Do Italians hate the English or is it the language barrier?

1. English is now an international language. It’s the language of business. Most children learn it around the world in order to have a fighting chance in various jobs market. It’s nothing to do with them being considerate, well brought-up, hard-working, etc. It is in their self-interest to learn English. This is for historical reasons which no living English person bears the responsibility for.
2. This means that when English people learn a foreign language it is unlikely to be as essential or advantageous as learning English is for native speakers of other languages, there is not the same self-interested drive for English people to learn other languages. So learning them is more a ‘nice to have’.
3. Because of this, English people learning other languages have many other languages to choose from, none of which with be as useful as their mother tongue when travelling. So there is even less incentive. This doesn’t make English people rude, entitled, whatever, it’s just the way things turned out.

I recently went on holiday where there were guests from many countries. The Italians were very rude and had little in the way of manners (not only the English who noticed, many other nationalities did). The rudest of them all though were the Russian guests.

I'm not remotely worried, fp, just sad how true it is, having been embarrassed by English people's total lack of effort so many times. When speaking the language of the country I was in, I've also been "language shamed" and told I was showing off by English people, never by a foreigner. It's just bizarre.

Uncharitable 🤣 Why? English kids have the same number of brain cells as anyone else and the same if not far better schools than many European countries, so why do they deserve special treatment and why the terrible performance in foreign languages compared to other countries? Parents' insular, entitled attitudes.

Meanwhile Brits either giggle and snigger at the funny words and sounds, or just won't even try because their too embarrassed by the idea of trying to sound like those funny forriners

This is a very uncharitable take.

I think it’s more that Brits are looking over their shoulder expecting someone to take the piss out of them for being pretentious. It’s a fear of humiliation. It’s comes from class oppression “Who do they think they are, being all la de da like that !?!” not having ‘ideas above your station’, etc.

I've always found Italians to be very welcoming friendly and hospitable. I have to caveat that I do speak fluent Italian but my husband doesn't speak more than a couple of words and I don't think he's found any different. We love going on holiday to Italy for this very reason (well, as well as the stunning scenery architecture and delicious food, obviously).

No, any kind of very milky coffee is not acceptable after breakfast.

Don’t you worry, English people fully expect to be judged and treated with disdain by uncharitable and prejudiced people no matter what they do.

Never found Italians anything other than friendly.

I went to Italy in my 20's. First day there I went out to find a supermarket. A young Italian lady approached me and asked me a question in Italian. I apologised and said I didn't speak Italian ( in Italian) and got a load of abuse off her then she stomped off 🤷 nice welcome to Italy!

Totally agree.

I wonder why so many English people are concerned about looking "poncey" but not at all concerned about looking lazy, entitled and ignorant. As I've been told many times in perhaps less explicit terms by continental Europeans and a few Welsh people

I spent 5 years there, right on the Slovenian border, and the order of languages spoken other than Italian was Slovenian, German and (spoken among the older people but understood by their grandchildren) Friuliano/Furlan. English didn't get much of a look-in and if it was taught in schools it wasn't taught very successfully. If you could dredge up a Slovenian grandparent, which many children could, you were allowed to go to a Slovenian school (in Italy) where the standard of English teaching was very much higher.

I think it has to be something to do with your autism? Is your partner also autistic - body language/ the way you say things?
I can’t think it’s because you don’t know the language. I’ve been all off over Italy and barely used a word of Italian but waiters have always been polite enough.

I also used to work in catering and had to serve tourists daily. If I had been rude because they forgot to say please (some languages don’t have the word please at all) or attempt a chit chat about the weather, I would have been sacked. So why it’s ok the other way round?

Also, as already mentioned, in many other countries they really don’t get the difference between english, welsh and scotts. You can claim to be a scott as much as you like but they still file you in the english category in their heads. Because UK = England. (Disclaimer, some do understand it but there are large swathes who really don’t give it any thought).

I’ve always found Italian people very friendly on the whole, especially in restaurants and shops.

@AllProperTeaIsTheft I disagree, I’m not British born and english is not my native language. I still feel, if not poncey, self conscious when attempting to speak say italian or french on a holiday. I’m quite shy too which doesn’t help.

I’d say that many other people from my home country feel the same, they’d rather resort to english on their med holidays as it’s familiar and what they’ve learnt at school.

I think a lot of Brits feel like a ponce, putting on airs and graces, if they say ‘please thankyou, hello, goodbye’ etc in the local language. I know I enjoy speaking those words in other languages, mainly because it is fun, not out of good manners, but I still feel a bit of a ponce while I do. I doubt if people from any other country would be perceived as being a bit ‘up themselves’ by their fellow countrymen if they speak in English.

And this is what we struggle against when teaching kids foreign languages in school in the UK. It's an attitude I've never seen in any other country and it's frankly bonkers. Speaking the language of the country you're in is sensible and practical, not 'poncey'. It's such a weird, insular way of looking at communication.

Kids from other countries think it's useful and normal to speak another language (especially English) and the more you can sound like a native the better. Meanwhile Brits either giggle and snigger at the funny words and sounds, or just won't even try because their too embarrassed by the idea of trying to sound like those funny forriners, or can speak but just worry about looking too try-hard. It's depressing, frankly!

Same here. The rudest people to me whenI visited were other British tourists including one almost pushing me to get on the escalator in the airport despite there being a queue behind me and me about to step on. I had to stop DH from causing a scene.

I think a lot of Brits feel like a ponce, putting on airs and graces, if they say ‘please thankyou, hello, goodbye’ etc in the local language. I know I enjoy speaking those words in other languages, mainly because it is fun, not out of good manners, but I still feel a bit of a ponce while I do. I doubt if people from any other country would be perceived as being a bit ‘up themselves’ by their fellow countrymen if they speak in English.

i have lots of Italian friends and in my experience they can be slightly more forward compared to brits. Let’s be honest brits are known to be passive aggressive and polite under all circumstances whereas others might be more direct. It doesn’t mean they’re hate the British though, they just weren’t raised to be people pleasers?

When I needed help and asked “Do you speak English” - the affronted look I got back, with a curt “Of course” as a response, anyone would think I’d asked if they had been to school and could read and write.

Yes, in my experience, if you ask people under the age of about 50 in the Netherlands and Denmark (especially Amsterdam and Copenhagen) if they speak English, they react as if you've asked them if they can count to ten. 😄I've never been to Norway or Sweden, though I can imagine it's similar.

Going back to the OP, I'm astonished to hear of these negative experiences of Italians. Mine have been overwhelmingly positive. My Italian is less than rudimentary, but I found that if I made an effort to speak a little, people almost always replied to me in English, or if they couldn't speak English, they spoke slow, basic Italian that I could easily follow. I've visited Italy many times and have never had the slightest negative reaction to being British, or English specifically (and anecdotally, in my own experience, a lot of people on the continent use British and English interchangeably anyway).

I speak fluent German (or used to, it's rusty now) and only ever had the experience once, in all the years I lived in Germany, that someone replied in English to my German. I suppose I just sounded competent enough in the language that they didn't feel they needed to. Interestingly, it only ever happened a couple of times that Germans guessed I was British and a native English speaker from listening to me speak German. They usually clocked that I was foreign but assumed I was Dutch or Scandinavian. That's probably because they don't expect English speakers to know more than a couple of words in German!

They don’t sound very hospitable for people working in the hospitality industry - your friends.

That's ok, I like them 😊

Exchanging pleasantries just means hello, good bye, thank you, etc. that's very easy and everybody should do that for each country they visit, keeping in mind that in touristy areas people will prefer to practise their English anyway.

They don’t sound very hospitable for people working in the hospitality industry - your friends.

I went to Hungary recently. I only learnt hello, good bye and thank you out of your list, but also how to say cheers.

To be honest in Budapest, the locals don't expect or particularly appreciate foreigners' efforts with their difficult language.

I have friends who own businesses in hospitality in Greece and spain, they are from there.

The main nationality they moan or complain about are the English.

They say the same things, they find that English people rarely bother to learn anything passed "Thank you".
They just expect and assume English will be spoken everywhere.

But if they went to England on holiday, they of course would have to try to speak English or theyd get nowhere.

If you could even learn to say (in the language of the country you are in) "Do you speak English? My Italian/Spanish/Greek/French is very bad", it would go a long, long way and they are usually more than happy to switch languages or find another staff menber who can.

It's just being polite and respectful.