is, i sometimes wish that as brits we could eliminate a problem we call chavs. seriously, take out the chavs and we'd be the best country in the world. do chavs even realise that they're chavs?!

Also, has anyone heard about the slating that Rough Guide gave for Bournemouth? I'm sorry, but what a load of bull! Bournemouth is great! I only truly realised this when i stepped outside of the cinema, saw sunny skies, palm trees, gardens and clean beaches. It's a place you would want to move to.

 

Yeah, We tape flags to our hummers and *Hybrid* Hummers that get 15mpg!
We also fire large amounts of explosives into the air on the fourth of july. (I love this holiday, as i love fire.)

 

As for showing patriotism in England I think you'll find there is a stigma attached to it where if one flies the flag they would be considered a loon or one from a lower class and to be avoided. It applies to singing God save the Queen and other ways of showing patriotism. It isn't helped by authorities who do not fly the flag because it's politically incorrect yet when we all get together there is an explosion of patriotism. Take the Queen's golden jubilee for example wasn't Britain and London amazing that week with all these street parties and flags flying. Take the last night of the proms too.

The English do show it differently but it's also a shame that we can't show it like the Americans.

 

They were always lacking. The Victorian gentleman visited underage prostitutes (where do you think the laws on age of consent came from?) while his wife knew her place in the home; the British officer (and a gentleman, natch) walked his nicely polished riding boots over the colonials whose country he invaded and exploited by underhand tactics.

Stiff-upper-lip Englishness is as much a myth as Dutch tolerance. We stereotype by nationality, and we attribute all the positive traits to our own.

You have not been frequenting the right neighbourhoods in the UK (wise move). Ask Stephen Lawrence's family how well different social groups get along. Heck, ask the parents of Sophie Lancaster. This country still gets its knickers in a twist over female priests, gay marriage and Eastern European immigrants. Tribalism is alive and well. Nobody feels that they are prejudiced, but everyone wants the foreigners to leave now, please.

 

I think having it so flags are on every street corner like the US (at least what I see of the US through TV, we all know that never lies ) would make those events seem less special.

Unfortunate but true, but that's the way humans work I guess.