Queuing is not something we think is uniquely British at all. Its a thing americans who say we love to do but in reality we hate it as much as everyone else but just respect we have to do it. We also don't claim saying sorry alot is uniquely British, infact we don't even mention it. again another thing americans say about us that we don't mention. We don't claim accents are uniquely british at all, we say that there is no 1 accent when yanks show there British accent which is a posh English accent or cockney which again is English. Great Britain is a geographical term for the biggest island of the British Isles its made up of 3 countrys that all have their own distinct accents the US is 1 country yes you have accents but there is a distinct way a American speaks were in Britain the three countrys that sound completely different. What I'm saying is we don't think its uniquely British we just object when a American does a "BRITISH" accent when they are doing a English accent there is no BRITISH accent. Americans tend to say British instead of English and say Scottish as if it isn't part of Britain. We dont think changing of weather is uniquely British we just like to complain about the weather. What we mean by there is no climate is that we have a bunch of different weather types in a month that makes no sence in that time of year meaning we have no set climate, one day it could be cold and wet the next hot and humid or just humid, and the next month could be rain everyday but its mid summer. We dont think this is unique to us at all. And again sarcasm is a thing americans say about us, not us claiming its uniquely British. We are good at using sarcasm in most cases but we don't claim its unique to us in anyway. I like your videos but this seems like a bit of a stretch because you made one about the US. These are all stereotypes about us and nothing we claim to be unique to us.
I wouldn't say we enjoy standing in a queue, we just respect the queue. I say sorry just out of habit, I even say sorry to the dog. We can have a heatwave one day and the temperature can plummet the next and be windy.
@Darren Gee It's the deadly multi queue, you stand in the shortest one, take ages to get near the front, then the person in front has all sorts of problems and your stuck thete while the other queues go down pretty quick..
British people say "we have weather, not climate"?! I'm 63 years old and I've never heard anybody say that. As for sarcasm, we may not be unique in using it, but it's almost a way of life over here.
Brits do not ENJOY queuing. They do so out of decency. I can assure you a lot of continental Europeans do NOT queue. Especially the Germans. People are not generally rude in supermarkets. I would say that that is completely false.
I’m British and live in Germany. I’ve spent 30 years in different EU countries. I’d say that in a European context, the British certainly form queues and respect the queue more than elsewhere. And on the Continent the British are known for constantly saying ‘sorry’, which people tend to confuse with being an apology rather than what it normally is: simply a word uttered in certain contexts that has no real meaning but whose absence would be noticed as being rude.
As quite a few of the comments point out, the things that you refer to as what the British think are uniquely British are, in reality, what Americans think about the British i.e. American stereotypes of the British. Sarcasm isn't what the British do well, it's irony (obviously not unique, but much more common than it is in the USA - Aussies do irony and sarcasm really well, too {even better than the British @Andy U}). As for the weather, Britain lies at the intersection of five air masses which, with only slight movement, can generate radical changes. Very few countries are uniquely anything - the great thing about Britain is it's uniquely nothing, and amazingly various). Have enjoyed most of your videos, but this one ...hmm?
Hi Matthew, I have watched quite a few of your videos now and think you have some great ideas and insights about the UK and am glad you enjoyed your experiences with us. I don't know many people who think we are particularly polite as a nation, I believe a lot of what you see is people not wanting to cause a scene rather than being polite. The queuing thing is interesting because I would certainly have associated it with communist era USSR rather than thinking it is uniquely British. Weather is a safe topic so you don't have to talk about anything that might cause offense or be misinterpreted. I refer back to the not making a scene. Having lived all across the UK it does vary quite significantly over very short distances due to four different weather systems interacting and the gulf stream having an effect. I have a fascination with accents. I have certainly never thought that Americans have a generic accent but this does seem to be a thing in US films as was RP in the UK. Good luck to you all.
As someone who has watched all your videos this is one I certainly can't agree with at all. It stands to reason that these things you've mentioned happen all over the world, the idea that "we" think they're mutually exclusive to us seems very far fetched. And if you have heard these things from a few select people there's millions of others who definitely don't think like this about any of the things mentioned. Again I've enjoyed your videos and agreed with most of the things you've vlogged about but this is way off the mark. Sorry if those people have given you a false sense of the British psyche but they are a minority.
I’ve heard don’t move to the UK if you don’t like rain. Where I live and I’m sure other places we actually get more rainfall than the UK. When I was there for 10 days we had nice weather and it was autumn.
I'm a Brit and live in Nevada and people often tell me how wet Britain is. Have they never been to Seattle or San Francisco, etc or just about anywhere in the USA within 1000 miles of the East Coast.
You didn't see much change in the weather because you spent nearly all your time in the South East which is the most stable, predictable, warmest and driest region of the UK. If you'd spent a year in the North West or North East, you'd have experienced a lot more rain and wind and less general weather stability over your year. Many parts of the North West and North East experience flooding and landslips each year because of how much more overall rain they get than the South East. I don't know where this idea of no climate comes from. The truth is the UK has a slightly different regional climates caused by different jet streams, which clash against each other. Hence why the North West and North East and South West and South East all experience somewhat different weather. Particularly in temperature and amount of rain. www.bbc.co.uk/bitesize/guides/zpykxsg/revision/3 It's also possibly why the UK experiences the highest occurrences of tornadoes each year (measured by unit area of land) than any other country in the world. Though UK tornadoes are significantly weaker than USA ones. www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-3124716/Britain-s-Tornado-Alley-revealed-Home-Counties-Bristol-Birmingham-risk-twisters.html
I was expecting to be at least little offended by this video so I have to say I'm kinda disappointed!!! 🤣 Anyway regarding the accent thing: British pedantry regarding this subject is an overreaction after decades of stereotyping England as being entirely homogenous when it comes to accents. Conversely the world has been aware that America has different accents because of Hollywood and media in general (though as you said they are perceived inaccurately like "Southern"). There is no way anyone outside of England would be aware of the different accents with the exception of Scottish and possibly Liverpudlian (thanks to The Beatles), which is why "I love the English accent" is still a common phrase. You are correct that we aren't unique for having different accents but it's still something we can be quite (overly) sensitive about! 😤 🇬🇧 ♥️
The thing about we Brits and apologising, is not so much that we apologise when we bump into someone - which on the whole we (generally) do. But that we apologise when someone bumps into us. As for queuing, I can confirm that queuing is not a 'big thing' in Germany. More years ago than I care to remember, I was in the RAF and did a stint in Germany (twice). In the village next to the airbase where I was stationed, there was a permanent fast food caravan located on a large tarmac hardstanding, they were known as "Schnell Imbiss" - quick snack. It was frequented often by local servicemen and their families who would park their car on the hardstanding and wander over to the caravan and join the queue (of fellow Brits). On more than one occasion you would be stood in the queue awaiting your turn to be served, when a Mercedes (or other) would suddenly pull up right outside the caravan and queue. Out would get a German guy who strode all of three paces straight to the head of the queue - and be served.
Actually, Brits don't think of any of those things as uniquely British. Most Brits will say we don't even have an accent. Those are all things Americans think are British. Things that are actually uniquely British: Using C for cold temperatures and F for hot. Jelly and ice cream at birthday parties. Knowing what 1066 means and barely caring about any other date. Judging people by their favourite Doctor. Not speaking to any strangers unless they are accompanied by a dog.
Helen, I remember when we used "F" for both hot and cold then we had to change to "C", have to admit I use both and automatically say to myself ,e.g 10c is 50 F not too cold or it's 20C and around70F and quite warm. I have never heard the favourite Doctor one. On the whole I would say that people who live in towns and cities don't talk to strangers unless it's someone you see quite often, at a bus stop for instance. On the other hand , those of us that live in the country do talk to strangers, the trick is getting them to talk back. We can easy spot a tourist as when we say "Morning" they walk past without speaking [we are usually walking our dogs at the time] most tourists do speak, I quite often meet people from where or near where I used to live
I remember when they still had F on the weather, but very few my generation (let's just say no one under 40 because that's approaching for me fast!) or younger uses it anymore, even for the heat. I also know a lot of people who use kg for their weight & km for distance. The SI\metric system will win out eventually!
In the second week in February 2020 snow fell in the area of England where I live it was below freezing all week. Then it rained for one day all the snow cleared. For the next seven days it was between 15 and17 degrees centigrade, I was sitting in the garden in my tee shirt. Please don't say it's not changeable in the UK.
I don't think it's "not changeable" but it doesn't compare with our last week in the usa. In colorado,for instance, they got 5feet of snow (overnight!) four days ago. Today the high in that area is 20C. My experience is that the weather is very temperate in comparison to most of the states.
Go to most town / city's in Britain on a friday night and go to the bar in a busy nightclub or get a taxi afterwards and see how polite we really are 😉
Yea it's not so much about liking queing, most of us hate it, it's more to do with respectfully waiting your turn. One good example from 2 Americans living here who also do similar videos mentioned how with undergrounds and similar chaotic places Brits will usually wait and although it's not a proper line it's the waiting the turn, where as they say in similar American situations it remains quite chaotic without any order.
Hi there, about the queue thing, of course they are everywhere in any organized society. The brits however seem to be doing it in a more orderly fashion even when it comes to something like waiting for a buss. When it comes to sarcasm however they are lightweights. The Danes use so much sarcasm and irony that we can’t tell if people are being serious or not half time. It thoroughly confuses foreigners, just go watch some videos about people moving to Denmark. The little sarcasm they have in the UK was left behind by Danes in the Viking age, as this is something they wouldn’t have been able to come up with on their own 😉
Hi Matthew, I think you are confusing/conflating what Americans and other visitors say about us on You-Tube, with what we think about ourselves. On Queuing, We form queues more than many European countries. On Accents, I think the issue here is your comment about travelling 100 miles and getting a different accent. There can be significant changes in 1 or 2 miles. My hearing is not as good as it used to be, but I used to be able to hear(and recognise) changes across East London with major changes from Aldgate to Whitechapel, then a major change a Brick Lane, which lasts about 1/2 a mile eastwards, changing again for Bethnal Green (Note these are and always have been major immigrant areas, so the specific accent thee changes over time, with Bethnal Green being a bit of a buffer, more mixed) Further east we get to Mile End. There is a north/south split here, with the south being influenced by the dock areas and also he Seaman's hostels, there was also a Chinese area here (Poplar), further east we get to Silvertown another major change, far fewer immigrants until he 1990's, Further along East and West Ham, I know these were different, but I could never tell. But the change when you got to Barking was significant. That's about 10 miles with 13/14 different accents each with a slightly different dialect, there are probably only 3 or 4 that most people would hear, and only locals would recognise (locate). Note they also change over time, especially near Brick Lane.. I think with weather, we allow ourselves o talk to strangers about weather, its a safe subject. On 'Sorry' you have missed the difference, we will say sorry if you walk into us. Nice video.
My views were almost entirely from UK citizens. I honestly don't really watch us RUclipsrs. Most of these views I didn't even know were stereotypes until I heard people in UK talk about/reference them. Good thoughts on the rest!
I think I say sorry a lot. I get annoyed when people don't say sorry but feel bad when they do🙄🤣 as for the weather I think we just like to complain about it. Though I have to say this year has been a lovely spring /summer, and hoping for a snowy winter
Being polite is not just saying sorry, in fact as a brit I would say that is the least part of it. If your are inherently polite you should never need to say sorry
The queue idea being uniquely British could come from the War and just after. When food and many things were still rationed. People had to queue long after the War was over and so that may be why we thought we were unique. Another difference that wasn't mentioned was along with sarcasm the Brits always said that most other Nations don't have a sense of irony. Again a wrong assumption . Or is it?
The queues thing dates back to the wars and rationing because the Brits used to have to queue at every shop to get their weekly shopping. It kind of stuck with us as it was handed down to the consecutive generations.
I'm a Brit living in Minnesota, people here are absolute sticklers for queuing, for the bus, it's really just common courtesy, so I always get confused by that being exclusive to the UK. Cutting in is just the ultimate insult, a show of basic disrespect. Brits are also more upfront and therefore can be more argumentative and "in your face", which can come across as rude to people who aren't used to it. Brits always tend to thinks it's the only place where it rains, it's the eternal cloud (pardon the pun) we carry but it's just not true, plus lots of people think it's always sunny in America, again, as you said, not true and very varied. Tey think it gets freezing there, I'm like, "you've never experience MN" cold.
The whole “If you don’t like the weather, wait 10 minutes and it’ll change” comment is universal all over the world. But people think it is unique to their area. Always cracks me up!
Hahahahaha - I live in Italy and not one single Italian knows how to queue. Given the lockdown situation and being British this soon wore thin... I am not kidding - they'd all be in a group/bunched up together at the supermarket entrance and as someone new arrived they'd just ask who's the last?
I agree with you about Italians not queuing. I was in Venice waiting for a water bus with a lot of elderly Italian ladies. Everything was fine until the bus arrived and then it was like a rugby scrum and I nearly ended up in the lagoon. It seems funny now, but at the time it was really scary.
British loving queuing Your premise is wrong.... no one likes standing in queues The difference, having lived in the US and UK, I would say is that those in the UK will rarely complain. In the US there would always be a few people who would loudly complain and moan about why there was a queue and why was it not moving.... when it was clear to everyone else. However if anyone tried to use the emergency lane to undertake other motorists would pull their vehicles slightly into the lane and stop them. *The British say sorry a lot* I have never heard that said. *The UK has weather but not climate* Again I have never heard that said before *BY NO ONE* You do realise they're not the same thing don't you??? *That weather changes so rapidly* That is a subjective measure what is rapid for one person may not be for another and you seem to be equating dramatic changes in weather with rapid changes in weather. The British talk about the weather a lot, .... mainly in queues, to start off a conversation such as It was so lovely this morning now it looks as if it's going to rain or the other way round. *The British think sarcasm is uniquely British* Again I have never heard this claim made by the British. Your title needs to be change to Five Things Than An American Thinks That British People Think Are Uniquely British, But Aren't.
You should have named this video "Things other people think are true about the English" because every one of your points besides maybe the the weather quote, are what people say about us rather than what we would say about ourselves.
Matthew. I'm sure you're right about most of this but in British peoples' defence, we must have been listening too much to what Americans say about us! So many of the 'Americans living in the UK' videos on RUclips seem to suggest these 'uniquely British' stereotypes that we must have begun to believe them ourselves. Thinking right back to Bill Bryson's 1995 book 'Notes from a Small Island', he describes British people forming one queue (line) for several ticket windows and how amazing it was for people to do this without any instructions to do so. Well I remember the late 60s when there would always be a separate queue for each window in the Post Office (and you always knew that your queue would be slowest!) but then the Post Office introduced the system of the single queue for multiple windows and we just ended up adopting it, even if not mandated. So even when Mr Bryson commented on it, it wasn't really because those people had thought of it themselves - they were just following normal practice.
Also you're right about "weather". I've experienced Pensylvania, New York, California, Florida. UK is much milder. We don't dodge natural disasters quite like the US that's for sure.
I only ever heard those things from Brits. I didn't know they were stereotypes until I came to the UK, and people born and raised in the UK told them to me. 🤷♂️
I don’t think anyone likes queuing. It’s just that we are taught from a young age, that everyone should wait their turn, and jumping the queue will not be tolerated! I’ve never noticed the supermarket thing. Having been to America many times, I would say that the way people behave is very similar. Neither polite nor impolite. Cashiers might give you the false ‘“have a nice day” thing occasionally, but that is mostly insincere and part of the training. Americans tend to be more direct and say what they’re thinking. For example,I was walking across the road with my sister in Florida. An elderly gentleman stopped us and told us we needed to get some more tan! That would never happen in the UK! 😄
I have to agree with the comments saying most of those aren't things that we think are uniquely British, it's perhaps closer to a list of things that we think "Americans don't get" based on your sterioypical brash American tourists. And the sarcasm thing is partly a difference between AmE & BrE - Americans & Brits mean different things by the word. merican.vickihollett.com/sarcasm-in-the-uk-and-us-part-one-whats-sarcastic/
"I've never heard of British people saying sorry until I came to the UK". Err, you're back in the States now Matt. That should be "went to the UK". 'Came' implies that you're still here. We don't like ques, we just put up with them. ruclips.net/video/xrz9jMRb4wo/видео.html
Brits do apologise for you bumping into them it depends on where you are, the brits seem obsessed by queuing, including the unordered que where all you need to know is who was there first and who is in front of you, the British have a lot of accents, I did read that there were more accents in the UK than anywhere else in the world per square mile, but there is a lot of slang and dialect as well. Yes there are a lot of American accents but you can generally understand them, put a someone from Newcastle, Sheffield, Hertfordshire, ulster, Liverpool and Glasgow in a room together, some you will understand some you may not or might even think its a different language. the weather is a safe subject, there is nothing that the British like more than to whine about the weather, to hot to wet to dry to cold, but if you are ever stuck or get that quiet spot in a conversation its simple, "I hear we have rain on the way" and bingo its off again yes you get these everywhere but being British and growing up its like the British really like rules, when you can do something or say something, what is and isn't considered rude one minute is acceptable in another almost identical situation. good video
Hiya. Yes, sarcasm is not uniquely British, but we ARE the World Champions. Lol. Stay safe. All the best to you.
That’s the best and most useful comment I have ever read on RUclips. Congratulations 👏🏻
🇬🇧🤣🙏🏻❤️
Most of the things on this list are things that Americans frequently say about the UK rather than British people say about the UK. xxx
The "queue" thing has always confused me as a Brit
"British people love to queue"... they definitely don't, nobody likes to queue lol.
Yeah, queuing is just a necessary evil.
Exactly. We hate it. We just know the rules.
But what we do like is for people to respect the queue.
I agree completely, Brits don't like queueing, it's just good manners to wait your turn.
@@helenwood8482 there are definitely rules to queuing and que jumping...
Queuing is not something we think is uniquely British at all. Its a thing americans who say we love to do but in reality we hate it as much as everyone else but just respect we have to do it.
We also don't claim saying sorry alot is uniquely British, infact we don't even mention it. again another thing americans say about us that we don't mention.
We don't claim accents are uniquely british at all, we say that there is no 1 accent when yanks show there British accent which is a posh English accent or cockney which again is English. Great Britain is a geographical term for the biggest island of the British Isles its made up of 3 countrys that all have their own distinct accents the US is 1 country yes you have accents but there is a distinct way a American speaks were in Britain the three countrys that sound completely different. What I'm saying is we don't think its uniquely British we just object when a American does a "BRITISH" accent when they are doing a English accent there is no BRITISH accent. Americans tend to say British instead of English and say Scottish as if it isn't part of Britain.
We dont think changing of weather is uniquely British we just like to complain about the weather. What we mean by there is no climate is that we have a bunch of different weather types in a month that makes no sence in that time of year meaning we have no set climate, one day it could be cold and wet the next hot and humid or just humid, and the next month could be rain everyday but its mid summer. We dont think this is unique to us at all.
And again sarcasm is a thing americans say about us, not us claiming its uniquely British. We are good at using sarcasm in most cases but we don't claim its unique to us in anyway.
I like your videos but this seems like a bit of a stretch because you made one about the US. These are all stereotypes about us and nothing we claim to be unique to us.
Very condescending as well.
I wouldn't say we enjoy standing in a queue, we just respect the queue.
I say sorry just out of habit, I even say sorry to the dog.
We can have a heatwave one day and the temperature can plummet the next and be windy.
@Darren Gee It's the deadly multi queue, you stand in the shortest one, take ages to get near the front, then the person in front has all sorts of problems and your stuck thete while the other queues go down pretty quick..
British people say "we have weather, not climate"?! I'm 63 years old and I've never heard anybody say that. As for sarcasm, we may not be unique in using it, but it's almost a way of life over here.
Brits do not ENJOY queuing. They do so out of decency. I can assure you a lot of continental Europeans do NOT queue. Especially the Germans. People are not generally rude in supermarkets. I would say that that is completely false.
I’m British and live in Germany. I’ve spent 30 years in different EU countries. I’d say that in a European context, the British certainly form queues and respect the queue more than elsewhere. And on the Continent the British are known for constantly saying ‘sorry’, which people tend to confuse with being an apology rather than what it normally is: simply a word uttered in certain contexts that has no real meaning but whose absence would be noticed as being rude.
From Australia: You need to distinguish between IRONY and SARCASM. Everywhere has both WEATHER and CLIMATE as much as they have night and day.
As quite a few of the comments point out, the things that you refer to as what the British think are uniquely British are, in reality, what Americans think about the British i.e. American stereotypes of the British. Sarcasm isn't what the British do well, it's irony (obviously not unique, but much more common than it is in the USA - Aussies do irony and sarcasm really well, too {even better than the British @Andy U}). As for the weather, Britain lies at the intersection of five air masses which, with only slight movement, can generate radical changes. Very few countries are uniquely anything - the great thing about Britain is it's uniquely nothing, and amazingly various). Have enjoyed most of your videos, but this one ...hmm?
Love this channel but as a Brit i have never thought of any of these things
Hi Matthew, I have watched quite a few of your videos now and think you have some great ideas and insights about the UK and am glad you enjoyed your experiences with us. I don't know many people who think we are particularly polite as a nation, I believe a lot of what you see is people not wanting to cause a scene rather than being polite. The queuing thing is interesting because I would certainly have associated it with communist era USSR rather than thinking it is uniquely British. Weather is a safe topic so you don't have to talk about anything that might cause offense or be misinterpreted. I refer back to the not making a scene. Having lived all across the UK it does vary quite significantly over very short distances due to four different weather systems interacting and the gulf stream having an effect. I have a fascination with accents. I have certainly never thought that Americans have a generic accent but this does seem to be a thing in US films as was RP in the UK. Good luck to you all.
As someone who has watched all your videos this is one I certainly can't agree with at all. It stands to reason that these things you've mentioned happen all over the world, the idea that "we" think they're mutually exclusive to us seems very far fetched. And if you have heard these things from a few select people there's millions of others who definitely don't think like this about any of the things mentioned.
Again I've enjoyed your videos and agreed with most of the things you've vlogged about but this is way off the mark.
Sorry if those people have given you a false sense of the British psyche but they are a minority.
I don't think sarcasm is uniquely British, but there is definitely a uniquely British way of mixing irony and sarcasm.
I’ve heard don’t move to the UK if you don’t like rain. Where I live and I’m sure other places we actually get more rainfall than the UK. When I was there for 10 days we had nice weather and it was autumn.
I'm a Brit and live in Nevada and people often tell me how wet Britain is. Have they never been to Seattle or San Francisco, etc or just about anywhere in the USA within 1000 miles of the East Coast.
You didn't see much change in the weather because you spent nearly all your time in the South East which is the most stable, predictable, warmest and driest region of the UK. If you'd spent a year in the North West or North East, you'd have experienced a lot more rain and wind and less general weather stability over your year. Many parts of the North West and North East experience flooding and landslips each year because of how much more overall rain they get than the South East.
I don't know where this idea of no climate comes from. The truth is the UK has a slightly different regional climates caused by different jet streams, which clash against each other. Hence why the North West and North East and South West and South East all experience somewhat different weather. Particularly in temperature and amount of rain. www.bbc.co.uk/bitesize/guides/zpykxsg/revision/3
It's also possibly why the UK experiences the highest occurrences of tornadoes each year (measured by unit area of land) than any other country in the world. Though UK tornadoes are significantly weaker than USA ones. www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-3124716/Britain-s-Tornado-Alley-revealed-Home-Counties-Bristol-Birmingham-risk-twisters.html
I was expecting to be at least little offended by this video so I have to say I'm kinda disappointed!!! 🤣 Anyway regarding the accent thing: British pedantry regarding this subject is an overreaction after decades of stereotyping England as being entirely homogenous when it comes to accents. Conversely the world has been aware that America has different accents because of Hollywood and media in general (though as you said they are perceived inaccurately like "Southern"). There is no way anyone outside of England would be aware of the different accents with the exception of Scottish and possibly Liverpudlian (thanks to The Beatles), which is why "I love the English accent" is still a common phrase. You are correct that we aren't unique for having different accents but it's still something we can be quite (overly) sensitive about! 😤 🇬🇧 ♥️
The thing about we Brits and apologising, is not so much that we apologise when we bump into someone - which on the whole we (generally) do. But that we apologise when someone bumps into us. As for queuing, I can confirm that queuing is not a 'big thing' in Germany. More years ago than I care to remember, I was in the RAF and did a stint in Germany (twice). In the village next to the airbase where I was stationed, there was a permanent fast food caravan located on a large tarmac hardstanding, they were known as "Schnell Imbiss" - quick snack. It was frequented often by local servicemen and their families who would park their car on the hardstanding and wander over to the caravan and join the queue (of fellow Brits). On more than one occasion you would be stood in the queue awaiting your turn to be served, when a Mercedes (or other) would suddenly pull up right outside the caravan and queue. Out would get a German guy who strode all of three paces straight to the head of the queue - and be served.
if you think 'everyone' is happy to queue / wait in line, then you have never waited for a bus in Italy
Actually, Brits don't think of any of those things as uniquely British. Most Brits will say we don't even have an accent. Those are all things Americans think are British.
Things that are actually uniquely British:
Using C for cold temperatures and F for hot.
Jelly and ice cream at birthday parties.
Knowing what 1066 means and barely caring about any other date.
Judging people by their favourite Doctor.
Not speaking to any strangers unless they are accompanied by a dog.
Helen, I remember when we used "F" for both hot and cold then we had to change to "C", have to admit I use both and automatically say to myself ,e.g 10c is 50 F not too cold or it's 20C and around70F and quite warm.
I have never heard the favourite Doctor one.
On the whole I would say that people who live in towns and cities don't talk to strangers unless it's someone you see quite often, at a bus stop for instance.
On the other hand , those of us that live in the country do talk to strangers, the trick is getting them to talk back.
We can easy spot a tourist as when we say "Morning" they walk past without speaking [we are usually walking our dogs at the time] most tourists do speak, I quite often meet people from where or near where I used to live
I remember when they still had F on the weather, but very few my generation (let's just say no one under 40 because that's approaching for me fast!) or younger uses it anymore, even for the heat. I also know a lot of people who use kg for their weight & km for distance. The SI\metric system will win out eventually!
In the second week in February 2020 snow fell in the area of England where I live it was below freezing all week. Then it rained for one day all the snow cleared. For the next seven days it was between 15 and17 degrees centigrade, I was sitting in the garden in my tee shirt. Please don't say it's not changeable in the UK.
I don't think it's "not changeable" but it doesn't compare with our last week in the usa. In colorado,for instance, they got 5feet of snow (overnight!) four days ago. Today the high in that area is 20C.
My experience is that the weather is very temperate in comparison to most of the states.
Fair enough
None are uniquely British alone, but combined and amplified to 10 make Britain really unique .
Go to most town / city's in Britain on a friday night and go to the bar in a busy nightclub or get a taxi afterwards and see how polite we really are 😉
Oh I forgot to say, speaking from experience the Italians definitely do not que.
Yea it's not so much about liking queing, most of us hate it, it's more to do with respectfully waiting your turn. One good example from 2 Americans living here who also do similar videos mentioned how with undergrounds and similar chaotic places Brits will usually wait and although it's not a proper line it's the waiting the turn, where as they say in similar American situations it remains quite chaotic without any order.
The queue one is because apparently british people queue the best and people mistakenly think we like doing it
Colorado has extreme weather! Snows a ton one day and the sun shines hot the next day and melts it all. Like 40 degree (F) difference.
Hi there, about the queue thing, of course they are everywhere in any organized society. The brits however seem to be doing it in a more orderly fashion even when it comes to something like waiting for a buss.
When it comes to sarcasm however they are lightweights. The Danes use so much sarcasm and irony that we can’t tell if people are being serious or not half time. It thoroughly confuses foreigners, just go watch some videos about people moving to Denmark. The little sarcasm they have in the UK was left behind by Danes in the Viking age, as this is something they wouldn’t have been able to come up with on their own 😉
Hi Matthew,
I think you are confusing/conflating what Americans and other visitors say about us on You-Tube, with what we think about ourselves.
On Queuing, We form queues more than many European countries.
On Accents, I think the issue here is your comment about travelling 100 miles and getting a different accent. There can be significant changes in 1 or 2 miles. My hearing is not as good as it used to be, but I used to be able to hear(and recognise) changes across East London with major changes from Aldgate to Whitechapel, then a major change a Brick Lane, which lasts about 1/2 a mile eastwards, changing again for Bethnal Green (Note these are and always have been major immigrant areas, so the specific accent thee changes over time, with Bethnal Green being a bit of a buffer, more mixed) Further east we get to Mile End. There is a north/south split here, with the south being influenced by the dock areas and also he Seaman's hostels, there was also a Chinese area here (Poplar), further east we get to Silvertown another major change, far fewer immigrants until he 1990's, Further along East and West Ham, I know these were different, but I could never tell. But the change when you got to Barking was significant. That's about 10 miles with 13/14 different accents each with a slightly different dialect, there are probably only 3 or 4 that most people would hear, and only locals would recognise (locate). Note they also change over time, especially near Brick Lane..
I think with weather, we allow ourselves o talk to strangers about weather, its a safe subject.
On 'Sorry' you have missed the difference, we will say sorry if you walk into us.
Nice video.
My views were almost entirely from UK citizens. I honestly don't really watch us RUclipsrs. Most of these views I didn't even know were stereotypes until I heard people in UK talk about/reference them.
Good thoughts on the rest!
I think I say sorry a lot. I get annoyed when people don't say sorry but feel bad when they do🙄🤣 as for the weather I think we just like to complain about it. Though I have to say this year has been a lovely spring /summer, and hoping for a snowy winter
Being polite is not just saying sorry, in fact as a brit I would say that is the least part of it. If your are inherently polite you should never need to say sorry
As a British we do not think we are polite we know we aren't people only assume this because they think we apologise a lot
The queue idea being uniquely British could come from the War and just after. When food and many things were still rationed. People had to queue long after the War was over and so that may be why we thought we were unique. Another difference that wasn't mentioned was along with sarcasm the Brits always said that most other Nations don't have a sense of irony. Again a wrong assumption . Or is it?
The queues thing dates back to the wars and rationing because the Brits used to have to queue at every shop to get their weekly shopping. It kind of stuck with us as it was handed down to the consecutive generations.
I'm a Brit living in Minnesota, people here are absolute sticklers for queuing, for the bus, it's really just common courtesy, so I always get confused by that being exclusive to the UK. Cutting in is just the ultimate insult, a show of basic disrespect. Brits are also more upfront and therefore can be more argumentative and "in your face", which can come across as rude to people who aren't used to it. Brits always tend to thinks it's the only place where it rains, it's the eternal cloud (pardon the pun) we carry but it's just not true, plus lots of people think it's always sunny in America, again, as you said, not true and very varied. Tey think it gets freezing there, I'm like, "you've never experience MN" cold.
The whole “If you don’t like the weather, wait 10 minutes and it’ll change” comment is universal all over the world. But people think it is unique to their area. Always cracks me up!
A queue and a line is the same thing people from other countries just don't understand why we call it a queue we hate them as much as everyone else
Hahahahaha - I live in Italy and not one single Italian knows how to queue. Given the lockdown situation and being British this soon wore thin... I am not kidding - they'd all be in a group/bunched up together at the supermarket entrance and as someone new arrived they'd just ask who's the last?
I agree with you about Italians not queuing. I was in Venice waiting for a water bus with a lot of elderly Italian ladies. Everything was fine until the bus arrived and then it was like a rugby scrum and I nearly ended up in the lagoon. It seems funny now, but at the time it was really scary.
British loving queuing
Your premise is wrong.... no one likes standing in queues
The difference, having lived in the US and UK, I would say is that those in the UK will rarely complain.
In the US there would always be a few people who would loudly complain and moan about why there was a queue and why was it not moving.... when it was clear to everyone else.
However if anyone tried to use the emergency lane to undertake other motorists would pull their vehicles slightly into the lane and stop them.
*The British say sorry a lot*
I have never heard that said.
*The UK has weather but not climate*
Again I have never heard that said before *BY NO ONE*
You do realise they're not the same thing don't you???
*That weather changes so rapidly*
That is a subjective measure what is rapid for one person may not be for another and you seem to be equating dramatic changes in weather with rapid changes in weather.
The British talk about the weather a lot, .... mainly in queues, to start off a conversation such as
It was so lovely this morning now it looks as if it's going to rain or the other way round.
*The British think sarcasm is uniquely British*
Again I have never heard this claim made by the British.
Your title needs to be change to
Five Things Than An American Thinks That British People Think Are Uniquely British, But Aren't.
You should have named this video "Things other people think are true about the English" because every one of your points besides maybe the the weather quote, are what people say about us rather than what we would say about ourselves.
I literally heard all of these things from people in the UK. 🤷
@@SchaeferFamilyAdventure They are just common British stereotypes though. There are plenty of idiots who will just reel them off.
Fair enough
Matthew. I'm sure you're right about most of this but in British peoples' defence, we must have been listening too much to what Americans say about us! So many of the 'Americans living in the UK' videos on RUclips seem to suggest these 'uniquely British' stereotypes that we must have begun to believe them ourselves.
Thinking right back to Bill Bryson's 1995 book 'Notes from a Small Island', he describes British people forming one queue (line) for several ticket windows and how amazing it was for people to do this without any instructions to do so. Well I remember the late 60s when there would always be a separate queue for each window in the Post Office (and you always knew that your queue would be slowest!) but then the Post Office introduced the system of the single queue for multiple windows and we just ended up adopting it, even if not mandated. So even when Mr Bryson commented on it, it wasn't really because those people had thought of it themselves - they were just following normal practice.
Also you're right about "weather". I've experienced Pensylvania, New York, California, Florida. UK is much milder. We don't dodge natural disasters quite like the US that's for sure.
We don't say that queuing is british you do,we don't say that we say sorry all the time you do.
I only ever heard those things from Brits. I didn't know they were stereotypes until I came to the UK, and people born and raised in the UK told them to me. 🤷♂️
What part of the UK have you visited? To me you sound as you have been in London and judge the entire country based on your experience in one city.
And what leafs you to ever say these things are uniquely British. I'm certain we'd argue they are universally polite.
Feels like you made a bunch of assumptions and got most wrong. I use to like this channel.
I summise that you made this video whilst the barbershop was closed ?
I noticed the longer locks too! Perhaps they didn’t give in and start cutting their own hair during the lockdown 😉
I have heard of that study! And the only place I saw people not want to queue was Italy 😉
Great video, Matthew!!
I don’t think anyone likes queuing. It’s just that we are taught from a young age, that everyone should wait their turn, and jumping the queue will not be tolerated! I’ve never noticed the supermarket thing. Having been to America many times, I would say that the way people behave is very similar. Neither polite nor impolite. Cashiers might give you the false ‘“have a nice day” thing occasionally, but that is mostly insincere and part of the training.
Americans tend to be more direct and say what they’re thinking. For example,I was walking across the road with my sister in Florida. An elderly gentleman stopped us and told us we needed to get some more tan! That would never happen in the UK! 😄
I have to agree with the comments saying most of those aren't things that we think are uniquely British, it's perhaps closer to a list of things that we think "Americans don't get" based on your sterioypical brash American tourists. And the sarcasm thing is partly a difference between AmE & BrE - Americans & Brits mean different things by the word. merican.vickihollett.com/sarcasm-in-the-uk-and-us-part-one-whats-sarcastic/
It's a shame you are missing this but we have had a heatwave the last few days... People are going bat shit. But then again it's Britain 😉
"I've never heard of British people saying sorry until I came to the UK". Err, you're back in the States now Matt. That should be "went to the UK". 'Came' implies that you're still here. We don't like ques, we just put up with them. ruclips.net/video/xrz9jMRb4wo/видео.html
This is complete and utter rubbish he doesn’t have a clue!
Brits do apologise for you bumping into them it depends on where you are, the brits seem obsessed by queuing, including the unordered que where all you need to know is who was there first and who is in front of you,
the British have a lot of accents, I did read that there were more accents in the UK than anywhere else in the world per square mile, but there is a lot of slang and dialect as well. Yes there are a lot of American accents but you can generally understand them, put a someone from Newcastle, Sheffield, Hertfordshire, ulster, Liverpool and Glasgow in a room together, some you will understand some you may not or might even think its a different language.
the weather is a safe subject, there is nothing that the British like more than to whine about the weather, to hot to wet to dry to cold, but if you are ever stuck or get that quiet spot in a conversation its simple, "I hear we have rain on the way" and bingo its off again
yes you get these everywhere but being British and growing up its like the British really like rules, when you can do something or say something, what is and isn't considered rude one minute is acceptable in another almost identical situation.
good video