Calling all immigrants. Any aspects of British culture you struggle with?

[FishCanFly]

I will start:

• Kids bedtimes. I've been called neglectful.
• School uniforms. I could buy many more clothes within reasonable fashion.
• Film\game ratings. Like if Skyrim would harm a 12yo

NHS

agriculture

construction

Britain would be pretty stuffed if all the immigrants and other migrant workers took SummerSix 's advice, obviously.

Funny how it works for pretty much every other country then isn’t it. The fat countries like Britain, America and Australia are the ones who pander to it.

@WburgWanderer definitely. We need some good mods in here.

Pander ? It's not a crime or a moral failing.

@ChardonnaysPrettySister

I hate baked beans. Horrible stuff, sweet, gloopy and pointless.

Sweet corn has its place though. In the bin.

😂😂

Baked beans is pretty good with an English breakfast since the salt of the bacon/sausage balances it but baked beans on toast is over sweetened yet somehow bland all at the same time to me...

You need ketchup on the beans on toast. It fixes everything 😉

I couldn't eat beans on toast without a lot of pepper 😬

Oh God I LOVE bedtimes! Nothing worse than grotty, overtired DC hanging around all evening.

Back in the 70s and 80s it was fine for other parents to discipline DC in their care or who they saw being twats - it's a modern thing that no one is allowed to speak to anyone else's DC or discipline them. I think that's why so many DC these days are entitled jerks - no one dares to tell them off - even their teachers. So if their parents are doing a shit job then that's that - no discipline at all.

@ContessaLovesTheSunshine - really?

I think that many English people don’t have a huge sense of national identity so use british.

I’m English and other things and describe myself as British. My Dm describes herself as British and she’s not lamenting loss of empire (as she’s from one Brit rule country, brought up in another Brit rule country).

I'm not so sure that it is working for Russia and China considering that the obesity rate is increasing.

www.themoscowtimes.com/2018/05/04/russia-obesity-rate-up-almost-50-in-5-years-health-ministry-a61355

edition.cnn.com/2019/03/19/health/china-obesity-kids-intl/index.html

Yeah, waste if good pepper and ketchup, if you ask me.

@ClaraThePigeon yes it’s sad. It’s as they are becoming more westernised. All countries that have slowly become more westernised have encouraged there’s many problems. Obesity being one of them.

People are overweight for all sorts of complex reasons and if the solution was just hearing that from a third party, everyone would be slim.

But countries where people tell each other they're fat and it's "culturally unacceptable", also have much lower rates of obesity. Peer pressure and society play a massive part. A lot of people in the UK are large and don't feel the need to change it because everyone else is, so they feel like it's normal.

Someone at my work who is size 20 made a Facebook post saying she is shocked that she has been diagnosed with Type 2 diabetes, and it's come out of the blue and she really needs to start looking after her health. Really? Out of the blue? Statistically it was more a case of when rather than if. I'm not shocked. Maybe if someone had mentioned it to her earlier rather than being blind to the issue, she could have done something about it. I've read that even doctors feel awkward telling patients they're fat, which is ridiculous, as it's the biggest cost to the NHS.

To those who questioned my above comment (re British/English), it's just one opinion; others are available! Quite nice to have it discussed, really. I can't promise to contribute much as I'm busy drinking European beer atm but will catch up later!

Italians say it like it is, if it is about how you look or appearances. They also however lie a very great deal, much more than most of the English people I know. The lies I am thinking of are of the " oh of course I will do that" when they have no intention whatsoever of doing whatever they said they would.

It's swings and roundabouts I'd say

The taps thing is because until recently the cold and hot water came from different sources. The cold was drinking water and from a tank, and the hot was poorer quality work and not supposed to be drunk. I had to explain this to relatives years ago when they wanted to make coffee using hot water from the hot water tap.

But do you want to live in a country where it's culturally acceptable to tell people they must look a certain way? Does that not lead to eating disorders?
I think it's fair enough for your doctor to tell you that your weight is not healthy or maybe a very close relative, but it shouldn't be something that it's okay to say to someone, just because it's factual.

I think obesity in places like Britain can be partly blamed on the food industry and no one in power cares enough to stop the market being flooded with sugary crap or processed 'food' which is full of artificial sweeteners. We've lost the art of making good food from scratch - it isn't a skill which is valued or that a lot of people have time for. Some other countries do just eat better than us.

People have it the wrong way round re whether telling people they are fat prevents obesity. Britain had been an idustrialised nation longer than most European countries ( by about 100 years) so they have been eating easily available highly processed foods for much longer. That is what they are fatter than other countries.

European (and other) countries are 'catching up' though and are getting fatter no matter how often individuals are given a hard time for being overweight

. 50 years ago people in this country would have been openly mocked for being fat, it didn't stop people getting fatter over time, The mocking or ' telling it straight' about someones weight has tailed off a bit ( in public anyway) compared to other countries because it is no longer a small minority of people who are fat in the UK.

I'd say openly telling strangers they are too fat ( used to happen to me regularly in Italy ) will likely tail off in other countries too as their obesity problem gets worse.

Only changing the environment will reduce obesity levels. Telling individuals they are too fat won't make any difference at all to overall obesity levels, though I am sure anecdotally one or two people will say it is helpful for them,

But I think it’s poor to blame those things. That’s why I mean about pandering. No one is forcing anyone to go out and buy those foods. If you want to eat healthily in Britain there is plenty of options. But the pandering and babying of people now means we have to have someone tell us what to do. They literally had to move chocolate from the tills like we are naughty toddlers. People want to have sugary foods removed, this is not the right option. You can eat sugary foods. But it’s on you as a grown ass adult to moderate how much of it you eat and give to your kids.

The "you alright" thing has made me chuckle I have to admit. I swap and change between "alright" "hiya" "morning" " afternoon" "evening" etc. I very rarely say hello. I also very rarely say thankyou I say cheers instead. I didn't notice this till it was pointed out to me by a girl I went to uni with. She was originally from Somalia via Denmark and I confused her a lot in the 1st few months. For about 4 weeks she thought I had a friend called lass cause I referred to girls I knew as lass. Its dialect and it changes between area. My dh works with a geordie and sometimes I struggle to understand him when I talk to him. I can understand why it can be quite difficult if english isn't your first language.

My Japanese host mother used to complain, "All British people only eat cookies for breakfast! I know! I've seen it every time!". Of course, you're not allowed to say otherwise, because of course according to people on this thread Brits are not allowed to say #notallbritishpeople 😂

From when I lived here previously, 16 years ago, there have been huge cultural changes that I've noticed.

People are now out running and exercising in a way that I didn't see then - I can remember our neighbours finding it hugely entertaining to watch me go off on a run!

There is a greater emphasis on nutrition and quality food - when I was last here, I was trying to explain to a friend that five a day didn't mean five bananas a day, for example!

Sometimes, it almost seems to go over the top the other way.

Reminds me of someone saying that if the Brits had done communism, they'd have done it right, no cheating. . .

I do think though, that children's meals and foods are the work of the devil. If a kid is always given sausage, boiled potatoes or chips, and peas and carrots - well, they're not going to magically come to a love of diverse food including lots of fruit and veges are they? (This example is of a family I worked for in NZ, every night I babysat for them - at least four times a week, that's what the kids got fed. The parents couldn't understand why they wouldn't eat broccoli. . . he was a flipping chef. But I've seen it over here too, with chicken nuggets, chips, and the token serve of peas, that don't get eaten, pretty much every night. . .)

I hate baked beans. Horrible stuff, sweet, gloopy and pointless Completely agree - disgusting stuff.

not many write complaints to the train operators

many of us have tried. We either receive no reply at all or pointless platitudes.