To be deeply disappointed in John Cleese

[drspouse]

I have no idea if this is typical but he just tweeted that London isn't an English city any more
What is it then pray tell? What's not English about it??

Absolutely not Eliza! If you read what I'm saying I go by the assumption that Mookie isn't discriminating or doing anything wrong. I just think she might be teaching in the wrong environment because she obviously dislikes the idea that parents choose to speak their native tongue at home. I never said she was racist but she has a negative view of bilingualism which I tried to counter.

Holding a Turkish immigrant up, especially when we are mid-Brexit, as an excuse for 'Englishness for a day' seems a trifle...odd, to be polite.

Why, if people are so keen on hero-worship, don't we find someone who actually was English, who did something good that we are proud of?

Possibly because adults are past the Santa Claus stage and realise all humans are flawed. Hero worship is best saved for Marvel Comics fans and Sci Fi.

Indeed, I would have thought Henry V was more fitting as a brexit hero, especially as some leavers seem keen to do Agincourt 2.0!

London is unique and diverse, but is it integrated? All those posters raving about the importance of diversity and how they love all the different languages they hear, that’s all well and good if your friends and neighbours are representative of that viewpoint. IMO there are very few fully integrated neighbourhoods as people generally gravitate towards people like them. If you find yourself an ethnic minority in your own neighbourhood, that can be depressing as you feel you’ve lost your cultural reference points.

Why, if people are so keen on hero-worship, don't we find someone who actually was English, who did something good that we are proud of?

What difference does it make? He was obviously chosen because of his actions. Just because people object to their culture being eradicated doesn't mean they are all racist you know.

{As I have already stated, I have many, many children coming in who have no English despite being born and raised here, many with older siblings who were also born here! When they start, our form asks them whether the child has any English and what language they speak. Many say they only speak their 'home' language to them.}

It is SALT advice to stick to your mother tongue and not switch back and forth with two languages. How are those that are less bright supposed to work out the two languages if they come from the same person? It's supposed to be hard.

Added to which, if foreign parents speak to their kids in English the child will end up speaking English with their accent and grammar, as happens to my DS. He's picked up my imperfect grammar and worse of all for Cleese, he sounds like he's not from round here, even though he speaks no other language than English, and precisely because I wanted him to.

And yet I have to tick the 'English as an additional language' box on his secondary school application, because he was 'exposed to another language' in his early years. I can see the point of him being labelled as having EAL because his English is possibly not perfect but it shows these figures need to be looked at carefully.

Foreign parents seem damned if they do and damned if they don't.

You truly think English culture is being eradicated? What is actually being eradicated? The language is one of the most spoken in the world; music, literature and entertainment: all tremendously successful. Why would you think such a great culture is under threat?
I am serious by the way, having a degree in English lit (the reason I came here in the first place).
I think it's thriving.

The economy and mostly decimated public services however, that's a different story.

I too would like to know in quite what way English Culture is being 'eradicated'. I'm not saying you're wrong and it isn't, I would just like it delineated.

@Eliza9919
Did you see the link I posted to the St George’s Day events in Trafalgar
Square this year?

London today, like most capital cities, is very much an international city

This keeps coming up, and I just don’t think it’s true. Most capital cities are definitely full of locals and not foreign-born, or first-gen. Tokyo is a world-class city, and is very Japanese. Maybe NYC and Singapore?

Hong Kong is literally getting swamped with Mainland Chinese that will probably dilute their Cantonese heritage, and maybe their language too. Tibet and Xinjiang, especially, are also losing their cultural identity because they are getting overwhelmed by Chinese economic migrants and there is nothing they can do about it and there is definitely immense frustration over it that spills into violence.

The young kids speaking English as a second language is a red herring. That's really not the problem.

I walk dogs with a woman who teaches at the local school. It is probably around 80% Asian/Eastern immigrants. Language is not the problem. Rather, a lot of them have seriously chaotic home lives (in the case of refugees, unsurprisingly) and in many cases the parents have shockingly backward views that sound straight out of the Daily Mail. She was telling me a story that one boy ran up and kissed another boy on the playground (they're like 7 or 8) and they had to report it to the parents (I have no idea why) and one of the kids was pulled from school for a few days and they had to have several meetings and so on.

The only people 'eradicating English Culture' are the Leavers in UK. Our global reputation will never ever recover from the madness of Brexit. Patience? Nope. Pragmatism? Nope. Diplomacy? Nope. Intelligent debate? Nope. I could go on...

@BertrandRussell They may have had a parade, but was that heavily promoted? I didn't hear about it. Was there as much fuss around St George's Day as St Patrick's Day? No, there wasn't. Was every pub decked out and full of promotional crap for St Georges Day? No it wasn't. The day assed relatively quietly in most places.

Boadicea / Boudica would be a good Brexit heroine... standing up to the Empire.

What a fascinating thread.

On the language / home language thing... we’re in the other side of this. Moved to France with 5 month old DS then had a second baby here. Neither of them spoke a word of French before starting «school» at three, and English is totally our home language. It took them both a while, but they are now totally bilingual - English and french. All their french has come from school. We were told not to speak any french with them as we’d just teach them bad habits (true!).

However, unlike a lot of the communities being discussed here, we are very integrated. All our neighbours are french, we shop in french shops, use french doctors, etc etc. All their teachers are french as are 90% of their school friends.

The other difference I think is that English is a very highly valued skill here. Everyone wants their children to be English speakers - the same does not apply to Moroccan, Algérien, Arabic or other North African languages (most common immigrant groups in France). Yes, they’d speak them at home - but it’s not something you’d put in a cv or job application.

FRANCE doesn’t do diversity, at all. Integration ie adopting the culture, values and beliefs of the republic are paramount. There is a lot of racism here - a lot of people are open about it.

“. Was there as much fuss around St George's Day as St Patrick's Day? No, there wasn't. Was every pub decked out and full of promotional crap for St Georges Day? No it wasn't. The day assed relatively quietly in most places.”

I’m not clear what you want to have happened. There was an entire afternoon of events in Trafalgar Square. And certainly in my small market town some of the pubs were decorated. Incidentally- who do you think sponsors and organises St Patrick’s day celebrations?

Does it matter? The point is that it is accepted that more fuss will be made of other countries celebrations, while to celebrate ours is frowned upon.

Integration ie adopting the culture, values and beliefs of the republic are paramount

I think this is important, it’s the sensible thing to do. I think we could have done better on the integration front in the UK.

Eliza its a two pronged thing with St Georges Day. I worked the St Patricks day celebrations in trafalgar square this year and 2 years back. Everyone I work with eagerly accepts working the St Patricks event. Apart from a couple of people perhaps getting a bit drunk there is a really nice feel about the day. And it is inclusive in terms of the celebration.

Feel free to correct me, but the perception of St Georges is different. It doesn't have that same wholesome, or inclusive perception. I'm British, but I feel if I attempted to walk around with the St Georges flag I'd be made to feel by others that I'm taking the piss.

Tell me I'm wrong. I'd like to be.

Honestly Sadiq Khan can go fuck himself. He sends out never-ending streams of tweets and videos about people from all over the world who now live and work in London (they NEVER feature native-born Brits) and how proud he is of the fact that London is European, open doors to the world, diversity is strength, bla bla bla, and then he criticises John Cleese for making an observation about the very thing he’s so fervently promoting? He should be agreeing with him and thanking him for bringing it to everyone’s attention!

Boadicea / Boudica would be a good Brexit heroine... standing up to the Empire.

Oh yes she would.

I'm not crazy about St. George and yes it seems rather different than St. Patricks. Obviously they're similar in the strictest sense, but we all know that St. George has been co-opted by white nationalists, don't we?

No one would actually be happy to have a St. George's flag on their street, I imagine.

Honestly Sadiq Khan can go fuck himself

I couldn't agree more.

It doesn't have that same wholesome, or inclusive perception

It’s a shame that it seems to have been hijacked by the far-right, as the English flag has been. I think we need to try and reclaim them in some way.

This keeps coming up, and I just don’t think it’s true. Most capital cities are definitely full of locals and not foreign-born, or first-gen. Tokyo is a world-class city, and is very Japanese. Maybe NYC and Singapore?
Japan has a very different culture and was a closed country under a policy of isolationism until the mid-19th century. This still shapes the demographics of Japanese cities.

At the height of the Empire London ruled a quarter of the world. The Empire brought people from all corners to London through trade and as labourers. You can see the same in the other major port cities of the UK, Liverpool, Bristol, Glasgow, etc.

The UK is a country of immigrants, from the Romans to the Anglo-Saxons to the Normans, to successive arrivals of political/religious refugees (e.g. the Huguenots), the children of Empire (India, Pakistan, Caribbean, South Africa), etc. There is no "pure English".

What is "English" after all? Our favourite foods have been introduced by immigrants - fish and chips (Jewish refugees), curry (India immigrants).

He criticises John Cleese for making an observation about the very thing he’s so fervently promoting

I was watching those very videos last night! John Cleese is agreeing with him, and yet he takes umbrage - isn’t that strange!