posted
Anyone indulging in some misplaced patriotism by celebrating the life of a Greek-speaking, half Israeli Turk who served in the Roman army and never actually set foot in Engerrrland?
posted
It's exactly this kind of racism that gives St Paddy's day and Saint Andrew's day a bad name!
Shame on you Ringo for even bringing it up!
(and no, I was supposed to go up to Bedford for a piss up but I'm going to King Tut tomorrow with the little'uns and figured since I spent £60 to see a couple thousand year old dead guy, I should be sober for it.)
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posted
It's all just a PR stunt dreamt up by manufacturers left with a surfeit of plastic hats, red and white face paint and George's Cross undercrackers after England failed to reach any footballing tournament this year.
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posted
In Catalonia, where George is also the patron saint, people celebrate by people giving their loved one a book (any book) as a gift.
Which of course is just a cynical PR stunt dreamt up by bookshops with a surfeit of books, but still, nice.
OOh it's even nicier than I'd remembered:
quote:In Catalonia St. George's day coincides with the Fair of the Book and the Rose. On this day every man offers a rose to his loved one (wife or fiancée), and in return she gives him a book. The book is in memory of Cervantes. This custom was started in 1926, to commemorate Cervantes death (authour of "Don Quiote")
posted
I'm not really interested in St. George's day. It's pretty meaningless. But, it does raise the question what do you think of when you think of England? Do you lapse into the nostalgic conservatism of warm beer and cricket? A single football victory, forty years ago? The bloody military peversions of past English kings? The political and cultural features of Elizabethan London? The occupation of Wales, Scotland and Ireland?
When I think of England, I suppose the first thoughts relate to a kind of 'common sense decency', but I'm aware that this is because I've been affected by the way that the white English believe everybody to be slightly backwards apart from themselves. "common sense decency" doesn't even mean anything, but it's there, a phrase, that's been drummed into me. "Fair play" and eccentricity are also in there somewhere as a result of the same thing.... received opinions from politicians and newspaper editors of the past. Before mass media, would a unified "Englishness" even exist? What is the history of the national identity? Or do we latch onto whatever somehow speaks to us the most - Haywain or Coal mine, spitfire or steed.
Another thing would be, how much of our personal identity would we lend to being English? There's a portrayal that our European brethren spend all their time waving flags and eating the national dish, but is anybody here actually proud of being 'English', or of 'England'? Would we now accept that we're British, or is that just a backdoor way of erasing the identities of the non-English citizens of the Kingdom?
quote:Originally posted by Dr. Benway: But, it does raise the question what do you think of when you think of England?
Bad teeth? Pale-skinned folk milling about whining about the weather? Football hooligans?
There aren't any pale-skinned people in England these days, thanks to the wonders of the tanning salon. One of the first policies introduced by current Prime Minister, Golden Brown was a forced hour per day on a sunbed for every British citizen.
Also, our teeth are steadily improving thanks to the influx of talented Polish dentists, and dental polish.
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Louche
Carved TMO on her clit just to make you feel bad
Louche
Carved TMO on her clit just to make you feel bad
posted
By 2020, most of the Northern English will look like this, I suspect. Unless they're all wiped out by Peak Oil because they just fade away when the booze supply runs out.
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quote:Originally posted by Dr. Benway: But, it does raise the question what do you think of when you think of England?
Bad teeth? Pale-skinned folk milling about whining about the weather? Football hooligans?
This is clever, because you've thought about the most nauseatingly boring and uninspired critiques of the English people from the viewpoint of an American, and reproduced them here for the 100th time. Is this all part of a grander piece of online performance art about the weakness of the American imagination, or are you trying to hypnotise us into submission by repeating this exhausted nonsense over and over again?
posted
also, would most people place their regional identity above their national one in terms of importance to their how they would define themselves?
quote:Originally posted by Dr. Benway: also, would most people place their regional identity above their national one in terms of importance to their how they would define themselves?
posted
perhaps it's time that we ditched this London / Not London nonsense, and allowed the rest of the UK to become the thirty third national borough.
posted
I think of the British as being uppity and unemotional. There are plenty of other stereotypes to draw on outside of pale skin and bad teeth (though I have heard the same American stereotypes rehashed here time and again).
I think there is an inverse correlation between national identity and national vanity. I don't feel that Americans have much of a national identity, because we don't look too far outside of our borders in day-to-day life...and the idea is why should we. I'm guessing the English have a similar vanity, though certainly not to the same extreme.
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quote:Originally posted by Dr. Benway: This is clever, because you've thought about the most nauseatingly boring and uninspired critiques of the English people from the viewpoint of an American, and reproduced them here for the 100th time. Is this all part of a grander piece of online performance art about the weakness of the American imagination, or are you trying to hypnotise us into submission by repeating this exhausted nonsense over and over again?
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