the UK!

bloodiedathame · 27 Sep 2010 at 15:18

Stretch said:
Speak for yourself

In fairness I think I got one of the better ones.

Strife212 · 27 Sep 2010 at 15:20

Sawell said:
"More than half of Britons believe they live in a racist society, according to a major survey commissioned by BBC News Online."

Not to mention the society that spawned this:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/British_National_Party

The evidence is there. Let alone the massive racist history that the English have behind them.

How does that make it the most racist in any way?

There are a lot of places where minorities are in fear of their lives constantly, to say the UK is the most racist place is laughable.

XeNoN89 · 27 Sep 2010 at 15:20

Sawell said:
"More than half of Britons believe they live in a racist society, according to a major survey commissioned by BBC News Online."

Not to mention the society that spawned this:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/British_National_Party

The evidence is there. Let alone the massive racist history that the English have behind them.

America has a much much more racist history than us, and they have much more racism still than us today.

nydryl · 27 Sep 2010 at 15:21

Sawell said:
Not when you consider the number of countries that actually take competitive football seriously.

Football it seems is the national sport in over 90 countries so being regularly in the top 16 isn't too bad at all.

Badboy2k3 · 27 Sep 2010 at 15:21

[TW]Fox;17460753 said:
I generally dislike living in the UK and, given the opportunity, would emigrate. I plan to do so one day. However I honestly think that too many people wear rose tinted glasses. I'll focus on the transport networks thing as this is where my interest lies and most of my experience is.

It is quite true that aspects of the UK transport network are poor. Trains are often overcrowded and or expensive, many of the roads have huge potholes in, areas of the country are heavily congested, etc.

But this doesn't mean we are poor compared to the rest of the world. In actual fact, the rest of the world is often far poorer. Lets first focus on roads - a topic close to my heart and one that a lot of people tend to whinge about. I've heard people post that stupid comment about our roads being worse than a third world country on numerous occasions.

The reality of course is that our roads are amongst the best in the developed world. Yes, really. There are countries with better road networks than us - Spanish highways are better (Because we, the EU members, paid for nice new ones), and smaller high wealth countries like Switzerland etc have better maintained road networks. But what about the rest of the English speaking world?

Have you ever driven in America or Australia? In many cases the roads are absolutely shocking. The state of much of the highway network in the USA has to be seen to be beleived. We have potholes on residential streets, these guys have what can only be described as craters on 70mph highways. The roads are terrible. Our roads are frankly beautifully well maintained in comparison.

Then we've got highway networks. The Americans have a lot of highways but they are all totally random, junctions all over the place, random signposts, exits with sharp 90 degree bends, etc. Ours are sensibly laid out, well signposted, and all junctions conform to strict standards.

Australian highways? LOL. They don't really even have them. The main road between Sydney and Adelaide, two of the largest cities in the country, is a single carriageway road for most of the way. The motorways around Sydney are rough and bumpy - even the toll roads (We have only 1 toll Motorway, the USA and Australia have many).

The normal roads are a state as well. HUGE dips, massive gullies, the amount of cars with ripped off undertrays is unbeleivable. I cant remember the last time i scraped the bottom of my car here - yet in both the US and AUS I was frequently scraping hire car undersides off tarmac.

Trains.

Everyone moans about trains - but at least we have a semi integrated network with integrated ticketing in many places and frequent services. Try and catch a train from Rockhampton to Mackay, two of the largest cities on Queenslands East Coast. They are only 200 miles apart, and there is a large railway line linking them. Despite this there is ONE TRAIN A DAY. Yet people over here moan about our trains? Try using the railways in San Francisco. You need 3 different tickets to use CALTRAIN, BART and the Muni! In London, one ticket works on everything.

How about you get some clue and THEN form an opinion on how much our transport networks suck?

Nice rant!

Some people don't know how good we have it in the UK!

Yas786 · 27 Sep 2010 at 15:22

Telescopi said:
We boast about our greatness the best

We whinge about everything so according to us we're the worst, at pretty much everything.

LOL this.

/end thread

[TW]Fox · 27 Sep 2010 at 15:24

cm1179 said:
how about i stick to my own opinion?

That's fine, but justify it.

Admiral Huddy · 27 Sep 2010 at 15:24

Sawell said:
We're the most racist

Without going into the racist debate, i think we are one of the most tolerable and diverse.

We're the best at being the overhyping despite being one of the worst at football

We are still one of only 8 countries to win the world cup and our club record in Europe is pretty good imo.

[TW]Fox;17460753 said:
..snip..
How about you get some clue and THEN form an opinion on how much our transport networks suck?

nicely put Fox

Personally, I don't mind our railways.. It's quite expensive but then I don't have a car anymore which saves me quite a bit and there are rarely any problems. I know this because i only have 3 delay vouchers YTD. As the train passes ovet the M25/A12 there's always tailbacks.

hybrid572 · 27 Sep 2010 at 15:25

Sawell said:
"More than half of Britons believe they live in a racist society, according to a major survey commissioned by BBC News Online."

Not to mention the society that spawned this:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/British_National_Party

The evidence is there. Let alone the massive racist history that the English have behind them.

And yet the BNP only have 14,032 members, at least according to the wikipedia article you linked. Ask almost anybody in any other country you know- I can guarantee their equivalent (far-right racist bigot party) has a much bigger following.

Most Americans won't take an organisation seriously until it has at least a million members, and they've only got five times as many people as we have.

On a related note, check out this site: http://fishmech.net/bnp/
Type in your postcode (or one near you if you're bothered about privacy), and it will bring up a list of all the BNP members that live near to you- their names and addresses. Purely for informative purposes.

Andr3w · 27 Sep 2010 at 15:26

I think we are pretty good at standing in line and complaining

Superficial · 27 Sep 2010 at 15:28

By head of population we have done more for the world than any other:

http://www.nationmaster.com/graph/peo_nob_pri_lau-people-nobel-prize-laureates

(make sure you take into account population of countries)

nydryl · 27 Sep 2010 at 15:28

[TW]Fox;17460854 said:
That's fine, but justify it.

I'd justify my criticism of the transport system in Scotland by comparing it with experiences in other countries. Although services here are regular they are frequently late and overcrowded. The train services here also seem grossly expensive for the length of the journey you are taking.

Sawell · 27 Sep 2010 at 15:30

Admiral Huddy said:
Without going into the racist debate, i think we are one of the most tolerable and diverse.

I think a lot of us are, sure. But you can't help but feel we're on the brink of semi-serious civil unrest due to people's shameful intolerance of other races. My OP was perhaps a little poorly worded, the UK has settled down in recent years.

cm1179 · 27 Sep 2010 at 15:30

[TW]Fox;17460753 said:
Have you ever driven in America

yes. it was a joyous experience.

franco_22 · 27 Sep 2010 at 15:31

This thread is making me smile.

The british think they have an expensive transport system and experience poor customer service from retailers

[TW]Fox · 27 Sep 2010 at 15:33

cm1179 said:
yes. it was a joyous experience.

You think American roads are in better condition and better laid out than ours?

bloodiedathame · 27 Sep 2010 at 15:33

I think the UK is hideously average at just about everything...

Admiral Huddy · 27 Sep 2010 at 15:33

I think we are pretty good at closing our eyes at to what this county really has to offer, Maybe because we to preoccupied with modern life, like having being stuck in front of a screen somewhere or eyes down into our mobiles for example..

cm1179 · 27 Sep 2010 at 15:36

franco_22 said:
experience poor customer service from retailers

i will do most of my shopping online. i dislike shopping in shops in the UK for the best part because it is not a very personal experience. same with bars in this country. in other parts of europe, i can sit outside of a bar in lovely surroundings and receive proper customer service, not the in/out service i receive over here.

Django x2 · 27 Sep 2010 at 15:37

[TW]Fox;17460753 said:
Have you ever driven in America or Australia? In many cases the roads are absolutely shocking. The state of much of the highway network in the USA has to be seen to be beleived. We have potholes on residential streets, these guys have what can only be described as craters on 70mph highways. The roads are terrible. Our roads are frankly beautifully well maintained in comparison.

Really, having covered massive distance in Florida, I can only dream of similar glossy smooth tarmac like that here. I didn't see or hit one pothole, of course, my 205/95 R16 tyres might have soaked up a lot of it.

France, they just have it soooooooo right when it comes to roads