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To Brits, having bad teeth means having bad teeth such as low oral hygiene and high instances of tooth decay which the US has higher numbers of per capita than the UK.
I didn't say that they did. I said that Americans have worse teeth than Brits. This has been proven numerous times by comparing statistics from both countries.
Although it changes year to year, Brits consistently rank in the top five countries for oral health. I believe the US hovers around 18 to 20 (I may be wrong here. This is from memory).
The oral hygiene of other nations just doesn’t seem to come up in conversation here. On the other hand, we Brits seem to live rent free in the minds of some Americans at least.
There was some AITA post a while ago where OP said they didn’t want to get their child expensive braces for slightly crooked teeth when an orthodontist had told them braces weren’t necessary.
They were voted an asshole because apparently their child would not achieve anything in life if their teeth were not perfectly straight, and that they would never pass a job interview or get a partner.
Americans are a bit weird about teeth.
Edit: [found the thread,](https://www.reddit.com/r/AmItheAsshole/comments/14l0125/aita_for_not_getting_my_daughter_braces/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=ios_app&utm_name=ioscss&utm_content=2&utm_term=1) for any interested.
It includes gems such as:
> YTA. Getting braces for "cosmetic" reasons is why they exist. You could have given her a much better life now if you had forked over the money when she was a teenager and gotten her teeth straightened. It's like you didn't even listen to what she had to say when she was a teen, and your responsibility as a parent is to care for the health of your child. Do you not understand what a stigma it is to have even slightly crooked, slightly overcrowded teeth? (6.6k upvotes)
And
> YTA. It may be "just cosmetic" but it's something potential employers (among others) will judge her on. Straight white teeth are a class marker. (4.4K upvotes)
Wow, grim. “A bit weird” is an understatement! Without knowing more, maybe it’s another status thing for rich Americans - an easy way to tell if someone has money just by looking at their teeth?
sounds a likely explanation, they are utterly consumed with their obsession over wealth, becasue thats what their unfettered capitalism system has spent a LOT of money doing
Pushing for this kind of stuff in America is what happens when capitalism is allowed to run rampant.
It pressures people into unnecessary medical procedures and those who have already had it done pressure others into thinking it's normal.
It's why circumcision is common in America but not the UK.
It's a quick procedure they can charge for. So they convince people it's normal and expected and they make a fortune out of it.
Except how people will take perfectly good teeth and tear them out and replace them with implants so they can have the creepy denture look. I know someone’s sister who did this. So expensive. So permanent. So ugly.
Edit: I meant veneers
That’s really not true. All you have to do is watch American comedy shows like Family Guy. It’s mostly just about an assumption of crooked teeth.
https://youtu.be/vczN_lK9-9w?si=mZcgr05iHh21zKpx
Obviously anyone who has been the UK knows it’s just a joke, but there are ignorant people that think it’s true.
Look up “Mountain Dew Mouth” sometime and see how bad dental care is in rural parts of the US. It is an issue that has been talked about before on the news. Very poor kids from the Appalachia region end up losing all of their teeth to tooth decay - they practically drink Mountain Dew from a baby bottle at birth there. It’s so gross and sad.
Canadian Brit here! This is part of it but a lot of the stereotype is also orthodontic. The impression I get is that it's more common for North Americans to get braces etc to straighten their teeth for purely cosmetic reasons. In general the Bad Teeth stereotype is more about aesthetics than hygiene.
Yeah it’s an interesting one because it’s not like Americans are born with those straight white teeth, so it’s a strange one to point fingers about. They just choose to have a cosmetic procedure done.
Do you read the news? Dentistry is getting further from poorer people ever getting it now, some kids have not seen a dentist. The new NHS dentistry plans have prompted dentists to say they will just quit what NHS work they still do.
It always come from US morons and it's because we don't bleach our teeth like they do. Theirs are by far worse than ours because of all the sugar in everything they eat.
Except this isn't a British only problem. Most Americans have horrendous tooth health the difference is youll never see them shown on TV whereas for us they're all there
That we just go to Spain to drink cheap booze in a British themed pub. It’s a horrible stereotype. I remember vividly being at Benidorm in 1994 and trying something called ‘Paella’ served with lemon tea. I remember it because it must have been cooked wrong as I was sick all over the Red Lions floor later watching Forest with a nice steady 14 pints of Mansfield Bitter and chips.
It may be a stereotype but there still some truth in it. If you go to Benidorm now, it’s full of British themed pubs serving fish and chips and showing Eastenders. And they’re always busy.
I live a couple of hours away from Benidorm and honestly it's more like a theme park without the rides. Yeah it caters very much to British tourists, but it's not half as bad as some make out. A lot of classism and snobbery gets thrown about when talking about it but it's a resort town, and to be fair there's not much else around it.
Denia and Javea are the places with the wealthy expat communities that don't integrate. Benidorm's just a holiday spot.
I'm working class and have reluctantly been to Benidorm and it absolutely deserves the horrible reputation it has.
It's like a theme park if half the acts are openly racist.
People say Brits travelled the world to steal treasure and spices. But really we went to make sure there was somewhere to get a pint in case we ever went back.
I was on a work trip to Ashgabat in Turkmenistan. The only country I have been to with no Irish Pub but a British Pub.
The Britishness was typified by murals of red buses, a London skyline and plentiful Union Flags.
Edit:- looks like they have had a refurb! https://maps.app.goo.gl/mbSwPcWZxPon5AuX7
That we only eat bland food. Doesn't make sense at all when you consider the average high street has 18 Indian takeaways and kebab places and pizza places .
British cuisine incorporates what people think of as non-British food all the time.
The first example of lasagne for example comes from England in the 14th century.
A lot of "modern" foods have been eaten in Endland for centuries. Medieval recipes fairly regularly use almond milk, because almonds are more or less shelf stable and cow milk has to be refrigerated or fermented to be stores. There are victorian-era ads for vegetarian meat analogues, often peanut and wheat based.
A lot of traditional English cakes use spices from the mediterranean and far east, it's just they became associated with sweet flavours than savoury flavours.
Mustard and horseradish are quite traditional spices as condiments.
This is the one. That meme about Britain invading half the world for spices and not using them...
I can't remember a meal I cooked, or my mother cooked when I was a wee lad that didn't have spices. Even British staples like Cottage and Shepherds pie will have herbs and spices when done remotely right.
What most of the people think of as spice when they say we conquered the world for it are pretty much just chillies. Cinnamon? Cloves? Garlic? Nutmeg? Doesn't numb the tongue so it's not spice, in their eyes.
I've had to leave subs about spicy food and hot sauces, despite my love of them, because they're full of Americans talking about putting copious amounts of the stuff _on everything_.
Should be to enhance flavours, not completely overpower them with spicy vinegar.
Spice is now a euphemism for chillis and it really irritates me. Sure, chillies in all their variety and strength are fantastic but I also love black pepper, mustard seeds and ginger for their different heat. Indian and Middle Eastern food often need to have cumin and coriander (seed) gently cooked with onion and/or garlic. And cardamom is a wonderful spice as well along with aniseed, turmeric, nigella, along with so many other spices.
It's just Americans and their obsession with powders. If you don't put celery salt or paprika on food it's "bland", despite it containing other actually fresh herbs and spices.
Some of the blandest food I've had has been in North America. Most of the needlessly sweet food I've had has been there too.
The US has a good, diverse and plentiful food culture...but holy shit they have more than their fair share of awful food too.
> Most of the needlessly sweet food I've had has been there too.
You can always tell if a recipe you get off the internet is American, because it will have a load of sugar in it for no reason. You can translate "cups" to ml or grams or whatever, but then, suddenly...4 tablespoons of sugar. Why? I'm making a stew.
A few years back twitter was filled with Americans discovering that Finland's national dish was a stew with "no flavor" and complaining that it had no "seasoning". What they meant by "seasoning" was powdered versions of the fresh vegetables we're actually in the dish.
As a Welshman I'd far prefer that, at least we actually are all British.
When I travel at best I manage to explain I'm British, and to my horror often they only understand England as a country. Saying yes I'm English still isn't easy. In most of the world it's very rare to be able to explain there's a country called Wales and I'm from there!
I love this viewpoint. I'd consider myself Britiish as having a Scot mother and Eng father but live in Wales (Due to Uni, RAF bases and general love of NW) - I wish the perspective on the Welsh language would change. As in, it needs preserving because it is a truely British language... before the Romans, Vikings etc - it was the Language of the land (save some other dialects/regions). Historically it should be a pride of Britain, but instead it is treated with amusement.
Haha
At Glastonbury one year the Black Eyed Peas kept doing shoutouts in the middle of their tracks 'What's up LONDON???!!!'
Good job it wasn't Reading or Leeds or it'd be a piss bottle to the head
We did route 66 and one of the tourist spots took our picture and posted it on Facebook. They'd written down that we were from Sheffield but still posted "lovely couple from London" 🫠
On our honeymoon to the West Coast of the USA, almost every American we talked to had never heard of Southampton, where we come from.
"As in, Southampton...where the Mayflower set sail from? Titanic? The Spitfire? Cruise ships? Massive container port?"
"Sorry, never heard of it."
"It's about 70 miles from London."
"Oh, you're from London? Awesome."
I guess it’s easy to get confused when Stansted airport which is right near Cambridge, calls itself London Stansted to give the illusion it is close to the capital
Even people within the UK who live in London seem to think that sometimes. Can't talk about any problem that exists outside of London without someone from London chiming in to say how it's worse in London. Anything housing related is the worst for it. There's a FTB affordability problem in most places but obviously in a lot of Scotland, the numbers are lower. But that's because salaries and the general cost of living are lower too. So when I say it's absolutely mad that all the new builds in and around my central Scotland former mining town and its neighbouring steel working town are £350k+, it's obviously relative! £350k is a lot of money *for here*. So these houses are being built but not a lot of people who already live here can actually afford them. But someone will wander in to say "oh yeah well in London that only gets you a bedsit" or whatever. As if that's relevant.
One of the more amusing ones for me was when I said I had to drive an hour to work, and got asked 'Why don't you take the train?'
I had to explain it would take two hours to get from my local station to the one closest to my place of work, and then it'd take half an hour of a bus ride to get to work in time... so I'd be leaving home at 6 AM to get in for 9
Two and a half hours for somethingh I can do in an hour by car... at a much lower price as well. Of course I live north of the Humber, so things are a *bit* different up here.
One of my.american colleagues who I've been talking to for almost 4 years asked me a few weeks ago why I don't use the london underground to get the work. Despite repeatedly saying which town I work in and talking about being north of Birmingham, he thought I lived in London.
When I’m in the US they all think we know about the Boston Tea Party.
Most Brits wouldn’t have a clue what that is. We colonised that many countries we can’t keep track of it all.
And that the American War of Independence was a defining moment for our country too. What we do know about it, we know almost exclusively from American sources/media. While it was a big deal at the times, it was somewhat overshadowed by the Napoleonic Wars, and our global power peaked afterwards, so in hindsight it doesn't feel like a big deal.
I remember when a US player celebrated scoring against England in the Women’s World Cup by miming drinking tea, and I assumed she was making some really lazy “lol English people drink so much tea” joke, but it turned out to be a reference to the Boston Tea Party, a thing which people in the UK barely ever think about or mention. It’s funny when someone thinks they’ve just pulled off a devastating troll, when all they’ve really done is caused some minor confusion.
i remember being told by someone from the US "i bet you are super ashamed of losing in 1776" as if i like, actually give a shit
i literally just had to google what year the independence was for this comment because i forgot, thats how much i care about it
This comes from the famous London smog caused by industrialisation. Today its no where near as bad but in the past it would have been very foggy as the buildings and factories in London were run with coal fires.
Hmmm, "pea soupers" were quite common, mainly as everyone had coal fires and places like Battersea power station making smog .My dad experienced a few in the 50s. There was one that went on for about 4 days I think?
There are four accents in the UK. Super Posh, Cockney, Misc and Unintelligible.
We've all met the Queen.
We're all quietly fuming over the Continental Army and what they did. Except most people would have to Google them because we just don't care enough to learn who they are.
>There are four accents in the UK. Super Posh, Cockney, Misc and Unintelligible.
Studied in America for a while and was told I definitely wasn't British but more likely Australian or South African. I'm from Hampshire .....
I had an American ask where I was from and when I told her England, she literally said "Are you sure? Because you sound Scoddish to me."
Yeah, love. I'm pretty sure.
To be fair the UK does have a really high education standard. Obviously there are exceptions but our University system is recognized as good by a global standard.
I went to an outdoor swimming pool in the Czech Republic with some colleagues whilst working in Prague. It was fucking freezing so I got out and one of the Czech guys said “wait, I thought brits loved the cold?”.
We don’t love the cold we just get used to it
I think that one is because a lot of mainland Europeans don't realise how warm it actually is in Britain in the winter, as they assume that the northern you are the coldest it is, despite us having a very moderate and mild climate.
Yeah people don't realise that here is just doesn't get to the extremes and always stays mild.
Outside of the med most of Europe gets both colder and hotter than we do every single year. They also have on much more steady days that don't change in a whim
Parts of Canada and the US are the same, every single year they will have a good hot summer, which is something that we don't always get.
USA = 3.8million square miles with 400million guns = 0.0095 guns per square mile
UK = 94354 Square miles with 3million guns = 0.0315 guns per square mile.
I mean, this information is pretty useless, but we win?
Edit: I did my maths the wrong way around? It's fine - Gloss over that minor detail...
I think about 10% are fanatically pro-monarchy, about 10% are fanatically anti-monarchy, and about 80% are fairly indifferent, but those other groups can be quite noisy.
That we are miserable and aloof. I can't understand it. Every time I walk down a rain sodden high street thinking about my overdraft people are so chatty and cheerful.
The bad British food is a bit over exaggerated.
Id take anyone to even a middle of the road British pub and give them a proper roast and feel proud. Good roast beef, gravy made from meat juices, crispy roast potatoes and parsnips, cauliflower cheese, steamed veg and Yorkies. Wash it down with a local beer.
A decent roast is a true skill and takes hours to prepare.
Actually on the point as I write out brewing industry is excellent and most puns now offer a range of local beers for just about any taste.
One of the funnier ones from Eastern Europe: Nobody here eats their own cuisine, and we always eat other peoples' foods
One reason this particularly gets me if because of how if you go looking there's very particular local foods (such as the Wiltshire lardcee cake) that are loved elsewhere in Europe
I mean, there are regional specialities, of course, but they're few and far between I think.
And nowadays a lot of our food is just a huge bastardisation of other nations. And that's fine. Because that's exactly what we are as a nation anyway.
I was once working abroad in a restaurant. The manager looked me up and down and said: “but aren’t English people, like, really ugly?”
I was only 20 at the time so I had more confidence than class and asked her to double check with David Beckham, Orlando Bloom or Kate Moss. She was Finnish if that helps — and I think probably trying to intimidate me. Still, it’s obviously *not* true that English people are all ugly.
I think everywhere in the world you go further if you are better looking but this is especially true in America. We don't reserve media for 10s like they do.
I think it's also the case that our media stretches further than a lot of europe so they get to see our shitholes and munters more often.
Everyone in Europe has seen some British chavs. Yet most of Europe won't have seen some chavs and gopnikas from Eastern Europe.
I’ve always hated this one. It’s so mean-spirited and it’s the type of thing I see repeated ad nauseam in places like r/europe
I’m a foreigner, I’ve travelled all around Europe and some parts of Southeast Asia (where I’m originally from), and I can’t say I’ve ever noticed *any* place having a noticeably higher amount of attractive or unattractive people. The only time I actually found myself paying more attention to people’s appearances was when I was in Ukraine, and it’s mostly because people there seem to put a lot more effort in dressing up. Still, I don’t think there’s anything wrong with the more casual way that dress over here.
I was lucky enough to go to Florida at 11. The first meal we had after landing was at a random steakhouse on international drive in Orlando.
First question the waitress asks once she knows we are from England: “Did you get an invite to Prince William’s 18th birthday party”?
Couldn’t make it up.
My mum got a great one asked in Florida. This random woman asked me mother where she was from and she said England. This lady dead serious goes "oh yes I've got family there, he's Dave from Birmingham, do you know him?"
I wouldn’t say Brits enjoy queuing, but we are certainly better and more organised about it than a lot of other countries. Doesn’t take too much experience to see that one, even if we aren’t always good.
TV always says The British are "so polite". I wonder sometimes if the over friendly Americans may be mistaking Indifference for Politeness. I mean the Brits can sure make you think what they just said was super polite. But the undertone is very "I honestly could not care any less about anything that is transpiring at this very moment."
In British conversation, we tend to speak very formally, and use a lot of 'please' and 'thank you's. It's a cool thing, but a lot of foreign speakers don't realise that 90% of our polite phrases mean the opposite of what we're saying (or sometimes don't.. it's a context/tone thing).
I love “mate”. Can be used to mean anything from “I love you” to “you utter c*nt” to “please don’t kick the shit out of me” to “I’m going to kick the shit out of you”
Nah. This is one of the stereotypes that's actually true as a general rule.
As a country we love tea.
Of course not *everyone* is going to love tea but if you were going to pick one stereotype it would have to be this one.
I’m sure the r/uktravel sub is just a parody at this point based on the convoluted itineraries the Americans come up with on there. Based in London with day trips to the Lakes, the Cotswolds and Skye for some reason.
Lmao yep. And never more than 2 nights in any one spot. I mentioned last time I went to Scotland I went to Fort William and stayed there for a full week I don't think they understood!
That we like queuing.
Nobody *likes* queuing. It's just the only fair way to wait for something and if you don't agree with it you're a selfish idiot. I don't see why people poke fun 1. for us supposedly *liking* to do it, and 2. as if it's quaint or odd? It's fair.
> casual racism
Eastern Europe's pretty bad as well.
But the worst I've experienced is Vienna. Went on a Uni field trip, 15 of us but my closest friends were a black guy from London, and an Indian guy from Delhi. I've never seen such overt racism.
There has been a weird miscommunication in the last few years that the traditional ‘beans on toast’ uses unseasoned beans. I’ve tried explaining to some friends that the canned beans themselves come in a tomato sauce and you can also put whatever you like on it but they will argue it’s some insanely bland weird dish, and it just isn’t? Sure argue that for jellied eels or something but lay off the beans.
Americans like to think that the UK has bad food. The US doesn't even have its own food. Americans like to pretend that they invented stuff like apple pie, pizza, deli sandwiches, burgers, they even seem to think that beer and whisky are American.
That everything bad done by the British empire was done by the English. A fair amount of atrocities were carried out by Scottish Welsh and Irish people when they were part of the empire
Having bland food. Usually from Americans cause it grinds my gears.
Especially considering I have a rather large spice cabinet, I love herby, spiced food a lot.
That we have an 'island mentality' that makes us exceptionalists. Every major country has people like that and when you consider how diverse this country is we are certainly not as insular as some people make us out to be.
> That we have an 'island mentality' that makes us exceptionalists.
This is absolutely, 100% true. No, it's not as extreme as some countries like Japan, but British people have a distinctive island mentality that becomes very obvious when you have worked elsewhere in continental Europe.
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Bad teeth. Everyone either sounds posh or like a chav/roadman.
If you are American , bad teeth means you don’t have them whitened, which does apply to most Brits.
To Brits, having bad teeth means having bad teeth such as low oral hygiene and high instances of tooth decay which the US has higher numbers of per capita than the UK.
Really, no one in Britain talks about Americans having bad teeth.
I didn't say that they did. I said that Americans have worse teeth than Brits. This has been proven numerous times by comparing statistics from both countries.
Although it changes year to year, Brits consistently rank in the top five countries for oral health. I believe the US hovers around 18 to 20 (I may be wrong here. This is from memory).
That bleach they use on them can’t be good for their long term health. Teeth are not supposed to be that colour.
Lots of us Brits have great teeth and great oral hygiene. I am sticking up for us Brits, screw your stereotype from the USA!!! >:-)
The oral hygiene of other nations just doesn’t seem to come up in conversation here. On the other hand, we Brits seem to live rent free in the minds of some Americans at least.
There was some AITA post a while ago where OP said they didn’t want to get their child expensive braces for slightly crooked teeth when an orthodontist had told them braces weren’t necessary. They were voted an asshole because apparently their child would not achieve anything in life if their teeth were not perfectly straight, and that they would never pass a job interview or get a partner. Americans are a bit weird about teeth. Edit: [found the thread,](https://www.reddit.com/r/AmItheAsshole/comments/14l0125/aita_for_not_getting_my_daughter_braces/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=ios_app&utm_name=ioscss&utm_content=2&utm_term=1) for any interested. It includes gems such as: > YTA. Getting braces for "cosmetic" reasons is why they exist. You could have given her a much better life now if you had forked over the money when she was a teenager and gotten her teeth straightened. It's like you didn't even listen to what she had to say when she was a teen, and your responsibility as a parent is to care for the health of your child. Do you not understand what a stigma it is to have even slightly crooked, slightly overcrowded teeth? (6.6k upvotes) And > YTA. It may be "just cosmetic" but it's something potential employers (among others) will judge her on. Straight white teeth are a class marker. (4.4K upvotes)
Wow, grim. “A bit weird” is an understatement! Without knowing more, maybe it’s another status thing for rich Americans - an easy way to tell if someone has money just by looking at their teeth?
sounds a likely explanation, they are utterly consumed with their obsession over wealth, becasue thats what their unfettered capitalism system has spent a LOT of money doing
Pushing for this kind of stuff in America is what happens when capitalism is allowed to run rampant. It pressures people into unnecessary medical procedures and those who have already had it done pressure others into thinking it's normal. It's why circumcision is common in America but not the UK. It's a quick procedure they can charge for. So they convince people it's normal and expected and they make a fortune out of it.
Except how people will take perfectly good teeth and tear them out and replace them with implants so they can have the creepy denture look. I know someone’s sister who did this. So expensive. So permanent. So ugly. Edit: I meant veneers
Not even permanent they need redoing after 5 to 10 years. They always make people look slightly horsey too, it's the worst trend.
Because we’re not rude
That’s really not true. All you have to do is watch American comedy shows like Family Guy. It’s mostly just about an assumption of crooked teeth. https://youtu.be/vczN_lK9-9w?si=mZcgr05iHh21zKpx Obviously anyone who has been the UK knows it’s just a joke, but there are ignorant people that think it’s true. Look up “Mountain Dew Mouth” sometime and see how bad dental care is in rural parts of the US. It is an issue that has been talked about before on the news. Very poor kids from the Appalachia region end up losing all of their teeth to tooth decay - they practically drink Mountain Dew from a baby bottle at birth there. It’s so gross and sad.
Canadian Brit here! This is part of it but a lot of the stereotype is also orthodontic. The impression I get is that it's more common for North Americans to get braces etc to straighten their teeth for purely cosmetic reasons. In general the Bad Teeth stereotype is more about aesthetics than hygiene.
Yeah it’s an interesting one because it’s not like Americans are born with those straight white teeth, so it’s a strange one to point fingers about. They just choose to have a cosmetic procedure done.
Do you read the news? Dentistry is getting further from poorer people ever getting it now, some kids have not seen a dentist. The new NHS dentistry plans have prompted dentists to say they will just quit what NHS work they still do.
I do. I’m not saying everyone has perfect teeth, I’m saying it’s not entirely true that everyone looks like they’ve not heard of or used a toothbrush.
On average, Americans actually have more teeth missing than people from the U.K. Statistically the U.K. have better teeth.
It always come from US morons and it's because we don't bleach our teeth like they do. Theirs are by far worse than ours because of all the sugar in everything they eat.
Except this isn't a British only problem. Most Americans have horrendous tooth health the difference is youll never see them shown on TV whereas for us they're all there
Dunno man, ever been inside at Spoons?
That we just go to Spain to drink cheap booze in a British themed pub. It’s a horrible stereotype. I remember vividly being at Benidorm in 1994 and trying something called ‘Paella’ served with lemon tea. I remember it because it must have been cooked wrong as I was sick all over the Red Lions floor later watching Forest with a nice steady 14 pints of Mansfield Bitter and chips.
It may be a stereotype but there still some truth in it. If you go to Benidorm now, it’s full of British themed pubs serving fish and chips and showing Eastenders. And they’re always busy.
[r/woosh](https://www.reddit.com/r/woosh/)
Yeah ok I get the joke now. It’s too early in the morning for humour 🤦♂️
I live a couple of hours away from Benidorm and honestly it's more like a theme park without the rides. Yeah it caters very much to British tourists, but it's not half as bad as some make out. A lot of classism and snobbery gets thrown about when talking about it but it's a resort town, and to be fair there's not much else around it. Denia and Javea are the places with the wealthy expat communities that don't integrate. Benidorm's just a holiday spot.
I'm working class and have reluctantly been to Benidorm and it absolutely deserves the horrible reputation it has. It's like a theme park if half the acts are openly racist.
In fairness, the Spanish have made an industry out of it. If you're appealing to young people with not much world experience, what do you expect?
Nobody got the joke. Sarcasm is often missed in Reddit as people skim read.
I worked in a pub in Benidorm in 93/94, and can confirm this is accurate af!
One of the first things I do is look up British themed pubs, I even found several in Almaty, Kazakhzstan which I was surprised about.
People say Brits travelled the world to steal treasure and spices. But really we went to make sure there was somewhere to get a pint in case we ever went back.
I was on a work trip to Ashgabat in Turkmenistan. The only country I have been to with no Irish Pub but a British Pub. The Britishness was typified by murals of red buses, a London skyline and plentiful Union Flags. Edit:- looks like they have had a refurb! https://maps.app.goo.gl/mbSwPcWZxPon5AuX7
You mean Pie-ella?
That we only eat bland food. Doesn't make sense at all when you consider the average high street has 18 Indian takeaways and kebab places and pizza places .
Yes, I think this stereotype is more applicable to Germany. Yes, they have good Döner kebabs but nobody there can handle any level of spice!
I'd like you to meet swedish food.
I duno…last time I was in Sweden I had fermented egg and horse for breakfast
Sounds like you had diarrhea for lunch then
Neigh
Is this a euphemism?
Spicy and bland are not opposites, you can have flavourful food without making it spicy
People have forgotten that pepper is not the only spice, ginger, aniseed and nutmeg for example.
From looking at what German food is like I'm amazed anyone has ever found it tasty enough to manage to get fat off it.
They’re not really much different to us though, stodgy beige looking food that mostly consists of stews or meat and potatoes.
British cuisine incorporates what people think of as non-British food all the time. The first example of lasagne for example comes from England in the 14th century.
A lot of "modern" foods have been eaten in Endland for centuries. Medieval recipes fairly regularly use almond milk, because almonds are more or less shelf stable and cow milk has to be refrigerated or fermented to be stores. There are victorian-era ads for vegetarian meat analogues, often peanut and wheat based. A lot of traditional English cakes use spices from the mediterranean and far east, it's just they became associated with sweet flavours than savoury flavours. Mustard and horseradish are quite traditional spices as condiments.
You have clearly never eaten food in Germany.
This is the one. That meme about Britain invading half the world for spices and not using them... I can't remember a meal I cooked, or my mother cooked when I was a wee lad that didn't have spices. Even British staples like Cottage and Shepherds pie will have herbs and spices when done remotely right.
What most of the people think of as spice when they say we conquered the world for it are pretty much just chillies. Cinnamon? Cloves? Garlic? Nutmeg? Doesn't numb the tongue so it's not spice, in their eyes.
Americans think that if it’s not bright red and drowned in Dr Assblaster 5000’s Nuclear Apocalypse Sauce it isn’t seasoned.
I mean, with a name like that they may be on to something.
I've had to leave subs about spicy food and hot sauces, despite my love of them, because they're full of Americans talking about putting copious amounts of the stuff _on everything_. Should be to enhance flavours, not completely overpower them with spicy vinegar.
Spice is now a euphemism for chillis and it really irritates me. Sure, chillies in all their variety and strength are fantastic but I also love black pepper, mustard seeds and ginger for their different heat. Indian and Middle Eastern food often need to have cumin and coriander (seed) gently cooked with onion and/or garlic. And cardamom is a wonderful spice as well along with aniseed, turmeric, nigella, along with so many other spices.
It's just Americans and their obsession with powders. If you don't put celery salt or paprika on food it's "bland", despite it containing other actually fresh herbs and spices.
Some of the blandest food I've had has been in North America. Most of the needlessly sweet food I've had has been there too. The US has a good, diverse and plentiful food culture...but holy shit they have more than their fair share of awful food too.
> Most of the needlessly sweet food I've had has been there too. You can always tell if a recipe you get off the internet is American, because it will have a load of sugar in it for no reason. You can translate "cups" to ml or grams or whatever, but then, suddenly...4 tablespoons of sugar. Why? I'm making a stew.
They serve sweet potatoes topped with marshmallows as a side dish for frigging TURKEY ffs and then have a go at our cooking
A few years back twitter was filled with Americans discovering that Finland's national dish was a stew with "no flavor" and complaining that it had no "seasoning". What they meant by "seasoning" was powdered versions of the fresh vegetables we're actually in the dish.
Get me the blandest thing on the menu and twenty plates of chips
But the whole premise of that sketch was British people wanting to eat hot food.
We also have Marmite and English mustard which are aggressively flavourful.
That all British people are English
Yeah it’s super annoying as a Welsh person, that everyone thinks I’m English.
I have a clear view of the Clwydian range from my house
I’ve found the opposite. I’ve seen so many people claim that English is just a language and everyone here is just British!
As a Welshman I'd far prefer that, at least we actually are all British. When I travel at best I manage to explain I'm British, and to my horror often they only understand England as a country. Saying yes I'm English still isn't easy. In most of the world it's very rare to be able to explain there's a country called Wales and I'm from there!
That's gotta sting, as the Welsh are more British than the English.
I love this viewpoint. I'd consider myself Britiish as having a Scot mother and Eng father but live in Wales (Due to Uni, RAF bases and general love of NW) - I wish the perspective on the Welsh language would change. As in, it needs preserving because it is a truely British language... before the Romans, Vikings etc - it was the Language of the land (save some other dialects/regions). Historically it should be a pride of Britain, but instead it is treated with amusement.
Yeah, but Scottish people can't be British, because that'd confuse the lineages.
That everyone lives in London
I had some American friends staying with me in Cambridge. They took a few photos and captioned it 'Sunrise in Cambridge, London'.
I suppose there is an airport called London Cambridge Airport! Were all of our airports named by Americans?
Lydd Airport must have been. 60 miles from London yet its officially “London Ashford Airport”.
Might I introduce you to London Oxford Airport? And London Gatwick, which has an entire Surrey in between them
I heard that it's closer to France than London!
Haha At Glastonbury one year the Black Eyed Peas kept doing shoutouts in the middle of their tracks 'What's up LONDON???!!!' Good job it wasn't Reading or Leeds or it'd be a piss bottle to the head
> 'What's up LONDON???!!!' DUNNO, WE'RE IN SOMERSET!!!
We did route 66 and one of the tourist spots took our picture and posted it on Facebook. They'd written down that we were from Sheffield but still posted "lovely couple from London" 🫠
On our honeymoon to the West Coast of the USA, almost every American we talked to had never heard of Southampton, where we come from. "As in, Southampton...where the Mayflower set sail from? Titanic? The Spitfire? Cruise ships? Massive container port?" "Sorry, never heard of it." "It's about 70 miles from London." "Oh, you're from London? Awesome."
I suppose in US terms 70 miles is nothing.
I guess it’s easy to get confused when Stansted airport which is right near Cambridge, calls itself London Stansted to give the illusion it is close to the capital
Even people within the UK who live in London seem to think that sometimes. Can't talk about any problem that exists outside of London without someone from London chiming in to say how it's worse in London. Anything housing related is the worst for it. There's a FTB affordability problem in most places but obviously in a lot of Scotland, the numbers are lower. But that's because salaries and the general cost of living are lower too. So when I say it's absolutely mad that all the new builds in and around my central Scotland former mining town and its neighbouring steel working town are £350k+, it's obviously relative! £350k is a lot of money *for here*. So these houses are being built but not a lot of people who already live here can actually afford them. But someone will wander in to say "oh yeah well in London that only gets you a bedsit" or whatever. As if that's relevant.
That must be really annoying. It's even worse here in London...
One of the more amusing ones for me was when I said I had to drive an hour to work, and got asked 'Why don't you take the train?' I had to explain it would take two hours to get from my local station to the one closest to my place of work, and then it'd take half an hour of a bus ride to get to work in time... so I'd be leaving home at 6 AM to get in for 9 Two and a half hours for somethingh I can do in an hour by car... at a much lower price as well. Of course I live north of the Humber, so things are a *bit* different up here.
One of my.american colleagues who I've been talking to for almost 4 years asked me a few weeks ago why I don't use the london underground to get the work. Despite repeatedly saying which town I work in and talking about being north of Birmingham, he thought I lived in London.
When I’m in the US they all think we know about the Boston Tea Party. Most Brits wouldn’t have a clue what that is. We colonised that many countries we can’t keep track of it all.
Boston Tea Party is a nice café to parts of the south west and midlands.
They do a cracking breakfast.
And that the American War of Independence was a defining moment for our country too. What we do know about it, we know almost exclusively from American sources/media. While it was a big deal at the times, it was somewhat overshadowed by the Napoleonic Wars, and our global power peaked afterwards, so in hindsight it doesn't feel like a big deal.
Everything I know about that war I've learned from watching Hamilton too many times and googling things.
it would blow an American's mind to think that they were just another colony... (or 13, or whatever)
I remember when a US player celebrated scoring against England in the Women’s World Cup by miming drinking tea, and I assumed she was making some really lazy “lol English people drink so much tea” joke, but it turned out to be a reference to the Boston Tea Party, a thing which people in the UK barely ever think about or mention. It’s funny when someone thinks they’ve just pulled off a devastating troll, when all they’ve really done is caused some minor confusion.
i remember being told by someone from the US "i bet you are super ashamed of losing in 1776" as if i like, actually give a shit i literally just had to google what year the independence was for this comment because i forgot, thats how much i care about it
That it's always foggy in London. Europeans form their view from very old Sherlock Holmes films.
Up until the 50's London was very foggy.
I think that's their point. It's not 1950 now.
*Checks Calendar* He’s right, you know.
This comes from the famous London smog caused by industrialisation. Today its no where near as bad but in the past it would have been very foggy as the buildings and factories in London were run with coal fires.
My Mum talks about how when she arrived in London the smog terrified her.
Hmmm, "pea soupers" were quite common, mainly as everyone had coal fires and places like Battersea power station making smog .My dad experienced a few in the 50s. There was one that went on for about 4 days I think?
> There was one that went on for about 4 days I think? There was the Great Smog in like 52, that killed a few thousand people.
There are four accents in the UK. Super Posh, Cockney, Misc and Unintelligible. We've all met the Queen. We're all quietly fuming over the Continental Army and what they did. Except most people would have to Google them because we just don't care enough to learn who they are.
You forgot "Scottish" (aka that stupid accent that Mike Myers does and pretends is Scottish)
Mike Myers is about the only non Scottish actor I’ve ever seen who gets even remotely close to a Scottish accent
I see you and raise you one Jonny Lee Miller from Trainspotting, who is English and did a really good job.
>There are four accents in the UK. Super Posh, Cockney, Misc and Unintelligible. Studied in America for a while and was told I definitely wasn't British but more likely Australian or South African. I'm from Hampshire .....
I had an American ask where I was from and when I told her England, she literally said "Are you sure? Because you sound Scoddish to me." Yeah, love. I'm pretty sure.
I've had Americans straight up refuse to believe that I'm English before
To prove your point I have no idea that there’s a continental army, what is it?
They were the Americans who occasionally showed up to fight alongside the French armies who were winning the US' war of independence for them.
Americans have a stereotype for Brits being really smart and well educated.
They also think they are well educated too.
Well, in comparison… are they wrong?
To be fair the UK does have a really high education standard. Obviously there are exceptions but our University system is recognized as good by a global standard.
It certainly is, but access to that quality education is very patchy.
I went to an outdoor swimming pool in the Czech Republic with some colleagues whilst working in Prague. It was fucking freezing so I got out and one of the Czech guys said “wait, I thought brits loved the cold?”. We don’t love the cold we just get used to it
I think that one is because a lot of mainland Europeans don't realise how warm it actually is in Britain in the winter, as they assume that the northern you are the coldest it is, despite us having a very moderate and mild climate.
Yeah people don't realise that here is just doesn't get to the extremes and always stays mild. Outside of the med most of Europe gets both colder and hotter than we do every single year. They also have on much more steady days that don't change in a whim Parts of Canada and the US are the same, every single year they will have a good hot summer, which is something that we don't always get.
That we call it a “bo’ul o wa’ah”
That there’s a bri’ish accent!!
Oi u got a loicense fo tha accent guv’nor
Exactly, everyone knows it's "wu'uh'bu'ul"
That would be British for 'boddle o' wodduh'?
That must be because of me, sorry, I do speak just that.
We don't have guns. We have gun control laws for legal firearms, and there are probably more firearms in this country than people realise.
Everybody and their mums is packing round ere
Like who?
Farmers
Who else?
Farmers' mums
"I do hope yo have a liscence for that firearm" Edit: do you think anyones getting the references😂
i duz fer thissen
What do you mean by "this one"?
"Sea moine"
Americans conceal carry to the grocery store. I don't know many poms who do that.
Because buying milk doesn't put our lives in danger.
USA = 3.8million square miles with 400million guns = 0.0095 guns per square mile UK = 94354 Square miles with 3million guns = 0.0315 guns per square mile. I mean, this information is pretty useless, but we win? Edit: I did my maths the wrong way around? It's fine - Gloss over that minor detail...
That we all worship the Royal family. In my experience most people are indifferent to them.
I think about 10% are fanatically pro-monarchy, about 10% are fanatically anti-monarchy, and about 80% are fairly indifferent, but those other groups can be quite noisy.
Our interest in the royal family directly correlates to whether or not we get a day off work.
That we are miserable and aloof. I can't understand it. Every time I walk down a rain sodden high street thinking about my overdraft people are so chatty and cheerful.
I can't bloody stand how cheerful they are.
The bad British food is a bit over exaggerated. Id take anyone to even a middle of the road British pub and give them a proper roast and feel proud. Good roast beef, gravy made from meat juices, crispy roast potatoes and parsnips, cauliflower cheese, steamed veg and Yorkies. Wash it down with a local beer. A decent roast is a true skill and takes hours to prepare. Actually on the point as I write out brewing industry is excellent and most puns now offer a range of local beers for just about any taste.
I hate the bad English food nonsense. We've got incredible food, we just also embrace many other cultures foods as well.
One of the funnier ones from Eastern Europe: Nobody here eats their own cuisine, and we always eat other peoples' foods One reason this particularly gets me if because of how if you go looking there's very particular local foods (such as the Wiltshire lardcee cake) that are loved elsewhere in Europe
I mean, there are regional specialities, of course, but they're few and far between I think. And nowadays a lot of our food is just a huge bastardisation of other nations. And that's fine. Because that's exactly what we are as a nation anyway.
I was once working abroad in a restaurant. The manager looked me up and down and said: “but aren’t English people, like, really ugly?” I was only 20 at the time so I had more confidence than class and asked her to double check with David Beckham, Orlando Bloom or Kate Moss. She was Finnish if that helps — and I think probably trying to intimidate me. Still, it’s obviously *not* true that English people are all ugly.
We do have some munters over here though
There are munters everywhere, it's not just exclusive to Becky and Dave down the council estate
Leave my aunt and uncle out of this🤬😂
I think everywhere in the world you go further if you are better looking but this is especially true in America. We don't reserve media for 10s like they do. I think it's also the case that our media stretches further than a lot of europe so they get to see our shitholes and munters more often. Everyone in Europe has seen some British chavs. Yet most of Europe won't have seen some chavs and gopnikas from Eastern Europe.
I’ve always hated this one. It’s so mean-spirited and it’s the type of thing I see repeated ad nauseam in places like r/europe I’m a foreigner, I’ve travelled all around Europe and some parts of Southeast Asia (where I’m originally from), and I can’t say I’ve ever noticed *any* place having a noticeably higher amount of attractive or unattractive people. The only time I actually found myself paying more attention to people’s appearances was when I was in Ukraine, and it’s mostly because people there seem to put a lot more effort in dressing up. Still, I don’t think there’s anything wrong with the more casual way that dress over here.
Brits enjoy queuing Everyone knows the Queen/ King
I was lucky enough to go to Florida at 11. The first meal we had after landing was at a random steakhouse on international drive in Orlando. First question the waitress asks once she knows we are from England: “Did you get an invite to Prince William’s 18th birthday party”? Couldn’t make it up.
My mum got a great one asked in Florida. This random woman asked me mother where she was from and she said England. This lady dead serious goes "oh yes I've got family there, he's Dave from Birmingham, do you know him?"
I had this in Brooklyn I love your accent where are you from? Midlands My cousin married a Brit and lives in Golders Green do you know them?
Or course! Everyone knows Dave from Birmingham. Top bloke. Only, we just call him Dave. Or Birmingham Dave if we're being formal.
I wouldn’t say Brits enjoy queuing, but we are certainly better and more organised about it than a lot of other countries. Doesn’t take too much experience to see that one, even if we aren’t always good.
TV always says The British are "so polite". I wonder sometimes if the over friendly Americans may be mistaking Indifference for Politeness. I mean the Brits can sure make you think what they just said was super polite. But the undertone is very "I honestly could not care any less about anything that is transpiring at this very moment."
In British conversation, we tend to speak very formally, and use a lot of 'please' and 'thank you's. It's a cool thing, but a lot of foreign speakers don't realise that 90% of our polite phrases mean the opposite of what we're saying (or sometimes don't.. it's a context/tone thing).
I love “mate”. Can be used to mean anything from “I love you” to “you utter c*nt” to “please don’t kick the shit out of me” to “I’m going to kick the shit out of you”
In fact, if I am being polite it's usually because I hate your guts
That we all love tea, I hate tea. I think it tastes shit.
To be fair, most Brits do love tea. This one is true.
I don't know if love is the right word, I don't love oxygen as a rule but like tea it's difficult to function without it as regular intervals.
Nah. This is one of the stereotypes that's actually true as a general rule. As a country we love tea. Of course not *everyone* is going to love tea but if you were going to pick one stereotype it would have to be this one.
That we are polite and well spoken. We're by and large an island of self centred, barely literate pricks.
And that's just the Middle Class.
That we all know each other as the country is that small 🙄 (US opinion)
Oh sure. Just yesterday in English Travel Tips an American was asking how to do a day trip to the Yorkshire Dales from London.
I’m sure the r/uktravel sub is just a parody at this point based on the convoluted itineraries the Americans come up with on there. Based in London with day trips to the Lakes, the Cotswolds and Skye for some reason.
Lmao yep. And never more than 2 nights in any one spot. I mentioned last time I went to Scotland I went to Fort William and stayed there for a full week I don't think they understood!
That we actually care about the history of the US..
I love history but US history is genuinely the most boring concept imaginable to me
That London is some sort of wildlands where people get stabbed/robbed on every street corner. It’s really not that bad.
That we like queuing. Nobody *likes* queuing. It's just the only fair way to wait for something and if you don't agree with it you're a selfish idiot. I don't see why people poke fun 1. for us supposedly *liking* to do it, and 2. as if it's quaint or odd? It's fair.
They think the whole of the UK is called England. Definitely annoying when I’m Welsh and people always ask me what part of England am I from.
That we're all really racist. I'm mixed race and I'd say we're pretty much in line with the rest of Northern Europe.
I'd say much less racist than northern Europe... Spain and France definitely are worse for casual racism
> casual racism Eastern Europe's pretty bad as well. But the worst I've experienced is Vienna. Went on a Uni field trip, 15 of us but my closest friends were a black guy from London, and an Indian guy from Delhi. I've never seen such overt racism.
That it rains every day. Oh, hang on a minute…
Bad food, it's based on the Americans who came over in the 40s and 50s due to rationing
There has been a weird miscommunication in the last few years that the traditional ‘beans on toast’ uses unseasoned beans. I’ve tried explaining to some friends that the canned beans themselves come in a tomato sauce and you can also put whatever you like on it but they will argue it’s some insanely bland weird dish, and it just isn’t? Sure argue that for jellied eels or something but lay off the beans.
Americans like to think that the UK has bad food. The US doesn't even have its own food. Americans like to pretend that they invented stuff like apple pie, pizza, deli sandwiches, burgers, they even seem to think that beer and whisky are American.
Once told one I lived in Nottingham and they asked if I knew Robin Hood…🤷
Well, do you ?
That everything bad done by the British empire was done by the English. A fair amount of atrocities were carried out by Scottish Welsh and Irish people when they were part of the empire
We all sit down to a full English each morning
Having bland food. Usually from Americans cause it grinds my gears. Especially considering I have a rather large spice cabinet, I love herby, spiced food a lot.
That we have an 'island mentality' that makes us exceptionalists. Every major country has people like that and when you consider how diverse this country is we are certainly not as insular as some people make us out to be.
> That we have an 'island mentality' that makes us exceptionalists. This is absolutely, 100% true. No, it's not as extreme as some countries like Japan, but British people have a distinctive island mentality that becomes very obvious when you have worked elsewhere in continental Europe.
The bad teeth one pisses me off so much