THE LAND OF SHAMBLES AND INCOMPETENCE:
Here's a story from Heathrow:
Though I was born and raised in South Africa, Britain has been my home for more than 20 years. I have raised a family here, come to know the UK as a wonderful and welcoming country where, by and large, things work pretty well. But my God, how that view was challenged as I flew into Heathrow Airport last weekend...
So, after going through all the necessary testing in South Africa, I flew home and the prospect of ten days quarantine in a hotel. I left Cape Town on the eve of May 1 on Turkish Airlines, with a stopover in Istanbul, before arriving into London at half past nine on the morning of May 2, a quarter of an hour ahead of schedule. So far, so competent. Both in South Africa and in Turkey the journey could not have been smoother. But for the masks and the social distancing, it was like pre-Covid travel. And then, Terminal 2, London Heathrow and the UK border.
‘Shambles’ does not even get close to describing the experience. Chaos. Levels of incompetence that we associate perhaps with the poorer countries of my native continent, not one of the world’s most famous airports in one of the world’s most advanced economies.
Leaving Cape Town and transiting in Istanbul, there had been a sense of calm efficiency. Signs for social distancing were clear, and the process well managed, the airport and border processes well staffed. At Heathrow, I could scarcely believe the density of the queues as the customs hall filled with passengers, with no social distancing whatsoever, no mask enforcement and people crowding in on each other as the lines lengthened, customs officials woeful in managing the flow, and no obvious ventilation...
Inside the Heathrow petri dish | The New European
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But why the shambolic and incompetent set-up at Heathrow?
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THE CLASS SYSTEM:
One of the main issues is the make-up of British society:
Jay Doubleyou: class is the big issue in the united kingdom: part one
Jay Doubleyou: class is the big issue in the united kingdom: part three
As surveyed by the BBC ten years ago, attitudes to class and service are part of the same picture:
Snobbery
For chef Michel Roux Jr, good service in a restaurant is as important as good food. If people don't feel welcome they won't come back. It's the same in any business, regulars are their life-blood.
Yet, despite how important it is, why is the UK still lagging so far behind? It's a hangover from the British class system, says Roux. "The issue of service in Britain is, maybe, a class problem with service seen as subservient," he says. "The old Upstairs-Downstairs syndrome, where it is only for the lower classes."
Why is service still so bad in the UK? - BBC News
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LOWER QUALITY SOCIAL SERVICES: LOWER SOCIAL CLASSES:
Class is at the centre of life in the UK:
Britain is obsessed with social class. Whether it’s the jobs we have, the words we use, the education we receive, political beliefs, or even the TV shows we watch, being preoccupied with class is as British as drinking tea and eating fish and chips. While the class system is complex, a key differentiator is economic capital; and a lack of income equality gives Britain one of the worst social mobility problems in the world.
Resolution Foundation: Britain's class problem comes down to "assortative mating" — Quartz
"Class prejudice is alive and well in modern Britain":
If you're from a lower social class, you won't complain, so things don't get better:
Satisfaction and Expectations: Attitudes to publicservices in deprived areas
If you don't own property, you have even less of a chance:
There Are Two Distinct Classes in Britain: People Who Own Property and People Who Are Getting Poorer
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PUBLIC TRANSPORT:
In the UK, any service which is 'public' is generally bad, because these services are for the 'public' - that is, the 'masses' who generally don't deserve any better.
This attitude translates into snobbery over buses and trains:
Did Margaret Thatcher say bus users over the age of 25 were failures? - Full Fact
In fact, if you go by train in the UK, it's as bad as a cattle truck:
Britain's worst journeys named and shamed | UK | News | Express.co.uk
Commuters get less space on trains than cows on cattle trucks | Metro News
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PUBLIC HOSPITALS:
The health service in the UK is free and very good - but hospital wards are much larger than on the continent:
the-use-of-single-patient-rooms-v-multiple.pdf
Middle-class medicine - Payment and Philanthropy in British Healthcare
For example:
The postnatal ward to which we were assigned was just a short elevator ride from the birth center, but it may as well have been on a different planet. It was made up of dozens of "rooms" — tiny cubicles with four curtains for walls. Privacy was non-existent. We could hear everything going on around us — patients' cell phone conversations, private consultations, coughing, laughing, eating, snoring, and of course, crying newborns.The good, the bad, and the ugly of England's universal health-care system
On an even deeper level, did the British upper classes treat their own lower orders in the same way as the lesser people they colonised - treating them with "infantalizing benevolence"?
Wards Apart?: Rethinking the Hospital through a West African Lens – Technology's Stories
Certainly, the lower your social class, the worse your health:
Health and Social Class information. | Patient
Inequality is fattening | Polly Toynbee | The Guardian
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PUBLIC SQUALOR:
There's a surprising amount of it about:
SQUALOR | meaning in the Cambridge English Dictionary
More than one million children in England live in bad housing:
Social housing is bad: "For much of history, especially before 1919 and since 1979, working-class existence has been marked by inadequate housing."
Audit 2017: How effectively are class inequalities controlled in the UK? : Democratic Audit
And it's not good for people's mental health:
British people rank among most depressed people in Western World | The Independent | The Independent
Meanwhile, town centres are declining:
61% of UK consumers foresee the end of the high street
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THE LOWER CLASSES AND BAD EDUCATION:
The public education system in the UK produces incompetents and morons - and people who 'know their place':
Jay Doubleyou: low literacy levels in britain
And so the 'mass tourists' from the UK behave like 'plebs':
Jay Doubleyou: "drunk stupid brits"
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THE UPPER CLASSES:
At the top of British society, the 'posh' do not send their children to state schools:
Jay Doubleyou: the british class system
They do not go through Heathrow airport but through their own private jet ports:
The Rich Are Scrambling To Escape COVID-19 On Private Jets
Of course, there are the very rich and privileged in every country - it's just that many of them are sending their children to posh British schools:
Britain’s Boarding School Problem | The New Republic
For rich Russians, UK schools in class of their own
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SOCIAL DEMOCRACY:
Of course Switzerland is famous for its 'finishing schools':
So, yes, this country has its banks and its ski resorts for rich foreigners - but generally, the 'public services' in the German-speaking and Scandinavian worlds are much better than in the UK:
Best Countries to Live in the World | U.S. News Best Countries
It's that social model again:
Jay Doubleyou: why are finns so happy?
Jay Doubleyou: the fall and rise of social democracy?
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THE GENTLEMAN AMATEUR:
Against this model of 'mass democracy' and societies that actually work, we have the British upper classes who do not take things too seriously:
Boris Johnson’s rise to Prime Minister, like many Olympians, cricketers and sports administrators may have involved a degree of ‘hard work’ but there is little doubt the privately educated benefit from social and administrative structures that ensure class divisions remain as strong as ever.
The Continued Survival of the Gentleman Amateur – The Social History Society
The current PM is a journalist - a profession he did not study:
Boris Johnson says he feels guilty about his journalism | Boris Johnson | The Guardian
The education of Boris Johnson, the UK's new Prime Minister - Study International
Most of the British political class seem to have studied Politics, Philosophy & Economics at Oxford:
This is what you might call the British bluffocracy. We have become a nation run by people whose knowledge extends a mile wide but an inch deep; who know how to grasp the generalities of any topic in minutes, and how never to bother themselves with the specifics. Who place their confidence in their ability to talk themselves out of trouble, rather than learning how to run things carefully. And who were trained in this dubious art as teenagers: often together on the same university course.
The rise of the bluffocracy | The Spectator
Welcome to Britain - the world's first 'Bluffocracy' - Reaction
It's the art of bluffing:
BLUFF (noun) definition and synonyms | Macmillan Dictionary
Bluff - Definition for English-Language Learners from Merriam-Webster's Learner's Dictionary
Britain is a place, then, where we don't believe in experts:
Britain has had enough of experts, says Gove | Financial Times
Gove: Britons "Have Had Enough of Experts" - YouTube
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HUMOUR: FAWLTY TOWERS:
The only way to deal with this is humour perhaps:
Jay Doubleyou: what is british humour?
Jay Doubleyou: pragmatics: it ain't what you say it's the way that you say it
Jay Doubleyou: high culture > popular culture --- high register > low register
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HOW OTHERS SEE US:
To finish, here is a perspective from abroad:
But for those who weren’t raised in the UK, this whole obsession with class is probably really bizarre. VICE spoke to a few foreigners who study or studied at British universities to find out what they found strange or surprising about the class system.Foreigners Reveal What Shocked Them About the British Class System
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