The War Against The British Vol. 1 The Australian Front
Lord Truth ( Maj. Gen.R.A.R.) 23rd April 2006
If we are to examine this lengthy and exhausting war in any detail it may be well to start with the situation on the Australian front where only quite recently there has been a serious flare up (concerning the new edition of the Rough Guide To Britain)
The Rough Guide and Lonely Planet are two famous Australian bibles for the budget traveller. I have used both extensively in the past,indeed mention of their names brings back many exotic memories...Ringos Guest House for example.....Is it still there in that back alley next to the Air France office in Connaught in New Delhi...and the Atlanta on Soy 4 in Bangkok..do the pretty girl receptionists still sleep on the floor behind the desk,wrapped up like mummies....and the two day bus from Patna to Katmandu..does it still run up that precarious terrifying winding road that leads to Tibet,: we had to stop while they fished out the dead from the bus that had fallen in the river three days earlier:,white fat already oozing in patches through brown bodies lying on the grass :and how much nowadays is Beijing to Moscow second class on the Trans Siberian....? So many stories,so many adventures.....
RG and LP always provided clear direct straightforward information, keeping any comments to the minimum....".its not the cleanest but its good value" etc etc... They were highly recomendable......Except......Except .............Except, strangely, when it came to their British editions....
Then suddenly everything seems to go haywire...a strange mental convulsion occurs ...nearly every page has a hate filled -and usually meaningless, snide, sneery, "putting down "comment and we know- we are in the front line of- The War Against The British....
Many many years ago ,when I was very young ,an uncle of mine made a joke during Christmas dinner about how you could always tell Australians because of their limp.
It was greeted with silent, shocked horror to which he added by saying they also walked like this and he bent down one shoulder.NaturallyI was fascinated and only later after much pleading were the explanations whispered in my ear as if obscenities ,although the ball and chain and chip on the shoulder still didnt quite make sense
As this took place at a time when the Aussies were still ready to cheer literally in their millions for their British king and who only a few years before had been ready to die literally in their thousands in WW2 ,its clear, that an awareness of an Aussie inferiority complex has been around for quite a long time....
In the early sixties I knew quite a few Aussies.There were thousands of them living in London,usually around Earls Court, using Britain as a base to do the required one or two year grand European tour before settling down to becoming accountants or architects
The men universally had neat "Peri Como" haircuts,wore the trademark of young New Yorkers -grey flannel suits and button down shirts.Beards ,even sideburns were unknown....As befitted the young inheritors of the world, they were neat and almost excessively polite
These Aussies loved everything about Britain:were totally fascinated, almost hypnotised by it.
I remember once ,returning on a Channel ferry a group burst into singing Land of Hope and Glory and Rule Brittania as the White Cliffs came nearer......
Yet there was ,in all this adulation and respect a clear understated but always there premiss: that Britain was , in any real sense,totally, utterly, finished, as any kind of force or influence in the world.....
Britain had become simply a great glorious historic museum.Its history had come to an end.
The American atom bomb had blown its military power to bits,its economic position was pitiable,its people recently rationed ,deprived,its cities still full of empty weed growing bombsites....and its popular culture on the radio or musichall, dominated by comedians and singers with phony American accents imitating American styles and attitudes
Because of course that was where the present was and the future lay .In America.In New York and Hollywood. Nothing would ever ,could ever challenge those mighty skyscrapers again.That is where the future lay, forever and forever more,amen.
Australians felt themselves excited by this because this is what they had in their hearts always wanted.Although not American they knew they were also part of the New World.At last they could look down happily and comfortably at their heritage,enjoying it as one enjoys an old characterful relative who has had an interesting life and at whose internment one will weep genuine tears
The adulation of the now spent Britain reached its historic peak in 1963,when President Kennedy eulogised Winston Churchill ,at his presentation in absentia with honary American citizenship.Kennedys speech blazes with the cliched glories and bravery of British history and the British contribution to the world
Right up to that moment the British could know that for all their faults, they were respected and indeed loved as a great liberating force in the world ,always (usually)on the side of the right and the just,a people who had indeed sacrified themselves their wealth and their Empire for the sake of the world.At night the stillyoung Queen could sleep confident in the knowledge that everywhere in that world people would turn out in their hundreds of thousands to cheer her....
Yet it is dangerous to imagine that a great nation like Britain,at the very top of the world for three hundred and fifty years,tiny in size yet great in bravery,enterprise and creative imagination,can ever be wiped off the worlds stage for long...If it was humbled by Americas economic power its latent energy would only ballon out elsewhere....
Less than a year after Kennedys speech the Beatles arrived on the world scene.......
Now I have already in these pieces mentioned the impact of the Beatles and what followed and I am somewhat embarrassed to mention them again but the fact is that within a year British popular culture had smashed Americas culturalhegemony into the ground and despite the endless promotional energy of what may be called the American lying machine it has never fully recovered
Whether in music, style, cinema-some twentyfive of the fifty biggest international hits were made in Britain in the last forty years-(all ruthlessly marketed as American) and in recent years, in the new creative energies of TV innovation, the years since the Beatles have kept Britain at the top of the world in every lifestyle area
These developments came as a huge shock to Australia
America could grit its teeth and smile bravely and patronisingly at what was happening but Australia was faced with a problem that needed almost psychiatric help
Almost overnight the old country (Britain) had taken the crown of youth from the "new country" Australia.....It was almost a perverted reordering of the natural laws of nature
Now this is not intended to be a social history of the time so I will explain what followed briefly.
The new energies that were liberated after 1964 -often to an astonished British population -let alone the world, continued through the seventies and beyond.By 1980 this confidence had prepared the way for the liberation of the British economy by Mrs Thatcher and the return as the worlds leading financial centre of the City of London as the rest of Britain basked from 1997 onwards in a nation at the top of the world again economically and also in scientific and technological innovation-in relation to population.
One cloud however had arisen shortly after the emergence of the Beatles. This was the ongoing situation in Northern Ireland but even this had been effectively dealt with by the Good Friday Agreement.That real and bloody war had seen the British prevail.
All this should surely have been reflected indirectly in any travel guide to Britain as indeed it was in American and other publications.
Yet sadly not the Australian. It is quite amusing to actually read old editions of them and see the almost desperate attempts to put the boot in......The docklands Canary Wharf development is a good example. This building of a few tall modern buildings regenerating a run down area was always refererred to in terms of its financial problems in the early nineties"when the bubble burst" and docklands "Mrs Thatchers dream "collapsed....
This mantra was repeated for years in each new edition....
I have often wondered at how this actually went down with these guides readers who would have been very young when these events happened....
Hey Clive..You've got brains ..who the ---- is this Mrs Thatcher they keep mentioning?
Jeez man how the ----would I know..Kevin your grandpa was English ,who..?---- man I never heard of her maybe she was the prime ministers wife or sumthink...
In one edition the reporter faced with ever more developments stated confidently that however successful it might become it would never be a really lively part of London...Wrong most Definitely!! Docklands is now only briefly covered and very much in "sotto voce"
These guides often make critical comments which are really ridiculous as there are never any comparisons..Somewhere is -dirty or sqaulid -but compared to what or where?
Of course the sense of excitement that London produces by having essentially old buildings renovated to state of the art design levels can be depressing to those always seeking the not only the truly old but the crummy slummy old.
How refreshing to go to Paris then and read the hilarious giveaway sentence in the opening paragraph-"the thing you notice at once about Paris is its shabby!"
Oh the glorious glorious shabbiness of Paris!Now we can relax!Now at last we dont feel intimidated by Londons sense of wealth and power-where we ourselves -despite being true blue eyed blonde haired Aussie or L.A. backpackers feel as dirty and deprived as those third world people London is apparently so full of...
I recently sent an email to the editor of one of these guides pointing out the childish sneery trick of always referring to the London underground as the "oldest in the world-opened in 1896..."
Its a trick that could be used about anything "JFK Americas oldest airport,opened in 1918" and is completely meaningless in real terms.
The editor did in fact reply saying that Australians do in fact like London very much and Im sure this is true.Why then ,in a hate filled world make these pointless comments?
Of course this problem is not confined to travel guides-the Americans take care to keep the boot on the British neck but thats another story. Meanwhile anyone who wants a full dose of the Aussie inferiority complex regarding Britain should look at these guides which in fact disgrace two companies that in every other area do a very worthwhile job
If we are to examine this lengthy and exhausting war in any detail it may be well to start with the situation on the Australian front where only quite recently there has been a serious flare up (concerning the new edition of the Rough Guide To Britain)
The Rough Guide and Lonely Planet are two famous Australian bibles for the budget traveller. I have used both extensively in the past,indeed mention of their names brings back many exotic memories...Ringos Guest House for example.....Is it still there in that back alley next to the Air France office in Connaught in New Delhi...and the Atlanta on Soy 4 in Bangkok..do the pretty girl receptionists still sleep on the floor behind the desk,wrapped up like mummies....and the two day bus from Patna to Katmandu..does it still run up that precarious terrifying winding road that leads to Tibet,: we had to stop while they fished out the dead from the bus that had fallen in the river three days earlier:,white fat already oozing in patches through brown bodies lying on the grass :and how much nowadays is Beijing to Moscow second class on the Trans Siberian....? So many stories,so many adventures.....
RG and LP always provided clear direct straightforward information, keeping any comments to the minimum....".its not the cleanest but its good value" etc etc... They were highly recomendable......Except......Except .............Except, strangely, when it came to their British editions....
Then suddenly everything seems to go haywire...a strange mental convulsion occurs ...nearly every page has a hate filled -and usually meaningless, snide, sneery, "putting down "comment and we know- we are in the front line of- The War Against The British....
Many many years ago ,when I was very young ,an uncle of mine made a joke during Christmas dinner about how you could always tell Australians because of their limp.
It was greeted with silent, shocked horror to which he added by saying they also walked like this and he bent down one shoulder.NaturallyI was fascinated and only later after much pleading were the explanations whispered in my ear as if obscenities ,although the ball and chain and chip on the shoulder still didnt quite make sense
As this took place at a time when the Aussies were still ready to cheer literally in their millions for their British king and who only a few years before had been ready to die literally in their thousands in WW2 ,its clear, that an awareness of an Aussie inferiority complex has been around for quite a long time....
In the early sixties I knew quite a few Aussies.There were thousands of them living in London,usually around Earls Court, using Britain as a base to do the required one or two year grand European tour before settling down to becoming accountants or architects
The men universally had neat "Peri Como" haircuts,wore the trademark of young New Yorkers -grey flannel suits and button down shirts.Beards ,even sideburns were unknown....As befitted the young inheritors of the world, they were neat and almost excessively polite
These Aussies loved everything about Britain:were totally fascinated, almost hypnotised by it.
I remember once ,returning on a Channel ferry a group burst into singing Land of Hope and Glory and Rule Brittania as the White Cliffs came nearer......
Yet there was ,in all this adulation and respect a clear understated but always there premiss: that Britain was , in any real sense,totally, utterly, finished, as any kind of force or influence in the world.....
Britain had become simply a great glorious historic museum.Its history had come to an end.
The American atom bomb had blown its military power to bits,its economic position was pitiable,its people recently rationed ,deprived,its cities still full of empty weed growing bombsites....and its popular culture on the radio or musichall, dominated by comedians and singers with phony American accents imitating American styles and attitudes
Because of course that was where the present was and the future lay .In America.In New York and Hollywood. Nothing would ever ,could ever challenge those mighty skyscrapers again.That is where the future lay, forever and forever more,amen.
Australians felt themselves excited by this because this is what they had in their hearts always wanted.Although not American they knew they were also part of the New World.At last they could look down happily and comfortably at their heritage,enjoying it as one enjoys an old characterful relative who has had an interesting life and at whose internment one will weep genuine tears
The adulation of the now spent Britain reached its historic peak in 1963,when President Kennedy eulogised Winston Churchill ,at his presentation in absentia with honary American citizenship.Kennedys speech blazes with the cliched glories and bravery of British history and the British contribution to the world
Right up to that moment the British could know that for all their faults, they were respected and indeed loved as a great liberating force in the world ,always (usually)on the side of the right and the just,a people who had indeed sacrified themselves their wealth and their Empire for the sake of the world.At night the stillyoung Queen could sleep confident in the knowledge that everywhere in that world people would turn out in their hundreds of thousands to cheer her....
Yet it is dangerous to imagine that a great nation like Britain,at the very top of the world for three hundred and fifty years,tiny in size yet great in bravery,enterprise and creative imagination,can ever be wiped off the worlds stage for long...If it was humbled by Americas economic power its latent energy would only ballon out elsewhere....
Less than a year after Kennedys speech the Beatles arrived on the world scene.......
Now I have already in these pieces mentioned the impact of the Beatles and what followed and I am somewhat embarrassed to mention them again but the fact is that within a year British popular culture had smashed Americas culturalhegemony into the ground and despite the endless promotional energy of what may be called the American lying machine it has never fully recovered
Whether in music, style, cinema-some twentyfive of the fifty biggest international hits were made in Britain in the last forty years-(all ruthlessly marketed as American) and in recent years, in the new creative energies of TV innovation, the years since the Beatles have kept Britain at the top of the world in every lifestyle area
These developments came as a huge shock to Australia
America could grit its teeth and smile bravely and patronisingly at what was happening but Australia was faced with a problem that needed almost psychiatric help
Almost overnight the old country (Britain) had taken the crown of youth from the "new country" Australia.....It was almost a perverted reordering of the natural laws of nature
Now this is not intended to be a social history of the time so I will explain what followed briefly.
The new energies that were liberated after 1964 -often to an astonished British population -let alone the world, continued through the seventies and beyond.By 1980 this confidence had prepared the way for the liberation of the British economy by Mrs Thatcher and the return as the worlds leading financial centre of the City of London as the rest of Britain basked from 1997 onwards in a nation at the top of the world again economically and also in scientific and technological innovation-in relation to population.
One cloud however had arisen shortly after the emergence of the Beatles. This was the ongoing situation in Northern Ireland but even this had been effectively dealt with by the Good Friday Agreement.That real and bloody war had seen the British prevail.
All this should surely have been reflected indirectly in any travel guide to Britain as indeed it was in American and other publications.
Yet sadly not the Australian. It is quite amusing to actually read old editions of them and see the almost desperate attempts to put the boot in......The docklands Canary Wharf development is a good example. This building of a few tall modern buildings regenerating a run down area was always refererred to in terms of its financial problems in the early nineties"when the bubble burst" and docklands "Mrs Thatchers dream "collapsed....
This mantra was repeated for years in each new edition....
I have often wondered at how this actually went down with these guides readers who would have been very young when these events happened....
Hey Clive..You've got brains ..who the ---- is this Mrs Thatcher they keep mentioning?
Jeez man how the ----would I know..Kevin your grandpa was English ,who..?---- man I never heard of her maybe she was the prime ministers wife or sumthink...
In one edition the reporter faced with ever more developments stated confidently that however successful it might become it would never be a really lively part of London...Wrong most Definitely!! Docklands is now only briefly covered and very much in "sotto voce"
These guides often make critical comments which are really ridiculous as there are never any comparisons..Somewhere is -dirty or sqaulid -but compared to what or where?
Of course the sense of excitement that London produces by having essentially old buildings renovated to state of the art design levels can be depressing to those always seeking the not only the truly old but the crummy slummy old.
How refreshing to go to Paris then and read the hilarious giveaway sentence in the opening paragraph-"the thing you notice at once about Paris is its shabby!"
Oh the glorious glorious shabbiness of Paris!Now we can relax!Now at last we dont feel intimidated by Londons sense of wealth and power-where we ourselves -despite being true blue eyed blonde haired Aussie or L.A. backpackers feel as dirty and deprived as those third world people London is apparently so full of...
I recently sent an email to the editor of one of these guides pointing out the childish sneery trick of always referring to the London underground as the "oldest in the world-opened in 1896..."
Its a trick that could be used about anything "JFK Americas oldest airport,opened in 1918" and is completely meaningless in real terms.
The editor did in fact reply saying that Australians do in fact like London very much and Im sure this is true.Why then ,in a hate filled world make these pointless comments?
Of course this problem is not confined to travel guides-the Americans take care to keep the boot on the British neck but thats another story. Meanwhile anyone who wants a full dose of the Aussie inferiority complex regarding Britain should look at these guides which in fact disgrace two companies that in every other area do a very worthwhile job
posted by Lord Truth at 7:36 pm
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