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What you're missing is that amongst a certain class of Brit, and across much of the West, relentless and savage cultural self-criticism has become the norm, and

What you're missing is that amongst a certain class of Brit, and across much of the West, relentless and savage cultural self-criticism has become the norm, and a currency used for in-group signalling. Even when people in the UK should be celebrating, as literally the first country in the world to develop an approved C19 vaccine in record breaking time, and enjoy the privilege of a free health system that can roll it out within _weeks_ they still find a way to twist it. Asking them to truly recognise the fact that there indeed exists big differences between the UK and much of the world in this respect will fall on deaf ears - it doesn't serve their purpose - which to be clear, isn't truth-telling or (heaven forbid expressing pride in their national achievements) it's a habit of personal advancement at the expense of others and dissolving their own culture in an acid bath of manifold criticism. It's only where this sort of criticism is expressed in forums with international readers, many in far less fortunate positions, does it begin to reveal itself for the pathology that it is.

MaxBarraclough 6y ago
> it's a habit of personal advancement at the expense of others How does this relate to your point about a culture of self-criticism?
- Wintamute 6y ago
  My point was related to cultural self-criticism, i.e. criticising your own culture, not a culture of (personal) self-criticism.
jack_pp 6y ago
I'm not from the UK but assuming the grandparent is right, you're saying they should be thankful that their country isn't as corrupt as other countries even though there's blatant corruption in something as important as the COVID response? That's like beating your children but comforting them that they atleast have food on the table and clothes on their back.
- jl6 6y ago
  A better analogy would be living in a nice comfortable house, which is much better than nearly all other houses - but then someone spots a problem with the chimney and starts comparing it to other houses’ chimneys, some of which have better chimneys, some of which have better chimneys but a worse overall house, and some of which are fantasy chimneys that could theoretically exist if only we all spent a bit more time thinking about chimneys. And in amongst all this chimney woe, the fundamental qualities of the house and the fundamental privilege of having such a house go forgotten.
  - tonyhb 6y ago
    Not quite. A substantial number of people in the UK live in poverty - between 20 and 25% [0]. This has been made worse by terrible political decisions, such as Brexit [0]. Specifically, austerity and political decisions (not limited to corruption) is linked to 130,000 preventable deaths [1]. Those same "budget cuts" for austerity exist while money is sent to "consultants" to "help fix things". Not everyone in the UK has it well. The government, quite frankly, is fairly shit. And corrupt. [0] - https://www.ifs.org.uk/publications/14901 https://www.ifs.org.uk/publications/14901 [1] - https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2019/jun/01/perfect-storm-austerity-behind-130000-deaths-uk-ippr-report https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2019/jun/01/perfect-sto...
    - jl6 6y ago
      Thanks for the great example. The poverty chimney needs to be considered in conjunction with the security doors and the air quality windows and the human rights carpets and the unemployment basement and the healthcare bathroom and so on... before deciding on the house’s value.
    - gadders 6y ago
      They're shit, until you compare them to who they were up against, which was a jew hating Marxist.
      - tonyhb 6y ago
corin_ 6y ago
> Even when people in the UK should be celebrating, as literally the first country in the world to develop an approved C19 vaccine in record breaking time The UK has one of the first (Oxford/AstraZenica), but this news about the first approved is not a vaccine developed in the UK. But I'm still happy to celebrate the Turkish couple's German company that's owned by Pfizer, as I will be when Oxford hopefully release more good news on top of their initial press release. And our culture is far from perfect in the UK. Criticising a country's problems doesn't prevent also celebrating its positives.
- _opc6 6y ago
  It's strange how we immediately take pride in stuff we had nothing to do with just because we identify in some way with the developers/creators.
  - rootsofallevil 6y ago
    > Patriotism is the belief that your country is the best by virtue of you having been born in it I can't find the original quote but I 100% agree with you that it is pretty odd to take pride in something you have an extremely tangential relationship with
  - beaconstudios 6y ago
    Isn't it essentially the same human instinct that drives the desire to increase representation in media for underrepresented groups of people? We relate to people who are "like us" in some dimension. Sure, it doesn't make sense in a sterile intellectual sort of way, but why does that matter? It's still real.
  - Wintamute 6y ago
    Well, a country is a shared endeavour isn't it? We collaborate together by following our national laws, paying our taxes, follow our customs and traditions and engage in cultural renewal and repair when required. In this way, everyone in the country is responsible for fostering a peaceful and prosperous environment that can prove to be fertile infrastructure for advancements and breakthroughs. Why not take some small measure of pride in this? It's a generational effort.
amrangaye 6y ago
Completely agree. Same thing happens in the US - to hear some Americans speak they have become a dictatorship with a tyrant in charge, and the whole system is broken. Meanwhile they continue to have free and fair elections, first amendment rights, the ability to take their government to court etc. In my country (in west africa) just voting against the dictator in charge can get you banned from getting any employment, send you to jail to be tortured etc. And marching on the streets in peaceful protest has actually had people sent to death row awaiting execution. I guess it’s a matter of perspective :)
- refurb 6y ago
  Seriously. I encourage anyone who thinks the US or any other Western country is a dictatorship to move to a developing nation and give it a try. I have. Once you've interacted with a corrupt bureaucracy or wondered whether the medicine you bought is counterfeit or realized the only thing stopping the cops from shaking you down is luck, you get a new found appreciation for stability, reliability and fairness (yes not always) of developed countries.
mellosouls 6y ago
Much of what you say is true, but doesn't negate the point of the comment you are assuming the motivation of. The UK national infrastructure does have a history of dubious at best procurement, outsourcing and "consultancy" decisions in supplying it's services - those public services often then coming under extreme criticism from the same quarters as your attack - who are often the same private sector blowhards who cause many of the problems in the first place. Far more public sector hating and damage comes from there than from the virtue signallers you (rightly) criticise.
- rootsofallevil 6y ago
  > does have a history of dubious at best procurement That is a very tactful way of describing what has gone on in this country for a while
  - mellosouls 6y ago
    Exactly, and it isn't in itself wrong to point it out.
CodeGlitch 6y ago
You're being downvoted for saying the truth? Come on HN you can do better than this.
tweetle_beetle 6y ago
A certain amount of self-criticism and cynicism is healthy and stops society from becoming complacent and sliding backwards. The more developed a country is, the higher the need for it is to maintain its status. As the US has shown in recent years, complacency erodes democracy, national status and personal quality of life. To take the example of the NHS - it is constantly under attack by budget cuts, fragmentation and privatisation. Would it still be something to be proud of in a few decades if everyone stopped holding leaders to account? I think you are arguing that some people are not genuine. If the price of progress is hearing people you don't care for virtue signalling, that's fine by me. I'd much rather have too much, and risk some of it not being genuine or warranted, than too little. And I would argue that the people who genuinely want better demonstrate more national pride and a better understanding of their own culture than those sitting back and patting themselves on the back.
tannhaeuser 6y ago
I've got to say that you yourself seem to fall victim to the very thing that you're criticizing (namely, polarizing over a national pride thing) as the vaccine is neither developed nor produced in UK. In fact, given the demand, it's not clear supply of the vaccine will allow for NHS' projections.
gadders 6y ago
George Orwell said it best: "England is perhaps the only great country whose intellectuals are ashamed of their own nationality. In left-wing circles it is always felt that there is something slightly disgraceful in being an Englishman and that it is a duty to snigger at every English institution, from horse racing to suet puddings. It is a strange fact, but it is unquestionably true that almost any English intellectual would feel more ashamed of standing to attention during ‘God save the King’ than of stealing from a poor box."

MaxBarraclough 6y ago

> it's a habit of personal advancement at the expense of others How does this relate to your point about a culture of self-criticism?

Wintamute 6y ago
My point was related to cultural self-criticism, i.e. criticising your own culture, not a culture of (personal) self-criticism.

jack_pp 6y ago

I'm not from the UK but assuming the grandparent is right, you're saying they should be thankful that their country isn't as corrupt as other countries even though there's blatant corruption in something as important as the COVID response? That's like beating your children but comforting them that they atleast have food on the table and clothes on their back.

jl6 6y ago
A better analogy would be living in a nice comfortable house, which is much better than nearly all other houses - but then someone spots a problem with the chimney and starts comparing it to other houses’ chimneys, some of which have better chimneys, some of which have better chimneys but a worse overall house, and some of which are fantasy chimneys that could theoretically exist if only we all spent a bit more time thinking about chimneys. And in amongst all this chimney woe, the fundamental qualities of the house and the fundamental privilege of having such a house go forgotten.
- tonyhb 6y ago
  Not quite. A substantial number of people in the UK live in poverty - between 20 and 25% [0]. This has been made worse by terrible political decisions, such as Brexit [0]. Specifically, austerity and political decisions (not limited to corruption) is linked to 130,000 preventable deaths [1]. Those same "budget cuts" for austerity exist while money is sent to "consultants" to "help fix things". Not everyone in the UK has it well. The government, quite frankly, is fairly shit. And corrupt. [0] - https://www.ifs.org.uk/publications/14901 https://www.ifs.org.uk/publications/14901 [1] - https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2019/jun/01/perfect-storm-austerity-behind-130000-deaths-uk-ippr-report https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2019/jun/01/perfect-sto...
  - jl6 6y ago
    Thanks for the great example. The poverty chimney needs to be considered in conjunction with the security doors and the air quality windows and the human rights carpets and the unemployment basement and the healthcare bathroom and so on... before deciding on the house’s value.
  - gadders 6y ago
    They're shit, until you compare them to who they were up against, which was a jew hating Marxist.
    - tonyhb 6y ago

corin_ 6y ago

> Even when people in the UK should be celebrating, as literally the first country in the world to develop an approved C19 vaccine in record breaking time The UK has one of the first (Oxford/AstraZenica), but this news about the first approved is not a vaccine developed in the UK. But I'm still happy to celebrate the Turkish couple's German company that's owned by Pfizer, as I will be when Oxford hopefully release more good news on top of their initial press release. And our culture is far from perfect in the UK. Criticising a country's problems doesn't prevent also celebrating its positives.

_opc6 6y ago
It's strange how we immediately take pride in stuff we had nothing to do with just because we identify in some way with the developers/creators.
- rootsofallevil 6y ago
  > Patriotism is the belief that your country is the best by virtue of you having been born in it I can't find the original quote but I 100% agree with you that it is pretty odd to take pride in something you have an extremely tangential relationship with
- beaconstudios 6y ago
  Isn't it essentially the same human instinct that drives the desire to increase representation in media for underrepresented groups of people? We relate to people who are "like us" in some dimension. Sure, it doesn't make sense in a sterile intellectual sort of way, but why does that matter? It's still real.
- Wintamute 6y ago
  Well, a country is a shared endeavour isn't it? We collaborate together by following our national laws, paying our taxes, follow our customs and traditions and engage in cultural renewal and repair when required. In this way, everyone in the country is responsible for fostering a peaceful and prosperous environment that can prove to be fertile infrastructure for advancements and breakthroughs. Why not take some small measure of pride in this? It's a generational effort.

amrangaye 6y ago

Completely agree. Same thing happens in the US - to hear some Americans speak they have become a dictatorship with a tyrant in charge, and the whole system is broken. Meanwhile they continue to have free and fair elections, first amendment rights, the ability to take their government to court etc. In my country (in west africa) just voting against the dictator in charge can get you banned from getting any employment, send you to jail to be tortured etc. And marching on the streets in peaceful protest has actually had people sent to death row awaiting execution. I guess it’s a matter of perspective :)

refurb 6y ago
Seriously. I encourage anyone who thinks the US or any other Western country is a dictatorship to move to a developing nation and give it a try. I have. Once you've interacted with a corrupt bureaucracy or wondered whether the medicine you bought is counterfeit or realized the only thing stopping the cops from shaking you down is luck, you get a new found appreciation for stability, reliability and fairness (yes not always) of developed countries.

mellosouls 6y ago

Much of what you say is true, but doesn't negate the point of the comment you are assuming the motivation of. The UK national infrastructure does have a history of dubious at best procurement, outsourcing and "consultancy" decisions in supplying it's services - those public services often then coming under extreme criticism from the same quarters as your attack - who are often the same private sector blowhards who cause many of the problems in the first place. Far more public sector hating and damage comes from there than from the virtue signallers you (rightly) criticise.

rootsofallevil 6y ago
> does have a history of dubious at best procurement That is a very tactful way of describing what has gone on in this country for a while
- mellosouls 6y ago
  Exactly, and it isn't in itself wrong to point it out.

CodeGlitch 6y ago

You're being downvoted for saying the truth? Come on HN you can do better than this.

tweetle_beetle 6y ago

A certain amount of self-criticism and cynicism is healthy and stops society from becoming complacent and sliding backwards. The more developed a country is, the higher the need for it is to maintain its status. As the US has shown in recent years, complacency erodes democracy, national status and personal quality of life. To take the example of the NHS - it is constantly under attack by budget cuts, fragmentation and privatisation. Would it still be something to be proud of in a few decades if everyone stopped holding leaders to account? I think you are arguing that some people are not genuine. If the price of progress is hearing people you don't care for virtue signalling, that's fine by me. I'd much rather have too much, and risk some of it not being genuine or warranted, than too little. And I would argue that the people who genuinely want better demonstrate more national pride and a better understanding of their own culture than those sitting back and patting themselves on the back.

tannhaeuser 6y ago

I've got to say that you yourself seem to fall victim to the very thing that you're criticizing (namely, polarizing over a national pride thing) as the vaccine is neither developed nor produced in UK. In fact, given the demand, it's not clear supply of the vaccine will allow for NHS' projections.

gadders 6y ago

George Orwell said it best: "England is perhaps the only great country whose intellectuals are ashamed of their own nationality. In left-wing circles it is always felt that there is something slightly disgraceful in being an Englishman and that it is a duty to snigger at every English institution, from horse racing to suet puddings. It is a strange fact, but it is unquestionably true that almost any English intellectual would feel more ashamed of standing to attention during ‘God save the King’ than of stealing from a poor box."