The World According to Joan by Joan Collins

Author:Joan Collins [Collins, Joan]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781780333861
Publisher: Little, Brown Book Group

Chivalry is dead, manners have been thrown out of the window and politeness is an arcane word that our ancestors used to describe a code of behaviour that has long since disappeared. What makes me despair about this development is that it is happening in Britain, erstwhile land of the faultlessly polite English gentleman. The extinction of this worldwide paragon truly hurts the great sense of patriotism and love I have for my country.

Instead, we British have begun to embrace boorishness and vulgarity as our national emblem. Gone is the gentleman, welcome the absent father; gone is the English cut, welcome the builder’s crack; gone is the dandy, welcome the football hooligan.

Royal Ascot, which used to be the highlight of the racing season for ladies and gentleman, has recently degenerated into a mass of badly dressed, badly behaved yobs and boors. Some of whom lie down fully clothed on the grass in full view of the Queen, and parade around fearlessly, exposing tattooed or ‘fake-baked’ bodies, with far too much flesh on show. Ascot’s protocol was severely flouted this year when brawls started within a drunken group in one of the champagne bars.

At Aintree and Cheltenham behaviour has always been more louche but Ascot used to be the pinnacle of prestigious English racing events, where everyone behaved beautifully and dressed flawlessly. Alas, no more and I for one don’t fancy going there any more.

Brits are quickly rivalling Americans as being the fattest in the world. We may also beat them in the most hideously dressed stakes too. It’s no one’s fault to be born ugly, but honestly, must it be worn as a symbol of pride? Is the answer to a plain face to put on 40 pounds, staple metal works to every available lobe and tattoo oneself like an Apache on the war-trail? The strident, guttural speech, the inflections garbled to virtually resemble grunts and bellows from Viking hordes, are impossible to ignore, except to their children of course who are much more energetically dispensing the chaos their parents no longer have the energy to perpetrate. Their facial expressions, their gait, their laughter, their very gestures are crude. Nowhere is this better epitomized than in the hilarious sitcom Benidorm.

Vulgarity has its place as a counterweight to pretension of course, but as a ruling national characteristic it is charmless, stupid and without virtue. In our desire to be egalitarian, and since it is easier to level downwards than to have aspirations of upward mobility, many middle class people have embraced and promoted the vulgarity that they wrongly assume is the characteristic of the proletariat. The problem with this is that it ceases to be just a pose and becomes what it is now: the portrait of our national character.

Of course the phenomenon of this annihilation of decent behaviour is somewhat global. Strolling around the bucolic Place des Lices in Saint Tropez – a quaint square that thanks to the French nationalistic pride has remained unchanged for centuries – you take your life in your hands on market day.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.