It strikes me as vicious behavior. Of course responsibility for the spill rests mainly with BP. They gave the (insistent) green light to proceed with the well. While the equipment just happened to be all kinds of neglected, ultimately it is quite plainly BP’s chain of authority which is to blame for allowing the blowout.
But my point is that I am starting to see this kind of behavior as a congenital British trait. So… should I seek counseling? Srsly I can get it free through work
Not everyone. Just one in particular. One who clearly isn’t smart enough to realize that “some” and “everyone else” are not the same thing.
Oh come on. Poetic license, hello? Poster and crew make up an ingroup, the implied outsiders are retards. It really isn’t so big a leap.
What crew? WTF are you babbling about?
It was merely a comment that me judging all Americans but the few idiots I meet, either here or in real life, is about as sensible as you judging British people by the actions of a global multinational corporation that happens to include the word British in its previous name.
Well, you did say this:
It suggests you have some kind of ‘crew’, be it trans-Atlantic or what have you. Maybe you are one of those rare, likable Brits.
Okay fine well and good. Now what am I supposed to do with this anti-Brit antipathy?
BP is 40% owned by British institutions and individuals and 39% by US ones. BP employees some 96,000 permanent members of staff for the day-to-day operation of the business, 10,000 British and 24,000 American.
Why don’t you hate America?
The new Republican slogan as of 1/20/09 (all they had to do was add “n’t”).
I’ll concede I haven’t conducted a comprehensive review of the process but my understanding is that the legislative authorities that have permitted drilling in Alaska were American; that any regulatory bodies overseeing any drilling in Alaska are American; the powers of those the regulatory authorities are decisions taken by Americans; that the sub-contracting companies are likely to be American (or domiciled in a tax haven) and the foremen, engineers and riggers they employ are also likely to be American.
So on that basis it’s crystal clear why it is rational to blame the Brits for everything that might go wrong.
Interesting parallel with what the US has done in the (Arabian) Gulf, don’t you think?
Bottle it. It’s of no monetary value but it does seem to shield you from all manner of dangerous realities.
Move to Ireland! No love of the Union Jack in County Cork, I assure you.
Oh come on now, old chap. Keep a stiff upper lip about it, there’s a good fellow. Damn colonials, always on about their “feelings”. Harrumph. rustler newspaper in vexed fashion
You Cork feckers would have him whining in a New York minute 
That’s assuming he could even understand what the locals were saying. I wouldn’t bet on that… 
I live in the States, idiot. I can see why you would assume the normal situation is to have no friends, but that isn’t true for all people.
Stick it up your arse maybe?
Couldn’t we just dump our teabaggers?
Have you ever seen Die Hard? Or Die Harder? Or The Aristocats? Or any one of a hundred paint-by-numbers Hollywood thrillers with a British villain? Or Patton: Lust for Glory? (yes, even in WW2, the Brits were the villains!)
You’ve been thorough conditioned by your movie industry to believe that plummy accent = Sneaky Brit trying to Get One Over on the Honest Yanks. Once you grok this, you can start to decondition yourself. Remember: just because a bell rings, it doesn’t mean you have to start slavering.
BP America is effectively an American company, almost entirely staffed and run by Americans. The people who screwed up the rig were Americans. It’s almost comical to develop a prejudice against Brits based on this incident.
But … but … they’re different! They’re always adding extra vowels to words and they talk funny!
In fairness, Tony “I want my life back” Hayward’s public statements, in that supercilious Brit accent he has, contributed mightily to the PR issue we see in the OP.
I assumed no such thing. I don’t have any British friends, maybe that’s what you’re interpreting. Brits do take my money however.
Colonize me.
Perhaps. But it is their money (who cashes those dividend checks? Who is harboring the one of the world’s most destructive organizations?), their system, their property, and their record of fecklessness that got us where we are today. Add to that the lies, the denials, the distortions of the truth, the buying up of Google links for gosh sakes (they come to Our country and fiddle with Our free speech!!), the BBC announcers crowing that they don’t care (the link to the broadcast I am referring to isn’t there anymore. 8/1, the guy who got transferred to Berlin…), all the dodgy maneuvers to avoid responsibility and blame, the lowballing of the flow rate, and I suppose you could throw in a long history of Britain causing a lot of damage and then snooting at their victims.
Not that you don’t have a point. I admitted that it isn’t rational. Nonetheless I am not liking the Brits right now, and pretty much assign the whole bag to the British national character. That’s not very nice, no?