the English, the English, the English are best.

[davywavy]

We've left in the hands of three unfriendly powers
Examine the Irishman, Welshman or Scot
You'll find he's a stinker as likely as not

The English the English the English are best
I wouldn't give tuppence for all of the rest

The Scotsman is mean as we're all well aware
He's boney and blotchy and covered with hair
He eats salty porridge, he works all the day
And hasn't got bishops to show him the way

The English the English the English are best
I wouldn't give tuppence for all of the rest

The Irishman now our contempt is beneath
He sleeps in his boots and he lies through his teeth
He blows up policemen or so I have heard
And blames it on Cromwell and William the Third

The English are moral the English are good
And clever and modest and misunderstood

The Welshman's dishonest, he cheats when he can
He's little and dark more like monkey than man
He works underground with a lamp on his hat
And sings far too loud, far too often and flat

The English the English the English are best
I wouldn't give tuppence for all of the rest

And crossing the channel one cannot say much
For the French or the Spanish, the Danish or Dutch
The Germans are German, the Russians are red
And the Greeks and Italians eat garlic in bed

The English are noble, the English are nice
And worth any other at double the price

And all the world over each nation's the same
They've simply no notion of playing the game
They argue with umpires, they cheer when they've won
And they practice before hand which spoils all the fun

The English the English the English are best
I wouldn't give tuppence for all of the rest

It's not that they're wicked or naturally bad
It's just that they're foreign that makes them so mad
The English are all that a nation should be
And the pride of the English are ukmonty and me

The English the English the English are best
I wouldn't give tuppence for all of the rest



Following the debate over on ksirafai, I decided to whip up a quick poll on the greatest of all Human Inventions, the British Empire. Basically, I'm curious to know which year you think the Empire was at it's peak.

[Poll #556800]

Comments

Exercises in Counterfactualism

[applez.livejournal.com]

Well, this does pose several questions.

If you remove the very concept of the British Empire from world history, do you do likewise with the other European powers? If so, to what point, up to and including Spain's conquest of the New World (and all that silver & gold which flushed through the European markets)?

The most damning thing of Empire, regardless of whose Empire it is, is that it relies on an idea, and forcefits the world to it...whether it wants it or no. At least European-style agriculture and settlement of Africa was a near-complete failure thanks to local conditions that no amount of policy was going to radically change.

If one wants to measure Britain's Empire against others, clearly Britain's was mostly better than Russia's, or Belgium's ... but France's? The USA's?

As for "worse" as a conclusion, that, I believe, depends on one's timescale. Arguably, much of the world's strife today results from this very Imperial process that was begun by Britain and others. Worse, all the wrong lessons have been learned by some who persist in its wake, from that very 'forcefit' process.