Chap called Christopher Cox sent me a nice email about the blog and asked a question.
“Say, I know this is a strange query, but if you don’t mind my asking, would you possibly be able to tell me what people are generally like in the UK, compared with the United States (where I live)? I’ve been thinking of shifting locations to Britain (I love the climate, plus the people are undoubtedly more educated!), but I’ve been curious what the people are actually like, in general. The Brits are often said to be more polite and helpful than Americans on average; are they typically quite proper and formal, or are they often rather more casual, loud, and goofy? Do strangers often chat, or is quiet and reserve usually preferred?”
My answer would be “well, they’re kinda British” which isn’t much use, so in a rare moment of community involvement on this blog I figured I’d throw it open to my predominantly British readership.
So, what are we like?
This is the most genuinely humorous thing I’ve encountered today. Yesterday had an screamingly funny moment, so it wouldn’t do to compare.
I hope the answers to this post continue to pile up over the years, making this one pale into insignificance (other than being the first one).
One way of explaining what people in the UK are generally like is that they don’t ask this sort of question. As a nation of occasionally fractious minorities, the safe generalisation about Brits is that it’s not safe to make generalisations about Brits. Except that they all love chocolate.
Yep, I love chocolate :)
Well, if Big Brother has taught us anything, we just can’t accept that anyone with a vaguely American accent can be trusted. I despair, sometimes.
What are we like? We’re a lot shorter than Americans, on the whole, and have an ingrained pessimism which is both our strength and our weakness. Beyond that, what DP said.
Sheesh where would you begin? Many people think of themselves as English/Scottish/Welsh/Irish first, British next. Or even Cornish first, then English then British.
I guess a rule of thumb is the further you go from the city centres the more people will treat you as a human being.
We have a bigger vocabulary as we don’t abreviate everything you can conjugate. We have more swear words. Like eskimos and snow, we have many, many words for buttocks and breasts and sex organs.
We are crude and playful, hiding our emotions behind sport and binge drinking.
We live in cramped housing conditions yet our cities are vibrant as a result. We use public transport and dress better because people on the bus or train will see us. We have highstreet shops and corner shops and we’re not yet completely corporatised.
we’re surrounded by seaside.
We’re multicultural and better at being so than many other nations.
We have more funny jokes and TV shows per ratio to America.
We’ve been around longer and don’t have capital punishment or widely available guns or usually make people do their own taxes, but we do have free health care and a welfare system, which despite being abused, is a credit to our nation.
We’re oxymoronic and I love being British.
It makes me feel kind of sullied to say ‘English’. And besides, I’ve filled in so many American forms that require me to write ‘Great Britain’ it’s sort of hard for me to remember that I was actually born in England.
I was just in America, and am currently intimately aquainted with one of its citizens. Barring a few physiological differences, and a general difference in opinion as to the necessity of circumcision, the major difference between Brits and Americans stem from the facts that a) Brits have a long running tradition of trying not to get too excited in public and b) Britain is still recovering from World War II rationing. Put together, this means that our steaks are laughably smaller than American steaks, but we try not to get overexcited about it. We express ourselves mainly through the medium of sarcasm, although when that fails we have been known to punch people in the face. Brits are best kept happy by judicious application of beer. We mistrust anyone who starts a conversation about religion and have a level of political apathy rivalled in its intensity only by our fervant enjoyment of football, cricket, rugby and other sports which no other country is equipped to understand, despite being able to generally beat us at most of them. Our sense of justice is informed by our sense of history and we don’t see the point of specifying how fried eggs should be cooked.
Dan Cityofsound’s great article about football and architecture, which touched on national character as revealed through football, triggered a couple of thoughts:
The British, (or to be more specific, the English) are profoundly Amateur. We’re not that good at planning as a nation, (look at London – it’s a massive hodgepodge – and it’s all the better for it – and when we try planning, as we had to do after the war to rebuild our bombed cities, we did a really bad job of it). The football team doesn’t really have a plan – we’ve tried so many systems, and we’re still not sure which is our best way forward.
We’re big on fairness, and credit where it’s due. And sometimes we’re mediocre, and sometimes we’re sublimely good, but you can’t rely on either – like in a penalty shoot-out. We’re the living embodiment of the chaos theory, as a team and as a nation – we don’t know what we’re going to do, so how can the opposition? We have the potential to excel, and we have the potential to be dismal, going between the two in a matter of seconds, (or halves, so far this tournament).
We’re run, not by the Government or Whitehall, but by a newspaper called the Sun. Sure, Blair, or the Civil Service, or Goren-Eriksen make the decisions, but if the Sun doesn’t like the Prime Minister, or the Chief of Police, or the Football Manager, they’ve had it! And they can turn on them in a trice!
At the moment, we don’t like your government, but we are in awe of Americans, generally, though you won’t know it because we’re ashamed of the fact, and we might try and prove that we’re not. You’ll get on fine over here provided you don’t talk like you have your resume shoved up your arse – ie don’t tell us how great you are: you don’t have to, we’ll soon pick up on it. And ditch the raincoat – no one wears one, regardless how rainy it gets. The rain soon starts, but it soon stops. And don’t tuck your shirt in. And we love it if you make a gesture to fit in: not conformity, we don’t care for that, but we’re King Mucker-inners, if that makes sense, and we really appreciate someone who shows they want to be part of the gang, provided we can see they mean it. And don’t tell us how good America is compared to Britain: we know! We have an inferiority complex, beside also feeling superior to the rest of the world. We’re still getting over not being an Empire, and learning to cope with some of the horrible things we did to get and keep the Empire. (This is something America will have to go through sometime in the future, too).
First impressions don’t count over here – we’re such a small island and we’re packed in so tightly, you’ll always get another chance. But beware, everybody knows everyone else, and your sins will live on.
And finally, we’re no longer a nation of shopkeepers – Corporations from America and families from Asia have shown us how bad we were at that. And we’re no longer living lives of quiet desperation – nowadays it’s called a hangover!
I lived in the US for a year and one thought came out of that as a (generalised) basis for the difference in British and American attitudes to things. Americans are sovereign citizens, so often a man will act like the king of his own acre, including the right to carry his own personal arsenal, and this can also lead to a certain brashness of character. It has good and bad points. The British are a soveriegn nation, and though it may be deep below the surface, we have always been subjects of the monarch and perhaps have the slightly humbler attitude of the serf. Again, this has good and bad points about it. Both these mentalities affect a wide variety of attitudes to different things.
Oh yeah! Circumcised willies. Ha ha.
I’m too much of a lady to talk about THAT difference!
I think Garen’s point is very perceptive. I’ve never looked at it that way before.
The matter of being ‘shorter than Americans’ will disappear soon enough. the generation who are currently teenagers are much taller, on average.
Hm… It’s hard to generalise! I’m an American living over here in England. (I use English spelling because I have worked as a sub-editor (copy-editor) here.) There are many different traits the English have. Some good, some bad! It’s just a matter of whether there’s something about the people here that happens to suit you. For instance, when I came here for university for a year, I found them more down to earth and better company than my class-mates back in the US. Also, the girls are hot and have these awesome accents! If you want more information, I recommend the book The Xenophobe’s Guide to the English.
Well, having just moved away from Britain, and spent some time travelling around Europe, I think the thing that most distinguishes the British is that we generally have a terrible dress sense and really pasty complexions. Honestly, you can spot us a mile off on the streets of Europe.
Another point I would think is important for a stranger to grasp about Britain is that living in or visiting London is not the same as living in or visiting the rest of Britain. As a Londoner myself I’d say we were generally less friendly but simultaneously more tolerant than the rest of the island.
Finally, be careful of talking about the “War on Terrorism”. People have been trying to blow me up in London for as long as I have lived – but we never had a government trying to impose detention without trial, biometric passports or ID cards until we imported the endless “war on terrorism” mantra and philosophy from the current USA administration. There is quite a level of resentment about that.
Brits are scruffy, huffy, lewd, crude and don’t give a pair of flying god’s bollocks about pro-fecking-fanity. The polite and reserved stuff is just about how little space we have — if we were constantly in each others’ faces (good or bad) it would be a bloody nightmare. Cultural signifiers (football, beer, Dr Who) are many and varied but make no assumptions — people are as likely to hate them as love them. We don’t date, we just find a suitable-looking friend of the appropriate sex (and don’t expect to guess which one that will be by looking at people) and get drunk* with them. There are plenty of gods, but they stay in the church. There are plenty of nationalities but you can’t tell what they are by looking. Stupid art is important to us and summer is where we keep the festivals. Oh yes, and if you like boys … well, most of the British ones have something the American ones don’t.
* May or may not involve alcohol or forward planning.
We’re quieter than Americans
We’re not as good as the Americans at enthusiasm, starting or ending conversations, and giving or receiving compliments. However we are better at laughing at ourselves, or indeed laughing at anybody else who takes themself too seriously. We can find humour in pretty much any situation and when absolutely forced to talk to a stranger, a joke will generally be included within the first couple of sentences. Our houses are mostly smaller, but our gardens are generally bigger. Air conditioning is still something of a novelty. We don’t go out for breakfast.
There are two “Britains”. One which exists within the confines of London (and it’s sprawl) and the other one that is made up of the rest of England, Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland.
Despite the small distance between areas, the cultures, accents and behaviour may differ dramatically.
On the whole we are reserved, sarcastic and hide our best intentions lest we seem to brash. We don’t do over the top gushing, we don’t do “have a nice day”. We are polite, friendly, and know how and when to laugh at ourselves.
We are NOT how we are portrayed in the majority of newspapers (as they all portray different parts of us in the most extreme way).
And if you want mountains visit Scotland ;-) (ohh come on, I had to get SOMETHING in…)
My 2 cents worth: I carry passports from both countries, having been born in England but having spent from 1970-2003 living and working in the US. I became a US citizen about 8 years ago and did not need to give up my British citizenship (which was good at the time, feels even better now).
I feel more American than British much of the time though my accent has reverted back now that I spend a lot of time down at the pub where being American is not so desirable. I spell US English and pronounce “skedule” just like the Brits pronounce “skool”. So what can an American expect living over here? Here’s my take on the subject.
Britain is entitlement-rich, America isn’t. People work harder in America, often working three jobs to pay off the consumer bills. Britain is less of a consumer society but is catching up fast. Britain is expensive, the $1=£1 joke is not a joke at all. Britain is very heavily taxed and there are so many hidden taxes – VAT, for example is hidden in the ticket, US Sales Tax is not. Americans generally know how much tax they pay and expect government to be efficient and effective. Britains think their government is a joke and generally don’t think it’s worth voting for. The US Flag is a thing of beauty, to be revered, never burned. St. George’s flag of England has become a racial ikon and many semi-illiterate Brits think it must have the name ENGLAND on it in order to mean anything at all.
The UK has lived up to George Orwell’s 1984 – Big Brother is indeed watching you everywhere. If you don’t like being on the UK Government’s Candid Camera, don’t come over. America hates the Big Brother concept and citizen’s will do anything to stop having speed cameras at traffic lights.
Guns – yes, Americans like guns. They are efficient, effective people, remember! Guns are better at protecting you than knives or cricket bats or whatever, so why ban them? Americans generally believe that it is the person, not the weapon, that kills. The British justice system thinks the opposite as sentences for stealing money are usually much more severe than for murder.
Bring your US gas guzzler over with you – it’s cheaper to buy if not to run and driving on the wrong side of the road with a LHD car is actually quite easy.
But if you like good food, go to France.
Interesting watching people attempting to answer the unanswerable. Watch a few episodes of The Royle Family. That’ll come closer than most offerings.
We like to think we’re bigger than we are.
We like to drink more than we can handle.
We are great at inventing games but useless at being the best at them. (World Cup, Cricket, Rugby, Golf…)
We like to think we’re multi-cultural but out of the city centres we rarely are.
We are always welcoming unless you look shifty.
We don’t like the French, but not for the same reasons as the US.
We like fish and chips.
We love curry.
We love a Sunday Roast.
Adding to Peter’s post – watch the entirity of ‘The Royle Family,’ ‘The Office’ and ‘Dinnerladies’ and that’ll give you a strong idea about the large majority of us.
To Peter and Russ
Americans get a lot of British TV on PBS. Apart from Masterpiece Theater (which is mostly about historical England through the eyes of great writers) the most popular long running TV show is “Are you being served”. It may be that the BBC gives this long discontinued show away with other programming but time and time again I have heard Americans who have never visited Britain say that this program must represent the country at large! A frightening thought!
“Guns – yes, Americans like guns. They are efficient, effective people, remember! Guns are better at protecting you than knives or cricket bats or whatever, so why ban them? Americans generally believe that it is the person, not the weapon, that kills.”
I hope this is a joke.
In all my years of living in London (26+?) I’ve never needed to protect myself from anyone. Not even with a cricket bat.
The other day I had a Canadian extolling the very same virtues to me that you have about guns and he was VERY concerned about the intruders we all have to face on a daily basis in England. and he was also trying to tell me how manipulative and scaremongering our press are to the weak minded.
I think he was probably right.
Hmmm…
This has been compulsive reading, and given pause for thought. Here’s one such thought:
If I can escape to the wilder, natural parts of any country, I may find myself. If I live amongst its people, I may see myself reflected in them.
Gary – not a joke but certainly irony. Gun ownership does seem to be one of those many subjects that divide the two nations. When in Texas I owned three handguns at one time and never had to use them but was always confident that I could and would to defend myself. When in England I certainly don’t need a gun but do wonder if this attitude could change in the future as there is an underground gun society emerging in Britain. I have several friends who are NRA members and I find their hard core “right to own a gun” stand difficult to accept; however, it’s a right they have and a right they are determined to defend.
a bit rubbish but funny with it