Anglophilia: Is it permanent disappointment?

The UK is the Florida of Europe. Fat, smelly, stupid, and disgusting.

Britons were once seem as conservative, but much less bigoted than Continental Europeans.

God, how that has changed. There's a very nasty strain of hatefulness in some of the British posters on this site.

Never been an Anglophile, but the Brits seem to want to copy too much of American pop "culture", and that has made them seem less:

[quote]Dignified, respectable, and far less gauche and shifty

There's just a much bigger disconnect between what outsiders expect the UK to be and what it actually compared to France, Germany, Italy, Japan, etc.

British gentility is the world's longest-standing, most powerful, and most enduring SCAM.

Britain is in the toilet these days, I am ashamed to be British.

The UK is literally responsible for every single long-term geopolitical issue in the world today. If there is a deadly and intractible dispute between neighbors somewhere in the world, you can be sure that England started it. Usually it has something to do with the fucked up way that they wound down their colonial empire. They fucked everything up. These asshole can never be permitted to run the world again. It is safer in American hands.

Culture and society changed in general. People looked up to England for being posh, proper manners, class, and tea time. But then even the British got Kardashianized or Jersey Shored. Why strive to be better when you just have to make a sex tape with some semi famous celebrity and then get rich (or moderately wealthy) by becoming a reality TV star and a social media influencer? It's no longer about being a good role model, it's all about infamy, selling your brand and get other brands to sponsor your extravagant life.

Thanks to social media, streaming platforms and torrents giving users easy access to all sorts of foreign entertainment gives people an unfiltered assessment of how trashy most people in every single country are.

Most people are trash, most entertainment is trash, almost all politics is trash, most of our living experience is trash. And we have come to accept that, sadly.

r4 No I think its just Anglophone countries can actually read our newspapers and get to read the bad parts of the culture in a way they simply can't from other countries media because they can't speak or read the language so end up talking about it a lot more. I mean look at Paris syndrome tourists are horrified when they actually experience Paris compared to the perfect image of France they have of it in their minds.

[quote]People looked up to England for being posh, proper manners, class, and tea time.

This has never been true for large swathes of the country though. There have been trashy, low-class drunks, slums and so on at every period of history. You've just mistaken the upper and and upper middle classes for all of the country probably because most of our exported culture comes from those classes.

I live in the U.K. and I love it more everyday

I wonder how much of the fact that the UK has become relatively much, much poorer than it was plays into it all.

[quote]I live in the U.K. and I love it more everyday

Really? For what?

[quote]pop "culture"

Every country has popular culture and the UK is no different. My favourite anecdote is an American who visited London and kept going on and on at me about how he couldn't believe that Robbie Williams was popular in the UK. Lots of pop music has come from the UK, from the Beatles to the Spice Girls. Why is it so surprising?

My least favourite anecdote is the American who visited London and was sad that London isn't a bastion of white people. Cringe.

I think of anglophiles as easily-impressed people who haven't seen much of the world.

I've seen marked changes of perception of different nations throughout my life:

1. The UK. My impressions of Britons actually have been similar to those in the OP photo. I am 44 now, and I did a study abroad at Cambridge in 1999. When I went there, I expected to feel out of place in a highly refined and mannered society. Reality was quite different—just different. Most Brits I met from Cambridge were rude, and to date, I still have never met ruder people than those I met in London at the end of my trip. No politeness whatsoever, despite any manners to which they are accustomed. The architecture and landscapes in Cambridge humbled me. Breathtaking and ancient. The pop culture at the time I went was vibrant and colorful and I loved it. I came away loving British pop culture and aesthetics, but being very thrown by their unfriendliness and sloppy drunkenness. Every single night in Cambridge, streets were full of drunk British men yelling into the night and peeing in the middle of streets. Way more Game of Thrones than Mary Poppins or Chitty Chitty Bang Bang. My educational experience at Cambridge was challenging but less so than I expected. I had the impression from it that Brits are better educated than we in the US are. Now I think we are about on par on average, and that's a very condemning statement for both of us. I really thought nothing of the monarchy, but whatever I thought, "inbred white trash family" was not it. It is now. What a global embarrassment they are. Good God. That said—we have the Trumps, the Bushes, the Musks, the Kardashians...so I'm not throwing stones; I am just shocked to have learned the British royals live the lifestyles of a Florida trailer park colony.

2. The US. We used to be a lot kinder and nicer when I was younger and we have degraded to a more Brit-ish pettiness and nastiness. After I returned from my study abroad, I paid more attention to the UK than I did before I had gone. I was appalled that their members of Parliament called one another childish names, booed, laughed at one another, acted like bratty children. Look where we are now. That's common behavior now. And we even see it on message boards like this one. People used to be more thoughtful, even when putting someone down, and now it's just lowest-denominator childlike name calling most of the time. We are also drunker than we used to be. Meanness, rudeness, nastiness, alcoholism all have been celebrated over the past couple of decades. Remember when drinking on live TV would have been shocking? Then we got Andy Cohen, Kathie Lee and Hoda's antics being cool and now being a drunken slob is still 'cool.' And being nasty is expected; you just have to choose a political side along with it.

3. Finland. What the hell? When I was young, Finland had the highest suicide rate and it was seen as a bleak, joyless place where people didn't make eye contact or speak to one another. Sweden also was at the high-suicide/low-happiness level. Now they are the happiest countries on the planet.

[quote]That said—we have the Trumps, the Bushes, the Musks, the Kardashians...so I'm not throwing stones

People expect Americans to be trashy though.

[quote] I was appalled that their members of Parliament called one another childish names, booed, laughed at one another, acted like bratty children.

I have heard an American comment on this before! (He wasn't appalled though, he loved it.) Thing is, it's funny because Parliament's culture has always been like that. For hundreds of years. So I suppose again, there's a misconception about what it'd be like.

R18 We in the US have been cultivated more with videos of the Queen, Churchill, Margaret Thatcher, Tony Blair et al., who regardless of their politics represent the government and speak eloquently on a level few American people do. In my lifetime, only President Obama is similarly impressive in his eloquence.

And so, even if Parliament always has acted like a bunch of rowdy middle school boys, we don't see and hear that very much, but we get endless movies about aristocratic British leaders who seem composed and present themselves in an admirable way.

And then came muppety Boris Johnson.

The real story of recent years is Anglophobia. The New York Times, in particular, is relentless in its criticism of Britain.

Maybe that's because Britain was the world's last major empire (in the traditional sense) and we're all meant to pretend that historical events are traumatic in the present day.

Maybe it's because Britain, through its Empire, is responsible for much of the current world order and there are forces that want to overturn that order.

Maybe it's as simple as the fact that Britain's vote for Brexit was seen as a precursor for Trump and the New York Times will never forgive them for that.

[quote]The real story of recent years is Anglophobia.

Oh, get over yourself.

The total collapse of stiff upper lip into victim culture is another thing to add to the list.

[quote] Even the British got Kardashianized or Jersey Shored.

That would be Geordie Shore’d, pet!

R7 except Spain? France? Germany? Denmark? Portugal? P/Russ!a? All have caused as many global and colonial issues in recent centuries. England played a large role in unfortunate Western geopolitics, but by no means the only one...which you’d know had you ever picked up a history book.

These hateful, anti-British threads are a long-running tradition on DL. They pop up every couple of months.

I wonder if it's a backlash against the Royal threads, which can be pretty numerous sometimes (and heavily populated with Americans). Or maybe the OP is just your run-of-the-mill xenophobe.

R16 back here to add that I forgot I do feel some satisfaction about the current British comeuppance re colonialization...only because Brits in my experience have been high and mighty about themselves in comparison to the US for decades.

When I was at Cambridge, I met a local guy who told me "everyone in America is racist: everyone is black or white to you. Whether you're black or white or brown here, we're all British. We don't see color. We're not racist. Well, except we hate the Pakis."

I didn't even know what he was saying when he said "we hate the pockeys." I has to ask. I was too ignorant to understand why Brits would have tensions with Pakistan specifically.

But since then, I began to notice how often Brits point the finger toward American slavery. Yet I have to this day never heard any British person implicate their history in the American slavery institution. It was a British creation and a British institution before there were any motions to make the US an independent nation. Ultimately, Queen Elizabeth's reign is responsible for our slavery system.

And while sane and decent Americans all lament it and admit it's part of our historic shame with a legacy that continues through to this day, Brits only point the finger. That bothers me. It's disingenuous.

No nation has a shining history without past atrocities. It's weird to me that British people do still seem to glorify their past empire and ignore abuses, including their foundational role in the slave trade, abuses in Africa, Ireland and so many other places.

Never fell for it.

If you grew up in America during the 50s and 60s, don't you have precisely the same disappointment in your own homeland?

[quote] If you grew up in America during the 50s and 60s, don't you have precisely the same disappointment in your own homeland?

No, because this thread is about foreign observers of a culture. Not people actually experiencing that culture.

And American culture has always been viewed as trashy.

[quote] Dignified, respectable, and far less gauche

Honestly, I've never bought into that.

R28 Only a young'un would think America's always been trashy.

And the point of course is that it's an illusion to pick out Britain as if it alone has changed. It's the world that's changed, all around you.

[quote] Dignified, respectable, and far less gauche and shifty than any Continental Europeans...

Yes, I remember thinking the same while reading Dickens' novels.

[quote]Only a young'un would think America's always been trashy.

I didn't say that America has always been trashy. I said that the non-Americans have always regarded trashiness as part of American culture, whether accurately or not.

R25

They do the same thing with obesity. The UK is the fattest European nation, but Brits insist Americans are uniquely fat, despite having obesity rates closer to a US state than an EU country.

Is there any particular reason why so many British women (mostly young and lower-class) seem to have lip fillers and favor garish makeup?

Some of those women exist in the US and Continental Europe, of course, but it seems much more common in the UK.

I think a frenemyship is probably a normal relationship given our histories. Like France and Germany, the countries are similar to siblings who share the same DNA but have entirely different worldviews and personalities. They support one another but don't really get one another.

All those demure titled English roses - the epitome of dignity, respect, and noblesse oblige.

You don't know feeling disappointment in England until you're been a homegrown England football fan.

It's not called unending YEARS OF HURT for nothing. Am convinced Gareth Southgate & the FA actually want me to kms.

Is that an MTF at R36's link?

No, R38, but it's funny you should ask, as Lady Victoria has started associating with noted MTF, "Lady" Colin Campbell. Sad last days.

"Lady Victoria"? Tell me that's a drag name and she's not actually an aristocrat. It's one thing for a for council estate hooker to look like that, it's another for an aristocrat.

She comes from very high up in the British aristocracy. Though, a more recent history of her family is... something else. She's also been known to canoodle with Ted Cruz.

[quote]Is that an MTF at [R36]'s link?

Judging by her camel toe, I'd say not.

Might've gotten the snip. Judging by 'her' hairline, facial features, and body proportions my first guess was born male.

[quote]You don't know feeling disappointment in England until you're been a homegrown England football fan.

Just stick a flare up your ass, you'll feel better.

We’ll always have “Elizabeth R” and “Inspector Morse.”

I think you're due for another blue rinse, R45.

As I see things Britain was the main, yes, there were others too, organizer and guaranteer of the global trading empire that defines the modern world. The USA took over that empire after WW2. Britain had an early ability to project an image of itself around the globe to legitimize its empire and it did. Soft power and hard power worked to create this. Now Britain has seriously taken the backwards step of a de industrialization. Britain has hung its fortunes on Its financial sector which now post Brexit has little to offer but money laundering. Europe has its own banking sector now and doesn’t need Londons anymore. Britain still has London’s movie business and the BBC cultural cabal plus the British council to manufacture an image. Beautiful scenery and ancient architecture still adorn the country and it has many things to offer. Beautiful gardens and bucolic canals. The bus and rail are great systems when the workers aren’t striking. When walking around remember to look up at the buildings and down so you don’t step in the vomit from last nights drunks. Yes I’m upset about Brexit the worlds most incredible own goal to put it in a football metaphor.

Spain? France? Germany? Denmark? Portugal? P/Russ!a?

Spain yes, but Britain did the worst and were the most far ranging colonists, and frankly, they started the African slave trade then banned it, and paid off the slave owners for their losses, gotta love those Brits! Can we talk about the middle east now? The continual mess there was all due to... Britain! surprise! For money of course.

R25 I just read last month this graphic novel called Wake about a PhD student researching female slave rebellions and when she goes to the UK she’s confronted again and again with complete denial of the British involvement in the slave trade and denied access many times to private archives where she wants to research the topic, but they say none of it exists, though she just wants access to ship manifests and the captains and ship surgeons logs. She eventually goes to Liverpool, which was the central port for the slave trade, and accesses some information from the insurance documents. In the United States she didn’t really have those problems in archives, libraries and historical societies, just getting access to colonial court records at courthouses.

R48 Arabs/Ottomans started the slave trade in Africa and elsewhere long ago.

Also, pirate raiders from Africa and the Middle East used to snatch white women & kids from British shores as slaves. Well over a million white Euro/Anglo people--which was a significant percentage back then, in a far less populated world--were captured and traded as slaves in the Barbary markets in the space of a century.

Sounds credible, R49.

R19 speak for yourself. I'm a crude American and I know basic facts about British politics. Harold Wilson, Thatcher, Blair, Brown and May grew up working or middle class. Not every British person in a position of power is a member of the aristocracy. Thatcher famously faked an extremely posh accent and was mocked for it. Prime Minister's Questions is a well-known event. Boris Johnson is hardly the first shitty modern PM. Blair got involved in Iraq, Cameron promised to hold a referendum on Brexit even though he thought it was a bad idea. Sorry to jump on you like this but I hate it when an ignorant person claims to be representative of the entire US. Some Americans are incredibly inward looking and uninterested in the world, not everyone.

All the things that attract people to Britishness are extinct. Stiff upper lip, mercantile prosperity, refined taste, political traditions, outward-looking vision... all gone.

France still has its strikes and stylish populace and unabashed chauvinism. None of those things ever really interested me. But they're still there.

R54 but they're not all rail-thin hipster cinephile-philosophers with long refined noses and cutting-edge catwalk style who live off coffee and speed and airy romantic musings. There are so very many French natives who are fat, or violent, or stupid, or boorish, or slovenly and badly dressed, or provincial, or who don't know their arse from their elbow when it comes to culture or romance. They're not Musketeers or Les Mis characters, either. They're just modern Western Europeans, disappointing and trashy like most of us all.

This thread is like expecting that.

It's really about class and money everywhere, and how money no longer tries to be subtle about itself, but rather celebrates in vulgarity.

The middle class is all but extinct, and people of lower socioeconomic means behave horribly regardless of country. In the UK it's chavs....in Germany it's all the fat, racist Bavarians.....you can find dregs of the earth everywhere on earth.

R55, yes, of course, they're not *all* like that. But they are more like that than the average person. So at least some vestiges of French culture remain in France. In the UK? They're all gone.

They definitely seem to have less cultural impact. Is Adele last music star to become big in the US?

Doesn't anglophilia just come down to watching too much PBS as a child? All those lords and ladies of the manor sipping tea while the staff bowed and scraped and were happy too?

The last famous British author of the past twenty-five years had a very British, very public meltdown.

25 or so years ago I thought the answer was to move out of America - that somehow life would be better elsewhere.

And in some ways that's still true.

But Canada has its share of MAGAts or MAGA types. As does Britain, and Germany, and France, and, and, and......

Canada is consistently more liberal than the US. No that there aren't right-wingers there, but the general populace is slightly but noticeably to the left of the US. Outside Quebec at least.

I see the UK more favorably because of Brexit. Declaring their independence and standing up to the might of the EU is very reminiscent of the American Revolution. America suffered a lot economically when it did its Amexit, but obviously we survived it and later thrived, so hoping the UK will do likewise.

[quote]Declaring their independence and standing up to the might of the EU is very reminiscent of the American Revolution

I don't think they did. They kind of gave up Northern Ireland.

r62 Canada is much like the US - liberal/educated spots on both sides of the country (for Canada, it's Toronto et al) with a lot of redneck places inbetween.

R63 Brexit, in my opinion, was a bad idea firstly because the world is now divided into great power blocks and if you’re too small you’re just going to get eaten like a small fish amongst big fish. A small economy will simply be over powered by the shear size and might of the great empires internal market preferences and benefits. Britain was over powered by the United States when it had to give up its empire after the world wars and became massively in debt to the US. The only way it managed to stave off being economically subsumed then was its remaining industrial capacity which it used to create exports. It joined the Common market which later became the EU trading state. The other item Britain offered was capital from its trading empire, a service, for a handy fee. This policy has now played out. Brexit ushered its exit, when you’re out of things to offer you are subsumed under the wheels of greed humans love. Secondly Brexit is a bad idea because England has now practically de industrialized as a result of industries leaving because they’re no longer able to gain the advantage of tarif free European market benefits. Now Britain has very little to offer the world besides weapons its biggest export. Now banking is going away because Brexit has altered banking laws to favor Europe doing its own banking for itself. Britain has a few high tech and cutting edge engineering and biotech firms but they could and will likely be bought by the big fish and will only survive if the government can protect and sponsor their survival. Britain is tiny island full of people with a massive need for imported. I’d hate to be a young person living in Britain now.

[quote] I’d hate to be a young person living in Britain now.

yep tbh we're all literally going insane so go easy on us

I blame Masterpiece in PBS.

All I know is about a year ago Hollyoaks started to go to shit and by the end of the summer I gave up on it.

R69 a year ago? Try ten years ago or more, mate.

The last arc I truly deeply enjoyed was c. 2011-12 season, I think. The last several years in particular have been juvenile, tick-box exercises in car-crash telly, and not even in an enjoyable camp way. And all the characters these days are so flat and unlikeable compared to the 2000s cast.

I don't understand why there is such a large proportion of pop stars who are English. It's a small country. The US record industry seems inordinately interested in promoting English music in recent years. Adele, Ed Sheeran, Sam Smith, Harry Styles, Dua Lipa, Louis Capaldi, etc.

R71 The UK and Sweden have mastered pop-music production somehow. Every country has some speciality industries. For unknown reasons, those chilly, damp countries seem particularly good at pop music engineering. It's weird that Denmark, Norway and Finland have no presence in the music world, though, considering that Iceland carved out its weirdo-pop niche.

You'd think other European countries—especially English-speaking Ireland, Netherlands and Germany—would have greater output into the US market, but nil, not since U2, the Cranberries, Sínead, the Coors and Amber decades ago.

Don't overlook other countries, either. Japanese 'J-pop' broke out decades ago, paving the way for Korean 'k-pop' that is so popular influential worldwide now. There's far less reason that South Korea should be as big as it is in our pop market and yet it is.

When Arthur Treacher's started closing, you knew Britishmania was over.

Besides, what red-blooded American puts vinegar on their French fries.

British music personalities are entertaining to have around for dinners during all expense paid business trips, R71. The Swedes don't have that "allure", have to work harder because of it.

R73 They’re called chips you heathen!

[quote] I used to have a higher opinion… But I've increasingly turned against it

OP, that is your problem, not Britain's.

You should take responsibility for your own perceptions.

[quote] I just read last month this graphic novel

R49 That your first mistake.

OP's view of Britain was likely formed on watching adaptions of Agatha Christie, Brideshead Revisited and reading Daphne du Maurier.

Lady Victoria Hervey is the trashy sister of the 8th Marquess of Bristol. She gets away with looking like a hooker because the Herveys have been considered mad for centuries. Literally!

Her gay half-brother, the gay 7th Marquess blew through the entire family fortune of $80+ million in the 1980s, a lot of it up his nose, and promptly died. Young Rupert Everett was one of his pals.

I blame all this Brigerton shit for ruining it all.

[quote] this Brigerton shit

But that was imported from the U.S. They should have flushed it down their own toilet.

Very British People like Nicolas Fairford are unmatched in genteel sophistication and are natural aesthetes! Find me a German or a Chilean or a Beijinger with such natural refinement and grace!

Beige food, beige people, finally fading.

Lower middle class fraus who decorate beds with weeny pillows need to be taken behind a shed with a club and...

R69 That's around the time when the new EP, Lucy Allen's material started airing. And I agree.

R70 I thought Bryan Kirkwood's 2018 story about male sex abuse with football coach Buster was brilliantly written and acted, deserving every award it won.

What's there left to love about Britain without Margaret Thatcher?

I agree with anyone who says that while the UK was in the EU, it should have carried out a scorched earth policy from within to block every question requiring unanimous consent from member states, until the EU either threw out the UK or fundamentally altered its mission and dropped political unification as a goal.

I’m not disappointed. British people are chilled out and very loyal friends. I also enjoy working with people from the UK. They have been going through some tough times lately. It got colder than usual this year and fuel was expensive. Last summer they had a deadly heat wave. As a nation that loves animals it was even more stressful.

The UK has differences from America and I think some of the cultural differences are an adaptation to island living in a restricted space. I like the way the social and work activities are separate. Everyone is encouraged not to take themselves seriously. The education system produces some confident debaters and the young people are taught independence from their parents at a young age. There is an expectation of knowledge of implicit social rules. There is also the situation where difficult tasks are joked about and the problems are minimized to make the perspective more “meta” .. there is a lot to like about the UK, and this includes the southeast of England. Nobody’s perfect, there is a lot more good than bad imo.

For those whose knowledge of world history is limited, so they blame everything on Great Britain:

^ By the way, I understand the distinction between the UK, Britain and England. Since the subject from the op is Anglophilia I was being realistic by mentioning that people from all over the UK can be found in England. Also, the accents change based on geography quite frequently. I’m going to visit again this May. Nothing to do with the coronation though

R72 It just seems weird how you will see some almost-unknown English singer launched with American audiences on SNL. Like the labels just want to push these people on us - Sam Smith, e. g. Australians, too (Troye Sivan). And of course all the Canadians. It seems off to me when there are probably so many talented, struggling Americans that could be made into stars instead of all these people from dominions of the British Empire.

[quote]All have caused as many global and colonial issues in recent centuries.

I'm not talking about recent "centuries" dummy. I am talking about the here and now. TODAY. Current events, current conflicts, things the world is dealing with right now. If your defense is to reach back as far into human history as you possibly can to point towards other empires that sucked, then you have no defense at all. Which you would know if you could read.

Live in the UK a short time and any philia will become instant phobia.

[quote]The last famous British author of the past twenty-five years had a very British, very public meltdown.

Who was that?

You could dress the BRF in Walmart clothes and drop them in hillbilly country.

They would blend right in.

R94 It was either Martin Amis or Ian McEwan.

[quote] The last famous British author of the past twenty-five years had a very British, very public meltdown.

Technically, she’s American.

R60 Was it Dame Hilary Mantel?

Or, R98, Dame Edith Evans?

We usually have waves of cool Britannia, but youth culture really took a hit during COViD, pretty much killing any organic scenes out there. It's all entrenched repeat with the same old players behind it somewhere. Add the unwelcoming feel no matter how you alive Brexit, and it's the most uncool the place has been since the 1950's.

[quote] it's the most uncool the place has been since the 1950's.

Did you just pick that date out of the air?

What about the 'Swinging 60s'?

R94

I was referring to the wizard book turned unhinged Tweeter writer.

r16/ r25 You were never "at Cambridge". You were studying abroad there in 1999. This difference is enormous.

R102 The Wizard? The Wizard? You can’t see the Wizard!

R103 ?? I was at Cambridge. I was at the University of Cambridge and in the town of Cambridge, UK. I don't even know what you are talking about. If you're suggesting I'm being pretentious and pretending that I was enrolled as a regular student at Cambridge, then you're rather stupid. I specifically stated that I did a study-abroad program there, and this is an anonymous Internet message board site. What in the world do you think I have to gain from trying to pretend I am someone I'm not, and why do you think I would have disclosed that I was there on a study abroad program if I were trying to make you think otherwise?

I was at Cambridge University when I was at Cambridge University. I was in Cambridge, UK, when I was in Cambridge, UK. My experiences with British people while I was there are the experiences I had, and that has zero to do with why I was there. You're pedantic. Stop it. It's annoying.

Downton Abbey will always be in my fantasy...lol.

Eldergay Anglophilia stems from the same impulse that has them worshiping a mythical midcentury American WASPocracy

Keep calm and carry on....all.

"Eldergay Anglophilia" is something I never really encountered before DL. Maybe it's peculiar to NYC as that seems to be where 90% of the posters on DL live.

How come there was no sequel, Cambridge Blues, where Chris O’Donnell’s a rugby loving exchange student?

I do want the British to dress in mid century period piece costume when I visit. Somewhere between Brideshead & Miss Fisher.

Always that vague 1915 - 1950

Leave me too my fantasy, you mean bitches 🤩