People from other countries - they’re just better than us, aren’t they?

I’m in France and customer service is non-existent! Routinely wait 20-30 minutes to get drinks orders taken and the same again for them to arrive. If you have a problem with anything you’re met with a shrug and told that nothing can be done. People push onto the metro in front even though they can see I’m visibly disabled and never offer a seat.

It’s just their culture. I do love this country and there is so much about it that is streets ahead of the UK, but it also makes me appreciate the good things about home too.

Love living here and im born and bred here. If theres a lot of brits who dont like where they live then that shows in how they live. Glass half empty folk

on my last all inclusive holiday a foreign family with two kids gave their kids screens for every meal, so I would disagree on that front alone. I have seen many foreign families do the same, it’s not just the UK 🤣

Yes. There's definitely a coldness, arrogance and sense of entitlement that you see in many English people that you don't see in other cultures.

It has been handed down from the colonialism days

Or just maybe, when you are in a place for a week or two, you have no idea what the “underclass” 🤢 is doing.

Ohhh we have our own versions... We're not better than the British; we're different, that's all!

No you're wrong you're seeing the side of the country that the people who work in tourism want you to see.

Im currently in france in a town I've visited several times before and have seen the following: cooked chicken being left out in the open at a market, just on top of the cooker. Dog shit in many places. Un paved pavements. Vicious dogs leaping at you as you walk past. Men pissing where they want. Last night I walked into the communal bathroom and a woman was washing her tuppence in the sink.

I still love the town and will come back.

😆Quite

Campaigning the rights of women sounds good to me.

Good. Who needs an in-depth conversation to buy a toaster? Give me an Argos catalogue and a pen and let's get on with it.

OP If you really believe it, then try to inact the changes you need to create what you are seeing

The British exceptionalism is hilarious. It even applies to negatives.

No you're not particularly worse than anywhere else FFS.

I've lived lots of places and now live in a lovely bit of the UK. The driving is better here than lots of countries, there is less violent crime than lots of countries, you're reasonably high up the obesity charts but not at the top. I love the fashion here compared to my home town but I'm comparing a small town to a big city which isn't fair.

Just a shame what the person who invented Harry Potter became

Agreed OP - Europeans are just somehow better than us fat, pasty, badly-dressed Brits and our feral children. Thankfully whenever I go abroad, the locals simply cannot believe I'm British because I'm so well-dressed (in tasteful, muted tones) and my children so vitamin-sufficient.

It’s also a discipline problem. From what have seen, European parents are, on average, much, much stricter with kids and young people than British parents.

I am in Italy now and have just come from Copenhagen and Japan and as an Aussie we could definitely learn a thing or two about manners and order from the latter and about style and beauty in general from the Danes. The world is a big place and we can all visit and bring a little of that back home with us.

Well I've just been in a (Western) European country which had a significant litter problem.

I suspect the clean places pay people to pick up litter while our councils are always claiming poverty and don't do it and rely on litter pickers (and also don't empty bins often enough so people leave their stuff next to a full bin and then the foxes or whatever get at it).

Sorry but I don't think a single person thinks Americans are better than Brits 😂😂 I think op was talking about European destinations

My MIL was from another country and she was vile.

It's weird that you think people are 'better' if they're good looking and well dressed. The kids probably behave because otherwise they're hit.

Maybe you should just move abroad if it's so great everywhere else OP? Personally I think it's really beautiful and very lovely where I live. I don't really care if they people around me are good looking and dress well though.

I went to Malta, some years back, and flew back early because it was so dirty and grim.

I hate to say it but the worst areas for us tend to be where they have a high immigration community. It seems to have gone to shit really badly. One area I know Roma live and they dump all the rubbish on the pavement. Grim.

They really, really haven’t. Pay is low, taxes are high, they’re taxed from the first € they earn, no zero band. Strikes are frequent, anything that requires a government official to work on it works at a snails pace or not at all. The tourist places look lovely generally but in most cities and towns there’s masses of graffiti, and high crime areas just like in parts of the U.K. Racism is rife.

It’s lovely to visit, but it’s just like the U.K. under the surface.

Wasn’t the French equivalent a certain Jean-Marie Le Pen?

We invented Harry Potter, and nobody can say the rest of the world took it and made it better, like they did with other British things, like football, and the railways.

In Spain when they clear up their dogs mess, they rinse the pavement with a squirting bottle of soapy water, the rubbish is never left for long to avoid cockroaches the area, the beaches are cleaned every night, the communities de weed the pavements. It works well even in the poorer communities.

Is this the same Balkans people who were shooting one another into mass graves and committing horrendous war crimes in the 90s? Yes, I’ve always thought they were much better than us. Ffs