I’ve always had great admiration for the Brits. Here’s a country that stood up to Hitler and where the person of the lowest social status speaks perfect English. Other countries have leaders who barely speak English (if any at all) but in the UK even the butler sounds like the Queen. I was watching Anthony Hopkins in “The Remains of the Day” and was just impressed by how a whole country can put on that fake accent just to impress the rest of the world. And it works. I am always mesmerized by it. I remember watching “Rumpole of the Bailey” and “Keeping Up Appearances” and wondering how they do it. They sound so elegant.
So I found the web site of Mark Roberts, the streaker who has streaked at many events including, a few days ago, at the EUFA cup. You can dowload videos of that and other streaks from his website and they are pretty funny. In this page you can find his stories. He first did it in Hong Kong on a bet. He was having a few beers with his friends in a pub and they dared him to do it and he did it. Not only that but he returned in time to finish his beer.
After reading a few of the stories I am impressed with one thing and that is how relaxed and laid back the British cops are. Every time they get him and they kid and laugh with him and let him go. He has even streaked twice at the same event.
I just cannot imagine this happening in America. American cops have no time for humor. They feel they are heroes saving the world from bad guys who are really bad. This is serious business with no time for levity. A guy who streaks would be handcuffed, arrested and charged with disturbing the peace of millions of Americans who, obviously, have no idea what a naked man looks like and might suffer a heart attack or worse if they saw one.
There is something really fundamentally wrong with a society where so many people choose to be miserable because others are for or against abortion, school prayer, tax cuts or invading some third world country. Americans really need to lighten up and very especially American cops should lighten up a lot. Once the country lightens up there would be much lowered racial and social tensions and everybody would be happier. And the country would not need to go around invading and beating up other countries to prove its worth.
America could learn a lot from the Brits. The Brits lost their empire and sank into insignificance and yet look at them: they still put on that fake English accent, have tea and enjoy a good laugh when a guy runs around naked in public.
Maybe we should let the Brits rule the USA again for a while. Can you imagine British cops patrolling in West LA? The bad guys would feel sorry for them and invite them to tea.
Maybe Americans should all start putting on British accents too. That would really be a hoot. There would be so much laughter nobody could be in a bad mood. Just imagine: if President Bush sounded like Anthony Hopkins he would sound intelligent and sophisticated and even those who disagree with his policies would respect him as they would be too mesmerized with his accent to pay any attention to what he was saying.
In summary: America really needs to lighten up. A lot.
And the Brits are really Ok people.
