Inspired by another thread. Is accent mocking ever OK ?

[toddymummy]

This one has always bothered me. Being from mixed European heritage, but not having an accent myself- I have found myself the subject of accent/ gesture mocking many times.

It doesn't happen as much anymore as it used to,say 10-15 years ago, but it does occasionally happen.

Is it ever OK ? People mock all kinds of accents- Irish, Scottish, Welsh, French, Italian, German.

It really bugs me, especially if it's done repeatedly and especially if it's done at work.

AIBU ?

eh I think you'll find it's legal tender!"

Don't use this argument in shops. Goats are legal tender in the sense you mean

I cannot bring myself to utter "eh I think you'll find it's legal tender!" hmm

I used to get this problem. It turns out that they aren’t even legal tender in Scotland, just widely accepted.

Don’t even bother trying to use a Northern Irish bank not in England.

@LJAKS

It's pathetic tbh. I'm Scottish and if it's not the accent or being asked if I'm an alcoholic it's having my notes refused because they look different 🥴 I hadn't been out of the country in years for obvious reasons and recently travelled to London, forgot how ridiculous people are. I cannot bring myself to utter "eh I think you'll find it's legal tender!"

Good that you don't say that, because it isn't legal tender in England. www.bankofengland.co.uk/knowledgebank/what-is-legal-tender#:~:text=Scottish%20notes%20aren't%20legal,aren't%20legal%20tender%20anywhere.

Try being a scouser……

There is a reason I worked on losing my accent! We are fair game

I used to know someone from Essex who was adamant she didn't have an accent but everyone else did. I couldn't quite fathom it.

I was thinking about a longer response to a pp and then came to the conclusion that I probably haven't grilled people enough on this concept that they think they haven't got an accent, I always just assumed they meant in the here and now, which kind of makes sense to me, but maybe they were actually so stupid. When I've heard people say it it's normally been in a discussion about my accent

However because I made the effort to lose my accent - I pick up others really easy. If I work with people with strong accents I tend to start unconsciously copying them within a day or so

My other half is from Yorkshire. I'm from Dublin. We mock each other all the time.

I tend to think it's situational. When I was growing up, my grandmother, who had quite a posh accent, would sometimes put on a very thick Gloucestershire farmer's accent - that was how many of the people farms around her in childhood spoke. My sister and I, Canadian kids who had never heard anything quite like it, thought it was completely hilarious.
It's not hilarious, it's nasty and the height of snobbery.

I am aware of that. It's a stock phrase often bandied about in jest by people who are fed up having their money eyeballed as thought they drew it themselves.

Being xenophobic is a hate crime, same as racism. It is clearly stated in law. Xenophobia includes mocking of accents, insulting people from which Country they come from (including when mumsnetters on here insult the British). It is never acceptable and I am sorry you h e been subjected to it.

In jest

Yea it can be quite funny. I can do a great impression of a Yorkshire pub landlord 👍

@LJAKS

I am aware of that. It's a stock phrase often bandied about in jest by people who are fed up having their money eyeballed as thought they drew it themselves.

Not a very good stock phrase, though, is it, since the obvious answer is: "No, it's not."

I’m southern and my best friend is northern, we regularly take the piss out of the way each other says certain words but I wouldn’t do the same to a stranger, someone from a different country or someone I knew would be upset by it.

I don’t mind so much if it’s between friends but being from North Wales it pisses me right off when people go ‘oh you’re Welsh!’ then launch into their attempt at a South Wales accent. I mean you can hear I don’t sound like that! We don’t all sound like Tom Jones when we speak!

Mocking isn't nice for any reason. It's laughing at someone.

But it can be funny to have a laugh at someone's accent. If everyone is laughing...

@WheelieBinPrincess. Oh I am so happy that my Norfolk accent is your party piece and that you and all your fellow party goers find it, what was it, strange and amusing? My, how hilarious!
Now which ‘Norfolk accent is is? South Norfolk, going into Suffolk? Breckland/ coastal/Great Yarmouth? West Norfolk? Or maybe Norwich which is again different? North Norfolk?
Or is it just the generic crappy ‘Norfolk’ accent that gets bandied about, ya know because we are just stupid bumpkins that wouldn’t know RP if it smacked us in the face?
Sorry if I seem over sensitive, but can’t you see just what your post reads like?

I would say it’s only OK to mock your own accent, the RP accent (which is my accent) or the super posh Royal Family type accent.

Or the equivalent for your own country if that’s applies.

What I sometimes wonder is if everyone’s accent sounds “plain”/ like no accent to them?

To me, my accent sounds sort of flat and everyone else’s more varied, but is it just that how everyone’s way of speaking sounds to their own ears?

Try being a scouser……
There is a reason I worked on losing my accent! We are fair game

I'm a brummie, but grew up in a real melting-pot on the southern edge of the city where people from all over the country came to work in the massive car factory. The man next door was from south Wales, the man opposite was from rural Wiltshire, the man around the corner was from Peterhead (north of Aberdeen). They were all married to local women. My parents were geordies. Everyone in my primary school grew up in the same kind of environment, and very few of our teachers were local (several were from Hereford, my favourite was from Burnley). Consequently, very few of us had brummie accents. None of us, at any stage in our lives, would have laughed at people with brummie accents, though, as we heard them all the time on the bus and in some surrounding areas. And because we all had neighbours with different accents, the most likely comment on a stranger's accent would be that they sounded like such-and-such a neighbour.

Except in very big cities, that kind of geographical (and social) mobility seems much less common now. So, even though television & radio have always made south-eastern accents appear to be normal and everything else to be comical or exotic, I think increasingly insular populations in small towns & cities are developing stronger accents and even dialects.

Although accents weren't often commented on, naturally other kids found other things to bully us about.

I always think it says much more about the person doing the mocking than anyone else. Tend to be quite parochial. I am Scottish, used to live in Yorkshire and my boss (not particularly bright pr dynamic) would say "oh aye the noo jimmy' literally everytime I saw him for a year. It got old very quickly for everyone except him. He thought it was hilarious every single time!

When I was an American living in England, I found it painful to be mocked for my accent for a long time, and then it made me angry. I think people who mock others for their accents are cruel and stupid. And it is worse if people are mocked for accents if they are speaking English as a second language, because they are doing something very hard, that is, trying to communicate in another language than their own.

I have people make fun of my accent all the time. If it’s done in a nice-ish way that’s fine, if they’re just doing it to be dicks then intend to think they’re dicks.
All about context for me.

I'm glaswegian, however I done so much work in Edinburgh that someone actually asked me if I was from there as I picked up the accent. Also dh points out sometime I sound like a fifer lol

I also get "och aye the noo" roared at me when I'm abroad. Apart from when I was in Mexico there was a woman from America and she loved my accent as she'd never met an actual Scottish person before.

I'm Welsh and get imitated in work when I say something super Welsh, usually that I don't even notice is odd. My husband is English and we mock each other frequently. It's all about context surely. I wouldn't have my husband arrested for a hate crime.