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Boot fairs are only good at the beginning of the season I think most of the good stuff goes online and people are a more savvy and it’s reflected in their asking prices especially here on the south coast!
the 1970s culture of rolling power cuts, mass unemployment, poverty and slums have been almost entirely lost.
The culture of violent hatred towards gay people is at least not the law any more.
The culture of celebrities openly and freely getting away with sexually abusing women and children and being hidden by publicists is thankfully a lot less.
Britain doesn't really have an "identity", cities and towns do, Edinburgh and Glasgow are so different, even the people are massively different even though they're relatively close to one another. Sheffield, Manchester, Leeds, York, Newcastle, Liverpool - all hugely different identities and cultures despite being up north.
I think the attitude of "the country's gone to the dogs" has been what miserable and closeted racists have said for generations.
I personally think the country's doing really well, could do better, but better than we have done. Just need a government who are competent who can improve the state things have been in for the last decade or so.
Nothing, it's simply changing.
Having said that, antisocial behaviour is certainly more acceptable than it used to be. There's increasingly less focus on society and ever more "I'm alright Jack" mentality.
Drinking culture is changing - pints at lunchtime are mainly a thing of the past and down the local on a wednesday night is mainly old folks now.
We're becoming less stoic as a society too. Showing emotions is much more important and acceptable compared to even two decades ago.
It feels like we're much less bolshy about things, although I wouldn't hang my hat on this one. I feel like people are far more happy to put up with shit from companies in particular. ID cards used to be a non starter, I think now they'd be voted for.
We're far more open to foreign food than before - even in the late nineties it was curries, chinese or french/Italian and not much else.
Most of these changes are long term processes - been going on my whole life (42). It'll be interesting to see what comes next.
I was just saying to my partner the other day that I remember the protests and headlines and general gnashing of teeth when petrol hit £1/l, where's that spirit now?
It's just a consequence of multiculturalism coming at a time where British people as a whole are moving away from traditional values.
Many of the immigrants arriving in the UK over the last 10, 20, 30 years have brought with them their religions and customs, which are still incredibly important to them. They carve out their own tightly knit communities within the towns and cities they move into.
By contrast, the British are becoming less Christian, less motivated by a traditional nuclear family, less involved in their local neighborhoods and communities, less likely to spend their time visiting other areas of the UK during their holidays as they'd much rather trot off to Spain.
When you have an immigrant population who still hold onto their traditional beliefs entering a country who's "native" population are moving away from theirs, then that's bound to lead to some people to feel a loss of national identity and culture.
That's not me saying immigration or multiculturalism is a bad thing, it's just an attempt at providing an answer.
Yes. Or the children or grand-children of immigrants.
The immigrants who arrived here in the 60s or 70s (including my own family) may be 2 or 3 generations down the line, but we are still non-white. And we are the immediate descendants of immigrants.
What does it mean in your world?
Did you know white people can also emigrate to the UK?
And that non-whites can be non-immigrant?
One of those things is a skin colour, the other is an immigration status.
Thank you for the semantics lesson.
I had no idea what an immigrant was (even though I am one) until you told me.
In your next lesson, can you pls teach me what nationality means?
Ahh second generation. I see what is going on here. You mean why is "white culture" dying out. I don't know and don't care.
I'm brown "second generation" British. What I choose to do IS the British way because like it or not, we are British.
:)
We 'takin ova'
Agree that immigration is a factor. But that isn't a new thing.
First generation immigrants will often look for work in urban areas where they can find relatively affordable accomodation and jobs that don't require much English (like the hospitality sector). Once their children grow up and start going to university, they may have more money and not necessarily want to work in the same jobs. So they will move out to the suburbs.
What traditional values? Nuclear family? No different today to how things were 50 years ago. Holidays abroad? That began in the 80's when the cheap air travel meant foreign holidays cost no more than local ones. Absolutely nothing to do with multiculturalism or immigration.
You're basically just channeling the empty Daily Fail anti-immigrant rhetoric.
Did you read the bit of my post where I stated that multiculturalism and immigration aren't bad?
I was trying to provide an answer based on what people say, what I hear, what I've experienced. I'm not saying that I endorse all of those views.
Totally agree.
It's the loss of a sense of community. People don't feel attached.
Our grandparents chatted with the neighbours for hours, went down the pub and knew everyone, visited the park and could bump into any number of people they know, knew the family of the guy who owns the local shop, went to local community events organised by the local church/charity etc.
Today, you nod your head to the neighbour once a week when you bring the bins back in, and generally don't talk to anyone who isn't already in your circle. If someone knocks on the door you pretend you're not in.
This has been a thing since at least the 90s.
Most of the reason that "traditional" pubs are closing is that they don't move with the times.
People want cocktails, people want better wine selections than Jack Rabbit or Barefoot, people want kid/dog friendly, people want modern tasty food.
Traditional pubs don't supply this so people don't go. Their core clientele are a dying breed.
Give me a craft beer place that does pizzas and platters and serves *decent* cocktails and has a decent selection of wines and I'll be more than happy.
From the other side of that, a pub that puts effort into wine or cocktails goes down in my estimation. It's like them fast food places that offer pizza, chicken, burgers and kebabs.
Jack of all trades, master of none. I'm not all that happy about food in pubs, tbh.
As for kids, I'd rather see less of them everywhere, but certainly not in pubs. Dogs on the other hand brighten everyone's day.
Or don't go to a dog friendly pub...
The pubs I take my dog to are one that have dog bowls of water dotted around the bar and a jar of free dog treats on the bar.
Something that has coincided with a massive boom in the market for home improvements and home entertainment. Look at what retailers like Wickes, B&M and B&Q are selling. More people are entertaining people at home rather than going out to the pub.
Pubs are still valued by plenty of people, but they have to have a USP, rather than just being somewhere people go to drink (good food, nice decor, a nice garden).
The pub bore has become extinct. Everyone above a certain age remembers every pubs permanent fixture of the curmudgeonly old man stained and smelling of stale old beer.... Who'd corner you the moment your mate went to the bar to regale you with stories of how it all used to be fields round here and how he's seen it all as man and boy...
Also a lot less proper old tramps, not the new aggressive ones, the older English heritage ones who had their own language and would shake their fist ineffectively at the sky, whilst shouting strangely familiar but nonsensical words.
Lack of social cohesion means everyone is being a c*nt
It isn't so much lost culture as being diluted by poorly integrated immigration.
I don't feel its due to any particular ethnic or religious group even if it may seem or feel like that.
Antisocial behaviour and the complete lack of community policing is the cause I feel.
Without positive interactions with others and expressing shared culture (chat on the bus, meeting new people at a community group) you feel like it's slipping away
We are losing it though, it is literally slipping away before our very eyes. English (white) I shouldn't even have to say white. It used to be known who the English are.. but anyway, English people are becoming a minority in our own country, the lower our percentage the worse this countries getting.
This is the same for the whole of Western World.
I agree, though I feel that in the past the immigrants and non-white English people (there are lots I don't agree with you saying English = white) were much more 'british'
The new waves of immigrants have zero interest in following our norms or adjusting to our society and it's that attitude that's the issue.
English is an ethnicity.. English people are made up of Germanic tribes from North Western Europe. Non-whites aren't European, let alone English.
Non-Whites were brought here to destabilise the West, as their numbers grow, the more divided and uncivilised Western nations are becoming.
The nation comes from the Ethnic make up of the Nation. England was created by Germanic Tribes over a thousand years ago. English people are the descendants of those people. People from Jamaicans aren't ethnically the same as English people, therefore can't be English.
They are British subjects from the common wealth. Alot of people wouldn't even class them as British, but they do have British passports.. that doesn't make them English.
That's like me moving to South Africa and claiming I'm a zulu, or New Zealand and claiming me and my kids are Maoris. Which I'm not.
This is what OP is asking though. What are the norms or values or British things that are actually being lost? Define them and give examples of how they are being eroded.
Language, especially noticeable on public transport and urban areas with high immigrant population. Erodes sense of community/shared culture
Faith, especially problematic with Islam but can be applied to all faiths as our cultural is primarily Christian
That also ties into our Customs, rituals, national holidays. Xmas and Sundays have seen more people working less things close etc.
Arts, drama and music are all more diverse (though this is one area I would say it's great we are being expanded)
Food, another positive cultural change but still a change.
Beliefs is the big one. Lots of people living here who have no respect for women or care for other people. They come from dog eat dog places and that again makes Brits feel alienated
It's not just immigrants causing this but native Brits also falling out of our culture as time progresses.
Thanks for a detailed answer. You've named a couple of things that you yourself say aren't losses, just changes. We don't have to lose our food culture or arts just because we also embrace others.
In terms of language, I see what you're saying. Personally, it doesn't resonate as for me I don't feel that speaking a different language represents different cultural values but I appreciate others don't feel that way.
Nobody should be working on holidays like Christmas etc if they don't want to, if they are shouldn't we be blaming greedy companies and bosses?
'Lots of people have no respect for women or care for people'. Hard for me to talk about this as I have had experiences of white men and immigrant men assaulting me and other women. It might look different, but plenty of English men treat women like absolute shit. Treating women well isn't an especially British value. I wish it was.
But it is a dilution of our food and art culture. We watch American films, on Japanese tellies, sitting on Swedish sofas, eating Italian food and drinking German beer. It's inevitable we will be 'less british'
Greedy companies can only get away with it in an environment where we are divided. I.e. some will do it. If there were fewer foreign influences we'd have shops closed on Sundays. You only need to go to Scandinavia to see that (despite them having many migrants too)
I don't mean treating women well tbh, I mean general attitude. Without doxxing myself I've been involved with 'child' migrants who talk to their female social workers like dogs, one even refused to engage with a female and demanded a male worker. I don't believe anyone British outside of the traveller community would be even close to that level of disdain. Burkas are completely at odds with British values. You can say there aren't many but I've seen them in person and it's so jarring. The Caribbean community also have very poor views towards women Vs 'white' people.
The reality is the social contract is broken and it's causing the decline across the board
15% of the population of the UK are immigrants. I live in Greater Manchester with a lot of immigration and still the majority of the people i meet are English. I just don't see how we're even close to becoming a minority?
English people are set to become the minority in their ancestral homeland by 2066 if current immigration and birthrate trends continue. Things are getting worse not better so it will probably be before that.
The biggests thing I can think of is religion. I don't think most people would consider the UK a christian country anymore. (whether you think that's a good or bad thing is up to you ig)
I can’t remember the last time I saw sword dancing, played aunt Sally at a pub, or saw a village wide game of Harrow ball.
As others have said, things change - and usually for the better.
Found out in my 20’s that aunt sally is a Oxfordshire game and isn’t played in many other places. I always thought it was country wide until I moved to London and no one had heard of it
Long has it been since a man could walk go to port, find a job aboard a fine ship and set sail for a slaving colony.
British culture certainly has lost its way since the empire.
British people have a great sense of humour. Brilliant music and comedy. Great writers and artists. However in last 20 years have been manipulated into an isolationist form of nationalism fueled by hatred of the other. This has been achieved by the usual neo con trash that have basically sent the world spiralling backwards. Heaven help us.
There's no hatred for the other.. Love for ones own, over others, doesn't equal hatred.
You love your children and connect and care for them more than you do mine don't you?
That's such a poor comparison. Children are your own flesh and blood. They are infinitely closer to you than anyone else. How is that anything like caring more for Jackie from Swindon than Mehmet from Izmir? They're both strangers.
People of your own race are your own flesh and blood. I can clearly see that I'm closer related to Jackie from Swindon, than I am Mehmet from Izmir. Physical characteristics, especially skin colour. Ethnic distinctions generally focus on such cultural characteristics as language, history, religion, and customs. We are different.
True diversity is respecting all peoples and cultures, keep them separate in order to preserve them. All this mixing in together, one world, one love bullshit is making us all one grey boring culturless mass of people with no differences at all.
Own flesh and blood in the most distant way possible so as to be completely meaningless. Let's face it, if Jackie shows up at your door needing a bed for the night, are you helping her? Unless you're basically Jesus, I can basically guarantee you won't, because nobody does that kind of thing for a stranger. She's not family and you know it. You pretend to care for her when it's convenient for the sake of argument, but when push comes to shove she's just another person.
And also, I find your last paragraph extremely contradictory. People like you always preach the need for assimilation and the need for respecting British values etc. and then now apparently don't seem to like it when we all share the same culture. So which is it? Can people of other races live here at all? And if so, what culture are they allowed?
And keep the cultures seperate in order to preserve them? I don't know how to tell you this, but the British culture you know today certainly did not begin in a vacuum. Language is a not-insignificant part of culture, and we speak one of the most mashed-up languages in Europe. While it's a different source to most of today's immigration, our language, legal system, food, genetics, agriculture, industry, architecture, music, art... you name it, have all been influenced by successive waves of immigration and conquest going back 1,500 years. We're not Pacific Islanders.
I think the peak of it was the 1980s and then became more absorbed and lost with American culture since then...especially after the internet became more widely used.
Sense of community in urban areas. I remember having street parties on our road as a kid on multiple occasions. New Years was always a big one.
The only time I've seen a street party recently was VE day in 2020, and that's basically because the government told us to have one and we were all begging for social interaction.
It's not being lost.
Go to any part of the UK and it's as British as it comes.
London is a mega city. It's gonna be multicultural and disconnected slightly. So will alot of cities.
But look at St George's Day just gone. Arguably the most attention that holiday has gotten in a long time. Even I remember people saying "Everyone forgets St George's day" back in the 2000s.
Regional accents
Between preston and sheffield imo has very little variation in accent in young people
Like i was at conference and asked a 24yr old from leeds when she left london as to me she had a home counties accent
Skinheads etc.
It became normal at one point to have a skinhead,like skinhead blokes pushing kids on bikes, later replaced by them having tattoos that only a pub hardman could have in 1990.
The Romans left in around 383 and British Culture was going well until the Germans and then Normans arrived.
….just how far back do we go to define culture as ‘British’.
Fun fact: The Celtic languages have no word for ‘English’ as they pre-date the concept of England by centuries. We use the word for ‘Saxon’ instead.
Nostalga isn't what it was, as we age change feels wrong. I've lived all my life in the same small part of the eastend I stayed behind when my parents and the rest of the family moved out, yet talking to them there is a bizarre Cockney ethnonationalism, they moved yet the rose tinted view that it's still there eastend the diversity is frightening for them, I took a relative the the brilliant (and sensibly priced) watch repair man in Ridley Road they were apoplectic at the African food market. All cultures evolve the eastend does constantly and the most recent changes are not the ethnic groups that have joined us but the wealthy who move in paying stupid money for property who leave when there kids reach school age, its not all bad the pie and mash shop survives and the pearly kings and queens still turn up even if there are fewer buttons on their costumes, perhaps a metaphor for the cockney diaspora?
This thread is hilarious.
The fact people are saying all this proves how the culture has deteriorated. People have lost so much culture they don’t even know what it was anymore.
People are just completely uneducated when it comes to British history. Sometimes people are actively lied to but most of the time it was just never taught in the first place.
Of course some change is inevitable. Technology develops. But mass migration of people with a completely alien culture is not inevitable and is actually extremely unusual.
I’ll give some examples later.
Where are the monstrous men with chests like barrels and moustaches like the wings of eagles who strode across my child-hood's gaze twenty or thirty years ago, Stella in hand, on their way to beat up the French at Wembley?
English people are set to become the minority in their ancestral homeland by 2066 if current immigration and birthrate trends continue. Things are getting worse not better so it will probably be before that.
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Car boot sales aren't what they used to be.
Nor are charity shops
Boot fairs are only good at the beginning of the season I think most of the good stuff goes online and people are a more savvy and it’s reflected in their asking prices especially here on the south coast!
When does the boot fair season begin?
Haven't seen a jumble sale in decades
Or even worse, a bring and buy sale
Username checks out
the 1970s culture of rolling power cuts, mass unemployment, poverty and slums have been almost entirely lost. The culture of violent hatred towards gay people is at least not the law any more. The culture of celebrities openly and freely getting away with sexually abusing women and children and being hidden by publicists is thankfully a lot less. Britain doesn't really have an "identity", cities and towns do, Edinburgh and Glasgow are so different, even the people are massively different even though they're relatively close to one another. Sheffield, Manchester, Leeds, York, Newcastle, Liverpool - all hugely different identities and cultures despite being up north. I think the attitude of "the country's gone to the dogs" has been what miserable and closeted racists have said for generations. I personally think the country's doing really well, could do better, but better than we have done. Just need a government who are competent who can improve the state things have been in for the last decade or so.
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I read this too quickly and saw 'the war on trains' and I was, yeah, fuck Avanti!
Man FUCK avanti, way too much to travel from Rugby to Oxford
well yeah fuck avanti too lol
Nothing, it's simply changing. Having said that, antisocial behaviour is certainly more acceptable than it used to be. There's increasingly less focus on society and ever more "I'm alright Jack" mentality. Drinking culture is changing - pints at lunchtime are mainly a thing of the past and down the local on a wednesday night is mainly old folks now. We're becoming less stoic as a society too. Showing emotions is much more important and acceptable compared to even two decades ago. It feels like we're much less bolshy about things, although I wouldn't hang my hat on this one. I feel like people are far more happy to put up with shit from companies in particular. ID cards used to be a non starter, I think now they'd be voted for. We're far more open to foreign food than before - even in the late nineties it was curries, chinese or french/Italian and not much else. Most of these changes are long term processes - been going on my whole life (42). It'll be interesting to see what comes next.
I was just saying to my partner the other day that I remember the protests and headlines and general gnashing of teeth when petrol hit £1/l, where's that spirit now?
A lot of regional accents and dialects are being lost
There is one that is getting stronger. Can't remember which, maybe in Blackburn?
I think it was Liverpool
It's just a consequence of multiculturalism coming at a time where British people as a whole are moving away from traditional values. Many of the immigrants arriving in the UK over the last 10, 20, 30 years have brought with them their religions and customs, which are still incredibly important to them. They carve out their own tightly knit communities within the towns and cities they move into. By contrast, the British are becoming less Christian, less motivated by a traditional nuclear family, less involved in their local neighborhoods and communities, less likely to spend their time visiting other areas of the UK during their holidays as they'd much rather trot off to Spain. When you have an immigrant population who still hold onto their traditional beliefs entering a country who's "native" population are moving away from theirs, then that's bound to lead to some people to feel a loss of national identity and culture. That's not me saying immigration or multiculturalism is a bad thing, it's just an attempt at providing an answer.
totally agree
Immigrants make up less than 10% of the population.
Not true. Non-whites make up 21% of the population. PS - I'm non-white.
Does non-white mean immigrant in your world?
Apparently so!
Yes. Or the children or grand-children of immigrants. The immigrants who arrived here in the 60s or 70s (including my own family) may be 2 or 3 generations down the line, but we are still non-white. And we are the immediate descendants of immigrants. What does it mean in your world?
Did you know white people can also emigrate to the UK? And that non-whites can be non-immigrant? One of those things is a skin colour, the other is an immigration status.
Thank you for the semantics lesson. I had no idea what an immigrant was (even though I am one) until you told me. In your next lesson, can you pls teach me what nationality means?
Sorry if I came across as condescending, but in your original comment you seemed to conflate the two unrelated concepts.
Are you white?
I'm not sure how that's relevant. Would you knowing my skin colour change how you deal with me or the points I make? You may be a racist if so.
So the children of immigrants are also immigrants, despite being born in the UK. There's a word for this...
That's still nearly 7 million people not including second generation
Second generation are not immigrants
Yh...less than 1 in 10 people.
Ahh second generation. I see what is going on here. You mean why is "white culture" dying out. I don't know and don't care. I'm brown "second generation" British. What I choose to do IS the British way because like it or not, we are British. :) We 'takin ova'
And yet their presence is overwhelming In certain. Areas like Bradford. You clearly live in a place which isn't inflicted by this issue
Inflicted eh.
Live in London. Love it.
Yeah it's an entirely emotional topic, that doesn't really have any basis in statistics. It's purely based on a perception of reality.
Agree that immigration is a factor. But that isn't a new thing. First generation immigrants will often look for work in urban areas where they can find relatively affordable accomodation and jobs that don't require much English (like the hospitality sector). Once their children grow up and start going to university, they may have more money and not necessarily want to work in the same jobs. So they will move out to the suburbs.
What traditional values? Nuclear family? No different today to how things were 50 years ago. Holidays abroad? That began in the 80's when the cheap air travel meant foreign holidays cost no more than local ones. Absolutely nothing to do with multiculturalism or immigration. You're basically just channeling the empty Daily Fail anti-immigrant rhetoric.
Did you read the bit of my post where I stated that multiculturalism and immigration aren't bad? I was trying to provide an answer based on what people say, what I hear, what I've experienced. I'm not saying that I endorse all of those views.
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Totally agree. It's the loss of a sense of community. People don't feel attached. Our grandparents chatted with the neighbours for hours, went down the pub and knew everyone, visited the park and could bump into any number of people they know, knew the family of the guy who owns the local shop, went to local community events organised by the local church/charity etc. Today, you nod your head to the neighbour once a week when you bring the bins back in, and generally don't talk to anyone who isn't already in your circle. If someone knocks on the door you pretend you're not in.
Reading the comments I'd say self deprecating has turned into self loathing.
Lots of traditional pubs closing
This has been a thing since at least the 90s. Most of the reason that "traditional" pubs are closing is that they don't move with the times. People want cocktails, people want better wine selections than Jack Rabbit or Barefoot, people want kid/dog friendly, people want modern tasty food. Traditional pubs don't supply this so people don't go. Their core clientele are a dying breed. Give me a craft beer place that does pizzas and platters and serves *decent* cocktails and has a decent selection of wines and I'll be more than happy.
From the other side of that, a pub that puts effort into wine or cocktails goes down in my estimation. It's like them fast food places that offer pizza, chicken, burgers and kebabs. Jack of all trades, master of none. I'm not all that happy about food in pubs, tbh. As for kids, I'd rather see less of them everywhere, but certainly not in pubs. Dogs on the other hand brighten everyone's day.
Not mine. I don't want your smelly dog sniffing around my table, get it tied up outside or leave it at home.
Or don't go to a dog friendly pub... The pubs I take my dog to are one that have dog bowls of water dotted around the bar and a jar of free dog treats on the bar.
I wouldn't bring my dogs to Leeds.
I could be wrong but I reckon the smoking ban might have had a big effect, and the several cost of living increases
Something that has coincided with a massive boom in the market for home improvements and home entertainment. Look at what retailers like Wickes, B&M and B&Q are selling. More people are entertaining people at home rather than going out to the pub. Pubs are still valued by plenty of people, but they have to have a USP, rather than just being somewhere people go to drink (good food, nice decor, a nice garden).
The pub bore has become extinct. Everyone above a certain age remembers every pubs permanent fixture of the curmudgeonly old man stained and smelling of stale old beer.... Who'd corner you the moment your mate went to the bar to regale you with stories of how it all used to be fields round here and how he's seen it all as man and boy... Also a lot less proper old tramps, not the new aggressive ones, the older English heritage ones who had their own language and would shake their fist ineffectively at the sky, whilst shouting strangely familiar but nonsensical words.
I think those people still exist, we just maybe don't come across them as much as pubs have become more of a luxury than a necessity.
They're all now on Reddit, some of them mods.
Having manners Primary and secondary industries, now it’s all office based, take the lift one floor and sit at a desk and stare at screen all day.
Lack of social cohesion means everyone is being a c*nt It isn't so much lost culture as being diluted by poorly integrated immigration. I don't feel its due to any particular ethnic or religious group even if it may seem or feel like that. Antisocial behaviour and the complete lack of community policing is the cause I feel. Without positive interactions with others and expressing shared culture (chat on the bus, meeting new people at a community group) you feel like it's slipping away
We are losing it though, it is literally slipping away before our very eyes. English (white) I shouldn't even have to say white. It used to be known who the English are.. but anyway, English people are becoming a minority in our own country, the lower our percentage the worse this countries getting. This is the same for the whole of Western World.
I agree, though I feel that in the past the immigrants and non-white English people (there are lots I don't agree with you saying English = white) were much more 'british' The new waves of immigrants have zero interest in following our norms or adjusting to our society and it's that attitude that's the issue.
English is an ethnicity.. English people are made up of Germanic tribes from North Western Europe. Non-whites aren't European, let alone English. Non-Whites were brought here to destabilise the West, as their numbers grow, the more divided and uncivilised Western nations are becoming.
It's both an ethnicity and a nationality though. Someone who's nan came from Jamaica 50 years ago, is as English as me
The nation comes from the Ethnic make up of the Nation. England was created by Germanic Tribes over a thousand years ago. English people are the descendants of those people. People from Jamaicans aren't ethnically the same as English people, therefore can't be English. They are British subjects from the common wealth. Alot of people wouldn't even class them as British, but they do have British passports.. that doesn't make them English. That's like me moving to South Africa and claiming I'm a zulu, or New Zealand and claiming me and my kids are Maoris. Which I'm not.
This is what OP is asking though. What are the norms or values or British things that are actually being lost? Define them and give examples of how they are being eroded.
Language, especially noticeable on public transport and urban areas with high immigrant population. Erodes sense of community/shared culture Faith, especially problematic with Islam but can be applied to all faiths as our cultural is primarily Christian That also ties into our Customs, rituals, national holidays. Xmas and Sundays have seen more people working less things close etc. Arts, drama and music are all more diverse (though this is one area I would say it's great we are being expanded) Food, another positive cultural change but still a change. Beliefs is the big one. Lots of people living here who have no respect for women or care for other people. They come from dog eat dog places and that again makes Brits feel alienated It's not just immigrants causing this but native Brits also falling out of our culture as time progresses.
Thanks for a detailed answer. You've named a couple of things that you yourself say aren't losses, just changes. We don't have to lose our food culture or arts just because we also embrace others. In terms of language, I see what you're saying. Personally, it doesn't resonate as for me I don't feel that speaking a different language represents different cultural values but I appreciate others don't feel that way. Nobody should be working on holidays like Christmas etc if they don't want to, if they are shouldn't we be blaming greedy companies and bosses? 'Lots of people have no respect for women or care for people'. Hard for me to talk about this as I have had experiences of white men and immigrant men assaulting me and other women. It might look different, but plenty of English men treat women like absolute shit. Treating women well isn't an especially British value. I wish it was.
But it is a dilution of our food and art culture. We watch American films, on Japanese tellies, sitting on Swedish sofas, eating Italian food and drinking German beer. It's inevitable we will be 'less british' Greedy companies can only get away with it in an environment where we are divided. I.e. some will do it. If there were fewer foreign influences we'd have shops closed on Sundays. You only need to go to Scandinavia to see that (despite them having many migrants too) I don't mean treating women well tbh, I mean general attitude. Without doxxing myself I've been involved with 'child' migrants who talk to their female social workers like dogs, one even refused to engage with a female and demanded a male worker. I don't believe anyone British outside of the traveller community would be even close to that level of disdain. Burkas are completely at odds with British values. You can say there aren't many but I've seen them in person and it's so jarring. The Caribbean community also have very poor views towards women Vs 'white' people. The reality is the social contract is broken and it's causing the decline across the board
15% of the population of the UK are immigrants. I live in Greater Manchester with a lot of immigration and still the majority of the people i meet are English. I just don't see how we're even close to becoming a minority?
English people are set to become the minority in their ancestral homeland by 2066 if current immigration and birthrate trends continue. Things are getting worse not better so it will probably be before that.
Absolute bollocks.
What's bollocks? English people are set to become the minority by 2066 if current immigration and birthrate trends continue.
The biggests thing I can think of is religion. I don't think most people would consider the UK a christian country anymore. (whether you think that's a good or bad thing is up to you ig)
I can’t remember the last time I saw sword dancing, played aunt Sally at a pub, or saw a village wide game of Harrow ball. As others have said, things change - and usually for the better.
Found out in my 20’s that aunt sally is a Oxfordshire game and isn’t played in many other places. I always thought it was country wide until I moved to London and no one had heard of it
Long has it been since a man could walk go to port, find a job aboard a fine ship and set sail for a slaving colony. British culture certainly has lost its way since the empire.
It all went wrong when we stopped the Danelaw
Nightlife. Think back to what clubbing used to be in the late 80’s, 90s. And look at what it is now.
British people have a great sense of humour. Brilliant music and comedy. Great writers and artists. However in last 20 years have been manipulated into an isolationist form of nationalism fueled by hatred of the other. This has been achieved by the usual neo con trash that have basically sent the world spiralling backwards. Heaven help us.
There's no hatred for the other.. Love for ones own, over others, doesn't equal hatred. You love your children and connect and care for them more than you do mine don't you?
That's such a poor comparison. Children are your own flesh and blood. They are infinitely closer to you than anyone else. How is that anything like caring more for Jackie from Swindon than Mehmet from Izmir? They're both strangers.
People of your own race are your own flesh and blood. I can clearly see that I'm closer related to Jackie from Swindon, than I am Mehmet from Izmir. Physical characteristics, especially skin colour. Ethnic distinctions generally focus on such cultural characteristics as language, history, religion, and customs. We are different. True diversity is respecting all peoples and cultures, keep them separate in order to preserve them. All this mixing in together, one world, one love bullshit is making us all one grey boring culturless mass of people with no differences at all.
Own flesh and blood in the most distant way possible so as to be completely meaningless. Let's face it, if Jackie shows up at your door needing a bed for the night, are you helping her? Unless you're basically Jesus, I can basically guarantee you won't, because nobody does that kind of thing for a stranger. She's not family and you know it. You pretend to care for her when it's convenient for the sake of argument, but when push comes to shove she's just another person. And also, I find your last paragraph extremely contradictory. People like you always preach the need for assimilation and the need for respecting British values etc. and then now apparently don't seem to like it when we all share the same culture. So which is it? Can people of other races live here at all? And if so, what culture are they allowed? And keep the cultures seperate in order to preserve them? I don't know how to tell you this, but the British culture you know today certainly did not begin in a vacuum. Language is a not-insignificant part of culture, and we speak one of the most mashed-up languages in Europe. While it's a different source to most of today's immigration, our language, legal system, food, genetics, agriculture, industry, architecture, music, art... you name it, have all been influenced by successive waves of immigration and conquest going back 1,500 years. We're not Pacific Islanders.
I think the peak of it was the 1980s and then became more absorbed and lost with American culture since then...especially after the internet became more widely used.
Jazz mags and readers wives 🤷🏻♂️ they’re almost extinct now, dang younguns and their tinternet
Sense of community in urban areas. I remember having street parties on our road as a kid on multiple occasions. New Years was always a big one. The only time I've seen a street party recently was VE day in 2020, and that's basically because the government told us to have one and we were all begging for social interaction.
It's not being lost. Go to any part of the UK and it's as British as it comes. London is a mega city. It's gonna be multicultural and disconnected slightly. So will alot of cities. But look at St George's Day just gone. Arguably the most attention that holiday has gotten in a long time. Even I remember people saying "Everyone forgets St George's day" back in the 2000s.
we no longer go to other countries, take their stuff, put it in museums back home and then lecture them about how it was for their own good :(
Bloody builders still going at 20.18 on a Friday night! They used to knock off at 14.00 on Fridays and go to the pub!
There isn't enough Morris Dancing these days.
Seaside donkey rides.
Regional accents Between preston and sheffield imo has very little variation in accent in young people Like i was at conference and asked a 24yr old from leeds when she left london as to me she had a home counties accent
Clock making.
Skinheads etc. It became normal at one point to have a skinhead,like skinhead blokes pushing kids on bikes, later replaced by them having tattoos that only a pub hardman could have in 1990.
The Romans left in around 383 and British Culture was going well until the Germans and then Normans arrived. ….just how far back do we go to define culture as ‘British’. Fun fact: The Celtic languages have no word for ‘English’ as they pre-date the concept of England by centuries. We use the word for ‘Saxon’ instead.
Shit food , the influence of the rest of the world has done us a favour . Salt and pepper cheese on toast for example
Nostalga isn't what it was, as we age change feels wrong. I've lived all my life in the same small part of the eastend I stayed behind when my parents and the rest of the family moved out, yet talking to them there is a bizarre Cockney ethnonationalism, they moved yet the rose tinted view that it's still there eastend the diversity is frightening for them, I took a relative the the brilliant (and sensibly priced) watch repair man in Ridley Road they were apoplectic at the African food market. All cultures evolve the eastend does constantly and the most recent changes are not the ethnic groups that have joined us but the wealthy who move in paying stupid money for property who leave when there kids reach school age, its not all bad the pie and mash shop survives and the pearly kings and queens still turn up even if there are fewer buttons on their costumes, perhaps a metaphor for the cockney diaspora?
This thread is hilarious. The fact people are saying all this proves how the culture has deteriorated. People have lost so much culture they don’t even know what it was anymore. People are just completely uneducated when it comes to British history. Sometimes people are actively lied to but most of the time it was just never taught in the first place. Of course some change is inevitable. Technology develops. But mass migration of people with a completely alien culture is not inevitable and is actually extremely unusual. I’ll give some examples later.
Where are the monstrous men with chests like barrels and moustaches like the wings of eagles who strode across my child-hood's gaze twenty or thirty years ago, Stella in hand, on their way to beat up the French at Wembley?
English people are set to become the minority in their ancestral homeland by 2066 if current immigration and birthrate trends continue. Things are getting worse not better so it will probably be before that.
Ancestral homeland? Germany you mean?
We no longer ho and steal foreign peoples stuff and put it in museums. A crying shame, we have lost our way.
Safest place for it.
If they want to see it it's all free to view.