Monday, 17 March 2025

Myths About Britain - Debunked

 

I was sitting in a bar in Amsterdam many years ago with an British work colleague and a Dutch man who was a customer. We were enjoying a quiet conversation when we noticed two young Dutch guys on the other side of the bar lambasting a slightly inebriated British bloke who was on his own. 

“You don’t care about your children!” declared one of the Dutch guys. “You send your children away for months to school. No wonder you people are the way you are.”

We were slightly uncomfortable hearing this but we ignored them. Eventually the British guy had had enough and left. Unfortunately, one of the Dutch guys heard us talking and the two of them immediately came over to us with a view to continuing their attack on British people. 

“So, you’re English?” he asked us. 

Thankfully, our Dutch colleague turned around and said something to them in Dutch which sounded very stern. Within a minute or two they moved away. 

“What did you say?” I asked. 

He replied:

“I told them that I lived in England for four years and everything they said was a load of rubbish. I told them that their behaviour is terrible and they are letting down Dutch people by being such arseholes.”

This was a one-off because Dutch people are usually laid back and really friendly. However, this unfortunate episode leads me on to some common misconceptions about the place I call home that simply aren’t true. Let’s dive in.

All British people send their kids away to school for months

This is, as my Dutch friend said, untrue on the whole. Also, I heard a French bloke in a restaurant in Paris saying the same thing to an American colleague once. This time I interrupted and told the American that this simply wasn’t true. 

What is true is that we do have public schools such as Harrow, Rugby and Eton (which has barfed out some Prime Ministers like Boris the Clown). Public schools are fee paying and heaped in tradition and deep in the realm of the filthy rich of our country. In public school you will find the children of royalty and nobility and extremely rich businessmen etc. because they are the only ones who can afford them.

The vast majority of kids in the UK, (93%)  go to normal state schools in the same way most other children in the world do. I have only ever met one guy who went to public school and he hated every second of it. He was a really good friend at university and he had what can only be described as a posh accent. 

Talking of accents …

There are only two British accents: the royal accent and cockney

The “royal” accent is what I would describe the accent spoken by Charlie-boy, aka King Charles III. It is known as “received pronunciation”. The cockney accent is the accent of London. The truth is that there are so many accents in the United Kingdom that listing them all would take ages.  Here’s a taster:

My accent used to be “Black Country” or “Yam Yam” which is very close to the Brummie accent in the video above spoken by Ozzy Osbourne. I used to sound similar to him because he was born about ten miles away from Walsall, where I was born. But even in those ten miles, the accent mutated and my original dialect had words that perhaps even Ozzy never used. 

You may also note that the video described that accent “being rated as Britain’s least intelligent” and since I moved away from Walsall I can vouch for this being true. When I moved to Liverpool for university, people used to say “what part of Birmingham are you from?”. I was naïve and said “How do you know where I’m from?, which may have made them think that people from Walsall and Birmingham are as stupid as the accent makes them sound.

This was of course the first time I encountered the Scouse accent (spoken by people from Liverpool). When I tried to open a bank account as a naïve 19 year old, I really struggled because I could barely understand the woman I was dealing with. She was a fully-fledged Scouser and we struggled to communicate because my accent was so strong too. She got my name wrong about ten times and she probably thought I was stupid too.

Over the years, my accent has faded and now I have what Southerners would call a neutral Northern accent. Yet occasionally, my Yam Yam accent surfaces (usually when I am ranting). There is no Mancunian in there (well possibly a hint).

We all live in London

London is the capital of England and the United Kingdom but we don’t all live there. I have been asked by an American, “So what’s it like living in London?”

Now, London is a huge city but it is over two hundred miles away from Manchester. I have friends who live there and I visit the place quite often. It takes four hours to drive there from Manchester and this is why I usually take the train, taking just over two hours. 

But I am not from London and I don’t live there. And the truth is that 90% of travelling people from the UK that you will meet do not live in London either. Some even live in different countries (see below).

That said, London is a good place to visit. I love it but I wouldn’t want to live there at all. It is too chaotic and too busy for me. 

England is the United Kingdom

I was born in England and I live in England. I was also born in the United Kingdom. But the United Kingdom is not England. 

The United Kingdom consists of four countries: England, Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland. If, for example, you were to ask a Scot whether he was English, you may well get a rude reply. Each country has its own devolved government for local issues but the centre of government of the UK is in London, so perhaps I can understand the slight confusion when meeting somebody from the UK. The accent usually gives it away. 

I can imagine that there are other things that confuse foreigners too, especially when I mention the word "British". I am English and I am also British. Where does “British” fit in I hear you cry? Why are we also called Great Britain? 

Allow me to explain. 

See the following diagram.


The big island that contains England, Scotland and Wales is called Great Britain and people who live in all of those countries are British. There are a lot of smaller islands off the coast of Great Britain but they count as British too (for example the Isle of Man and the Isle of Wight). 

The other major island is Ireland and this comprises the Republic of Ireland and Northen Ireland. The islands of Great Britain, Ireland and all the other smaller islands make up the British Isles. From the perspective of Ireland, the Republic of Ireland (or Eire) is an independent country but Northern Ireland is part of the United Kingdom. Hence the full name of the United Kingdom is The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland. 

I hope that clears things up and makes sense.

And Finally …

There are a couple of other myths that need to be debunked so I will do that in another post. 


6 comments:

River said...

I listened to the video and honestly think most of those accents sound similar to each other, this probably explains why I am unable to learn other languages. I don't have "the ear" for it. I knew that not everyone sends their kids to boarding school, what you call Public School, but I am surprised that it is called public school, here in Australia those schools withvery high fees are called Private Schools as in not government owned and the regular schools, the state schools, are public schools. i htink the boarding Schools are just called boarding schools and most students there are from more rural areas that don't have High Schools or any schools.

Plastic Mancunian said...

Hi River,

I think it's possibly because you are Australian. You guys sound the same to me too but I am certain that this is not the case. Also, I have been mistaken for an Aussie in America several times. Yes - it is a bit odd about the naming of them I knew you had them Down Under too. In fact they may even have them in Holland and France too but those guys compaining were just too ignorant to know.

:o)

Cheers

PM

Lisa said...

This was so helpful! In the U.S., people with lots of money sometimes send their kids to private schools, rather than public schools. Public schools are the "regular" schools in every city/town/etc. Some private school tuition is equal to college (university) tuition. We live in a place where public education is good, so our kids always went to public schools. There are some places in Alabama (the state where I live) where public education is horrible and I feel for those folks who are forced to find a private school where they can afford the tuition or get a scholarship.

Kwizgiver said...

The British Isles diagram was extremely helpful--I now understand why we refer to Great Britain as England. I guess I thought the countries were like states in the US.

Plastic Mancunian said...

Hi Lisa,

It's the same story here. Some schools are brilliant (like the one I went to) but others are terrible.

:o)

Cheers

PM

Plastic Mancunian said...

Hi Kwizgiver,

I think the countries are more than just states. For example, all four countires are represented in football (soccer) in the World Cup. Yet, bizarrely, in the Olympics where are known as Great Britain. I'm not sure why that is. It is a weird set up when you think about it and there are people in Scotland and Wales who want "independence" so that for example Scotland can be a separate country outside the UK. It can be complicated.

:o)

Cheers

PM