Global Warning

14 June 2008

Theodore Dalrymple delivers a Global Warning

The image of women in Victorian times veered between that of madonna and whore, but nowadays in Britain it veers between harridan and slut. This is only natural in a country where vulgarity is not only triumphant, but militant and deeply ideological. The men, of course, are just as bad.

Recently, I flew to an Aegean resort now much favoured by our permanently bronzed proletarians. I was going to a conference of intellectuals there. The pudgy tattooed women en route to paradise had diamonds in their navels; the shaven-headed men, lager made flesh, had skimpy vests stretched painfully over their beer bellies, gold chains and an earring to prove their indelible individuality. One had the words ‘If found, please return to the pub’ inscribed on his chest; another, ‘Lager recycling unit.’ I shouldn’t have laughed, but I did.

As far as I am aware, however, it is only when the British go on holiday that it is deemed necessary to warn passengers in an aircraft that drunken violence will not be tolerated (though how it will be dealt with at 35,000 feet is less clear); and it is only in British airports that arriving passengers are warned that threatening behaviour towards immigration staff is ‘taken seriously’ and will, perhaps, end in prosecution. Welcome to Britain: land of incompetent and impotent official menace. If you are not careful, you will be photographed breaking the law.

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Andrew

June 12th, 2008 9:08am Report this comment

Isn't this getting a bit repetitive now?

Ed Lancey

June 12th, 2008 10:09pm Report this comment

He should never have given up the day job. He is turning into an expense account bore. Although I see the conference were too stingy to fly him out on a non-charter flight.

David Short

June 13th, 2008 4:22am Report this comment

Try Ryanair. I'm sure the 'flight attendants' there must have taken compulsory lessons in 'customer hostility'.

I try to avoid using the airline now, but when I do I absolutely never bother to smile or say hello, goodbye or thank you to them. It is never reciprocated, and they probably prefer surliness anyway...

By the way, don't forget that your own managing director contributed to the vulgarisation of British society when he dumbed down the previously excellent Sunday Times, which enriched my life as a young 'proletarian' when edited by Harold Evans!

EyeSee

June 13th, 2008 6:44pm Report this comment

Theo, you are a gem. It is as it is and if we could be rid of the real bores, the foul-mouthed English and have back the real English, then that would, strangely be progress. I defer to you Sir, not least because deferrence is a step in the right direction. You carry on saying what you like, because that is what I like.

Judith

June 16th, 2008 1:02pm Report this comment

On this side of the Atlantic, your British reputation of mannerly sophisticates & consummate gentelmen preceeds the evident reality of the more boorish Brit that you describe. Maybe it's all the upstairs-downstairs British television shows we watch in the States that enforces this misconceived idea we Americans have of the polite British. Thought it was an abberation when traveling in Hong Kong amidst all the British expatriates & watched them congregate in loud, druken stupor even in the most upscale hotel bars & city restaurants. Struggling to place my heavy carry-on suitcaste in the overhead bin of a British Airline plane, I figured some helpful English gentelmen would jump to assit me only to be rescued by a humble, classy American.

Lydia

June 30th, 2008 12:36am Report this comment

I haven't experienced the British in Britian, but have endured the worst through the net. The hardest to deal with are the young British women. The men are still a bit more decent. The women's comments on various blogs remind me of what Basil Fawlty said: There is only one brain between the lot of them. These are the young college women, mind you, a class that I used to think of as being more refined and knowledgeable about civilization.

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