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Britons have become so mean that many of us think poor people don’t deserve leisure time
(www.theguardian.com)
this post was submitted on 08 Aug 2023
208 points (97.7% liked)
UK Politics
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"Have become"? They were always this mean. The article doesn't seem to have a comparison between this survey and an earlier one showing that Britons have become this way, and I rather suspect this meanness has always been the way.
I think it is hard for a British news outlet to give their readers a reality check and bash them all in one go without some offramp. The amount of people who would thank for a wake uo call like that is much smaller than the group of conservatives snowflakes who can not deal with criticism and would be enraged.
It also frames it as something that you can easily change. If it was "always have been" people would be more likely to shrug and say "whelp, seems we will never change". Kind of reminds me of how they frame climate change stuff now.
I don’t think you can generalise that broadly. Yes we’re a country of crabs in a bucket, nosy curtain-twitchers, and insufferable village scolds but we’re also a country that gives generously to charity, still fundamentally believes in democracy and the rule of law despite everything that’s happened, and apparently we poll among the least racist and homophobic countries in Europe which is nice.
No nationality is a hive mind, we’re not inherently good people or bad people we’re just people. I think we should be looking to tackle our crab bucket mentality but we can’t do that if we think that mentality is something intrinsically part of us rather than something we can choose to reject.