Posted on 12/13/2004 5:39:51 AM PST by Le Bouledogue Britannique
It has been noted that there has been a grievous and unprovoked attack on Great Britain on these pages
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-chat/1295524/posts
which THE MANAGEMENT, in their wisdom, have seen fit to leave in situ.
Therefore, here is the British response.
[Note to Mr Moderator, please feel free to remove this thread (I'm sure you will anyway) and indeed ban me from these boards (once again) However, if you do choose you that path, please display your lack of bias and sense of fair play by removing the "40 Reasons why the US is Better than Britain (humor)" thread which I have linked to above at the same time. Thank you.]
70 Reasons why GREAT Britain is miles & miles better than the USA (humour)
1. Michael Moore
2. You don't have any custard
3. You invented McDonalds
4, Our military are peacemakers.
5. We know a few things about the U.S., whereas you know next to nothing about the UK.
6. We have a sense of humour (and we even know how to spell it)
7. We don't rely on therapy or Prozac to lead a "normal" life
8. We understand irony.
9. We can watch TV for ten full minutes without a 15 minute commercial break
10. We are 6 times less likely to be murdered in the UK than you are in the US
11. We are 60 times less likely to be shot in the UK than you are in the US
12. We don't feel that we have to own firearms to protect ourselves from our own government.
13. We aren't xenophobic
14. Did I mention Michael Moore?
15. We don't expect people to like us or respect us, but some of them do. The U.S. seems to have got that back to front.
16. British beer doesn't taste like diluted gnats urine.
17. We don't have rednecks (at least, if we do, they don't actually have red necks)
18. We can drive around corners and most of our cars can manage more than 10 miles to the gallon.
19. We are intelligent enough to use a manual gearbox
20. We are not all obese.
21. Yorkshire pudding.
22. We are a net exporter of oil
23. We can sometimes see the other guys point of view.
24. Our accents don't sound vulgar.
25. We don't hate people just because they are different to us.
26. We have a prettier flag than you.
27. We invented modern democracy, you just pay lip service to it.
28. We have more attractive women here per head of population than you have.
29. We don't have the left wing stink hole that is Hollywood.
30. We are capable of enjoying a film (translation: "movie") in which nobody gets killed every 3 minutes.
31. We don't eat raw corn.
32. We don't have to buy our drinking water from other countries
33. Most of our population realise that there is a world beyond our borders.
34. I live here.
35. Our armed forces are capable of mounting an operation without playing rock music at 120 decibels, shouting "YEAH RIGHT!", or "OH DUDE!" every ten seconds and putting panties on the heads of captives.
36. We enjoy steak & kidney pie. You are too pernickety to even try it and therefore don't know what you're missing.
37. Our students study geography
38. We don't let our armed forces recruit in our schools.
39. We don't let our homosexuals recruit in our schools either.
40. We do let the boy scouts recruit in our schools.
41. We are able to settle minor disputes without filling each other with lead.
42. We don't deny healthcare to a large proportion of our population because they can't pay.
43. We don't react to any perceived minor critism or a question of our opinions by accusing the other party of being a "pinko-commie", a "faggot" or a "reee-tord"
44. Our teachers are able to deal with difficult young children without calling the police.
45. Our police (even if they were called to a school) wouldn't dream of tazaring a six year old boy or handcuffing a 10 year old girl (for bringing scissors to school - what's that about then?), nor of locking them up in a cell.
46. Our teachers are able to deal with parents visiting their classrooms without kicking seven shades of excrement out of them.
47. Michael Moore anybody?
48. We play proper football, you....well, I needn't say any more on that subject.
49. We don't have crooks calling themselves TV evangelists, because we are not dumb enough to send them any money.
50. We stopped having mullet haircuts in the 80's
51. We don't marry our cousins & call the offspring Billy-Bob or Mary-Lou
52. We have toilet blocks older than your most historical sites
53. We have a pot plant at Kew Gardens which is older than the USA
54. While we don't have the first amendment, we do seem to respect it more than you do.
55. Michael Jackson.
56. We don't exaggerate our achievements in the 2nd World War.
57. You elected Bill Clinton.
58 You elected Bill Clinton, TWICE! (I mean, come on Yanks! Once is a mistake, twice was just stupid!)
59. We are capable of winning a sports event (oh yes we are!) without chanting "UK! UK! UK! UK! UK! UK! UK!" ceaselessly and intensely irritatingly over and over and over again.
60. We (with a little minor assistance from our Froggy neighbours) conceived, planned, built and financed the Concorde, the finest, fastest & most beautiful airliner the world has ever seen.
61. You, in a typical fit of petty jealousy and America-firstism, strangled commercial supersonic flight at birth by banning Concorde from your airports (and thus markets) on ridiculous environmental grounds (possibly the only time the US has objected to anything for that reason), then announced your own supersonic airline project (which never got built - while even the USSR managed to produce a Concorde rip-off)
62. We do not regard war as a spectator sport.
63. We, a small nation, in the space of a few generations, built the largest Empire the world has ever seen, and then gave it all back. Just for laughs. You, a very large nation, have attempted to dominate the world for the last 50 years and have failed, miserably.
64. We, while still retaining our patriotism, are able to appreciate and applaud the achievements of sportsmen, politicians, scientists and businessmen from other countries.
65. We have our own language that we ourselves invented. You have pinched ours and devalued it appallingly
66. We have given the world, modern democracy, law & order, the English language, the industrial revolution, the world wide web, penicillin, the jet engine and a host of other social and technological breakthroughs too numerous to mention. You have given the world....Mickey Mouse.
67. Is there a Michael Moore in the house?
68. We play cricket, perhaps not the most exciting sport out there I grant you but nonetheless a gentlemanly pursuit. You have baseball. Nuff said.
69. You, often claim, in your brusque, bombastic manner to be "the greatest nation on Earth". We smile silently but say nothing because we KNOW that we are.
70. No British Prime Minister has ever been caught with his pants down in 10 Downing Street.
& one for the pot...
71. We are British. Don-cha-know!
Toodle Pip Chaps.
If I may respond, I know Britain VERY well, having spent an awful lot of time in your country. Please allow me to refute some of your talking points.
1. As for Michael Moore, if I'm right he's probably of scoth-irish descent. Therefore, his ancestors lived on your dank moors, with the characteristic severe lack of dental hygiene.
2. Custard was invented in Italy.
3. As for McDonald's, I don't seem to recall any ENGLISH restaurants anywhere in the world. I find it hilarious that people who will eat Marmite will turn their noses up at a Big Mac.
4. My country hasn't been invaded by Italy, France (twice), Norway or Ireland, and come out on the short end.
5. If you knew as much about the US as I knew about the UK, then perhaps you'd move here and lose that silly accent.
6. Granted, I will give you Eddie Izzard, Monty Python, and Dudley Moore, but I find it funnier that you spell humor in the French manner.
7. You only understand irony because you can decry American "imperialism" while forgetting the British Empire.Excuse me, Commonwealth (snicker, snicker).
8. We don't have to have a license for a television.
9. You are six times less likely to be murdered in the UK because most British men couldn't summon up enough passion to pull a greasy string from a prostitute's backside.
10. You are sixty times more likely to be shot in America because the people have the right to arm themselves, unlike your country, where you have to take a number and wait for the local constable to be finished with sensitivity training before he comes 'round and deigns it necessary to save your life.
11. Never mind protecting yourself from your own government. How about protecting yourself from the criminals that have carte blanche to invade your home, courtesy of the same government.
12. Xenophobia? I guess all those Pakistani ghettos are a sign of enlightenment. Same could be said about the abolition of the Welsh language and all the West Indians in the East End ghettos.
13. Considering that the United States has done more for every country on the planet than Britain ever did, a little respect is well-earned, and by God, if you don't give it voluntarily, we'll bomb ya for it!
14. Granted, British beer is better, but our bars stay open until 4 a.m.
15. You do have rednecks. They're known as "Cornish" and "Cockneys".
16. Well, if my car was 3 feet wide by 4 feet long, and weighed less than the typical English grandmother, I'd be able to corner well, too.
17. We use manual gearboxes, but automatic transmission is an affordable luxury.
18. You are either obese or appearing to suffer from some wasting disease. Must be all that pre-packaged Sainbury's food and curry.
19. Yorkshire pudding is nice. Biscuits and gravy kicks ass.
20. Of course you are a net exporter of oil; It's too expensive for an Englishman to afford. Is gasoline up to $11 a liter yet?
21. You can see the other guy's point of view provided you aren't discussing football. Then you riot.
22. Vulgarity is in the ear of the beholder. If I recall, the English have the crudest sense of humor on the planet.
23. The Greeks invented modern democracy, we improved it by incorporating the concept of republic with democratically-elected leaders. By the way, how's that Queen?
24. if you have more attractive women, then how do you explain the Spice Girls and Fergie?
25. You have a left-wing stickhole that is No. 10 Downing Street. Our stinkhole merely influences culture, yours is the elected government.
26. Hmmm...Trying to remember the last English film in which Hugh Grant wasn't playing a sappy klutz.
27. Raw corn is good for ya.
28. New York City tap water is bottled by the gallon and sold all across Europe as designer water at high prices. In fact, Dasani water IS New York City tap water. Amazing what you can do with water when you don't have to depend on a Roman Aqueduct to get it to you.
29. True, most of your population IS aware of other countries. They just still lament that they were once British.
30. I'm glad you like your home. I like mine. Argument ends there.
31. British armed forces couldn't even muster enough force to kick half a dozen Argentines off some godforsaken rocks full of sheep. Even though those sheep were subjects.
32. If you insist on eating an animal organ that filters urine, be my guest.
33. Your students study geography in the same way Frenchmen study the fine art of bathing.
34. If I recall, your schools are ALREADY your armed forces. Or do Sandhurst and Eton no longer warrant the name?
35. Can't argue the homos in school point. You just wait until they show up on the football pitch.
36. Considering you don't have anything capable of filling a pencil with lead, this comes as no surprise.
37. if the National Health Band-aids and Eyedrops Campaign passes for health care, I'm glad I live here.
38. Considering you can never find a policeman in Britain when you need one, I'm not surprised your teachers have no need to call them. Perhaps if your teachers were armed?
39. There were no British achievments in the Second World War except getting kicked off the continent, being nearly bombed and starved into submission and finally, losing India. Oh, and I forgot, the Japanese really enjoyed Singapore.
40. We may have elected Bill Clinton twice, but you elected Blair three times.
41. The Concorde: did you know that when the Air France version crashed, that was the most Germans killed by the French since Verdun?
42. Yes, you built the British Empire and then were unable to hold it. Hypocrisy and military weakness lost it for you. We, on the other hand, dominate the world with the Yankee Dollar. So, who was smarter?
43. Over 50% of the English language has it's roots in French, German, Greek and Latin. So, what the heck did you invent?
While I admit to having great admiration for the British people, I also reserve a hearty belly-laugh for those of you who believe that Britain is the guardian of all things civilized, especially when your own history is one of violence, bloodshed and often stupidity. If it wasn't for the accent, you'd merely be Canadian.
That's because when asked the question "ballots or bullets?" you respond all-too-politely with, "Neither please - I mean, if that won't offend anyone. Now let's see what's on BBC2."
36. We enjoy steak & kidney pie. You are too pernickety to even try it and therefore don't know what you're missing.
A Brit lady once asked me if I knew how to fix kidney. After a negative answer, she said:
"You just throw it in the pot and boil the pi$$ out of it!"
We own it don't you know....
Estonia has to have the world's highest per capita of beauties ...
My mother visited England right after the war, and loves to tell how her hosts proudly served them cold canned creamed corn with whipped cream for desert. Evidently the U.S. sent a lot of American food over there that the Brits had now idea about.
The militia was to protect us from your government.
31. We don't eat raw corn.
?
Our beer is served cold. End of discussion.
But, was it raw? That would be the most heinious, disgusting thing I've ever heard us nasty Yanks do!
We can also protect ourselves from predators when they break into our homes. You have to rely on rape gates and the hope that the criminal won't decide to kill you or your loved ones while he's robbing you blind. And if you do decide to take action to defend yourself, your government will prosecute you.
"It has been noted that there has been a grievous and unprovoked attack on Great Britain"
You incorrectly, I believe, imply that that actions of a few reflect the sentiments of the whole.
With only a common language being the greatest divide between the two countries (smile), there is no doubt that the US and Brits have led most of the "positive" advances of the world and the greatest regard for the human rights of man.
Language?
Anglos/Saxons from Germanic regions
Normans from France
Romans from........ah, Roman Empire, read Latin
Norsemen
Scots
Irish/Celts/Druid dudes
Old English-Middle English from the above
etc.
Where did you say the language originated?
Thank you for a great laugh this morning.
Your post reminded me of one reason I am a a confirmed Anglophile. The British people are wonderful -- wonderfully witty, and wonderfully able to respond to criticism with humor (note -- proper spelling) and grace.
Thank you for giving the world Shakespeare, the English language (include the language of the King James Bible), and Margaret Thatcher. I could go one, but we Americans are never given to excess.
Bush held up, then ate, some raw corn during a campaign photo-op in Iowa. The limey's were aghast!
I meant is the Union Jack on the Moon.
Good counter. I'll even grant you a few with no contest. Numbers 1,2,3 and 20, for example.
But...... "24. Our accents don't sound vulgar."
Just the other day (on "the telly") I heard this coming out of a Brit with a strong Cockney accent: "Pi$$ off, you bloody bast--d!" Sounded like he was barfing it out. Strike #24.
BTW, most of what you call "rednecks" are of Brit stock. Lack of oral hygiene was one of the "Old Country" traditions they clung to.
:)
"You incorrectly, I believe, imply that that actions of a few reflect the sentiments of the whole. "
Nahhhh. I'm just pulling your legs.
And it's nice to see that some of you do have sense of humo(u)r after all.
;o)
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