Number 54 – They gave Karl Marx his first job

Whilst it is true that Karl Marx lived in London for 34 years he lived for many years in poverty and scraped together a living publishing articles in the New York Tribune, whilst I may not agree with Karl Marx's writings I feel (as did the British Government of the time) that he had a right to say what he thought, just as Mr Grasse has a right to publish his thoughts (however wrong they may be) because in British society we have a right to say, and publish, what we feel so long as it doesn't stir up racial hatred, it's a shame then that Mr Grasse has been allowed to publish this book as it succeeds in doing just that.

Number 53 – They invented the concentration camp

Whilst it is true that during the Boar War the British had concentration camps, it was not the first time they had been used. The term “concentration camp” actually comes from the Spanish word reconcentrados (reconcentration). And was first used to describe camps set up by the Spanish during the 10 Years War (1868-78), however to see the first example of this sort of camp we have to look towards – where else?- America! In the 1830's these camps were set up to detain Native Americans.


The following is an extract from the website http://www.issuesandalibis.org/ -

President Andrew Jackson finished what the Puritans had begun 200 years before. In 1830, Congress, urged on by "Old Hickory," passed the "Indian Removal Act" which gave the federal government the power to relocate any Native Americans in the east to territory that was west of the Mississippi River. Though the Native Americans were to be compensated, this was rarely done fairly and in some cases led to the further destruction of many of the already diminishing numbers of most of the eastern tribes.
The Cherokee Nation was allocated land in Georgia as a result of the 1791 treaty with the U.S. Government. In 1828, not only did whites desire that land for settlement purposes but also for newly discovered gold. Georgia tried to reclaim this land in 1830, but the Cherokee protested and took the case to the U.S. Supreme Court. The Court decided in favor of the Cherokee, however, the President and Congress forced the Native Americans to give up their land and in 1838 called in federal troops in to "escort" approximately 15,000 Cherokee people to their new home in the "Indian Territory." On the way, approx. 6,000 of the Cherokee people died. This event, known to the Cherokee as "The Trail Where They Cried," is better known as the "Trail of Tears."

That's a reason to be proud then!

Number 52 – They gunned down tens of thousands of defenceless Africans

Lets count the inaccuracies in this one.


1- “On a desolate African plain in 1884” wrong 1898

2- “eight thousand British infantrymen” wrong twenty five to twenty seven thousand Egyptian and British soldiers

3- “carrying high-powered machine guns met a horde of Ottoman soldiers” wrong they did not “meet” them, they were attacked by them

4- “armed with nothing more than spears and a few old muskets” wrong they had old rifles and spears, it is not known how many rifles, but with an army numbering more than fifty thousand men you can be sure that they had more than a “few” rifles

5- “Winston Churchill even celebrated the Battle of Omdurman” wrong, in his book 'The River War: An Historical Account of the Reconquest of the Soudan' Churchill actually gives a surprisingly balanced, well thought out account of the war and criticizes the military leaders of the time.

Not bad really Mr Grasse, why let the facts get in the way of a good story.

Number 51 – They filled their museums with stolen treasures

This is a pointless argument as EVERY museum the world over has artefacts in it's vaults that do not necessarily belong to them. Mr Grasse uses as an example the Parthenon marbles, well how about the Hope Diamond on display in the Smithsonian? This diamond was stolen from France, recut from the French Blue diamond which itself was cut from the Tavernier Blue diamond and was used in the French crown jewels, why then is it in America?

Number 50 – They germinated jingoism

That's rich coming from an American! The word jingoism is indeed an English word but the Americans had their own word for the same thing “spread-eagleism” and were (and are) just as guilty of it as the English.


Just to be clear jingoism means “extreme patriotism, especially in the form of aggressive or warlike foreign policy” does that sound like any nation we know?

Number 49 – They invented the machine gun

Oh my lord, Mr Grasse is right, almost! We did indeed invent a gun that could fire an almost constant stream of bullets, just not when Mr Grasse claims, in actual fact it was invented by James Puckle in 1718 (that's 171 years before Mr Grasse states). The idea of such a gun was expanded on and improved by many others before Hiram Maxim invented the Maxim gun that Mr Grasse talks about, oh and one other point Hiram Maxim was born in America and did not take citizenship in Britain until 1899 (10 years after the invention of his gun) therefore the Maxim Gun was actually an American invention!

Number 48 – They supported the Confederacy

I'm afraid to say that on this point Mr Grasse is again wrong, the British did provided arms, materials and even ship building to the Confederacy, however, we also supplied the Union with the same.


The only thing we were guilty of is making money from America.

Number 47 – They invented the velvet rope

It feels like Mr Grasse is clutching at straws with this one, for instance he gives no evidence that the British invented queuing to get in somewhere, if he had done his research as I have he would have found out that queuing did indeed begin in the UK, but it was out of necessity, people queued to get on early forms of public transport and also, because of rationing, to get food. It was not, as Mr Grasse states to make the people outside feel like second class citizens.


I have a theory why Mr Grasse hates the “velvet rope” so much, maybe he is excluded from getting into all the places he wants too, if this is the case then I suggest he tries changing his attitude and maybe more people will warm to him, as one of his employees said,when asked in a video for his company what she thought of Mr Grasse “he's an ass”.

Number 46 – They love a good hanging

Mr Grasse starts this particular diatribe with the fact that “every society has a spectacle at it's centre” apparently in America this is the Super Bowl in France it is the Tour De France and in North Korea it is the Mass Games, well that is certainly true now, but how about 142 years ago (that is when the last public hanging in Britain happened)? Well I'd like to look into history if I may. 1868 in America the “spectacle” would have been, well what do you know, a public hanging! In fact America did not abolish public hangings until 1936 (that's 68 years after England). Take a look at this picture taken at the last public hanging in America,

 

it looks like a “spectacle” to me!

Number 45 – They're a beacon of prudery and snobbery

In this section Mr Grasse seems to think that the British are all prudes and snobbish bores, he believes this to be the case because Victorian values were all prudish, I'm afraid to burst your bubble here Mr Grasse but this is a common misconception, they weren't prudish at all in fact there were more people with “loose morals” then than there are now. The author states that “in a truly free society, respect is due to every man and woman” while I agree in principle to this, I have to say that I think that respect has to be earned, which is probably why I have so little respect for Mr Grasse.

Number 44 – They encouraged and subsidized the slave trade

It is unfortunate that the British participated in the slave trade, in fact it was plain wrong for them to do so, however please don't blame the British for the whole thing, the biggest perpetrators were the Portuguese, this fact doesn't mean that the Portuguese were to blame either, most of the western world had a hand in the spread of slaves from Africa to the Americas, and I can honestly say that we were wrong to do so.


All that being said the British stopped this heinous trade in 1807 and banned slavery in 1833, however it was not until 1865 that the US abolished slavery.

One point I would like to make is that at the start of his tirade Mr Grasse says “modern Britain likes to look down it's collective nose at America's history of slavery and segregation”, well I have to say that segregation is a very separate issue. Enforced segregation never happened in Britain, as we all know it unfortunately did happen in the US, and if the British look down their “collective noses” at you in the States then I have to say, good, you deserve it, you should rightly feel ashamed.

Number 43 – They invented slums

Let me just point out that ever since people have lived together in towns and cities slums have existed. The only claim that the English have over the rest of the world is that we invented the word slum in the nineteenth century, as for the “rivers of sewage” that coursed “down the middle of narrow alleyways”, yeah right, which country invented sewers? That's right the English, therefore we cleaned our streets of disease and filth long before anyone else.


Sorry but this whole section looks like Mr Grasse has seen Oliver too many times, let me just inform you Mr Grasse, in words of one syllable, so you might understand – it's not real, it's made up, it's a bit of fun.

Number 42 – They perfected and spread the tedium of factory life

One thing I'm beginning to find tedious is pointing out how wrong Mr Grasse is, because yet again he is incorrect. The first factory as we know it today was in fact opened in Venice in 1104 it was the Venice Arsenal and it was erected to build ships (at it's peak it built one ship a day and employed over 15000 people). That being said I will agree that Britain did build lots of factories in the 1700's (as did America) but if it weren't for these factories and the wonderful people that worked in them we would not have the technology we have today, you wouldn't be able to read this blog for instance as the world wide web would not have been created because computers would still be the size of a small house (if indeed they would exist at all).

Number 41 – They invented child labour

Wrong, wrong, wrong, wrong, wrong! Child labour has been around as long as there have been children, to say that the British invented it is fabrication. Children worked mainly in farming throughout the world until factories started springing up in the UK and USA, these factories were hard and dangerous to work in, and, unfortunately children were used, but in Britain laws were passed that banned child labour in 1870, just imagine how terrible it must have been in the US, laws banning child labour were not introduced until 1938! That's 68 years after the UK.

Number 40 – They worshipped the Romans

To say we were a “savage people” before the Romans invaded us is, I'm afraid to say, incorrect. We set up economic and cultural links with Continental Europe and traded in tin with the Greeks, the Carthaginians, and the Pheonicians. Hardly savage then.
To say we worshipped them is also incorrect, we had little choice but to have them in our country, they were, as Mr Grasse points out “a more advanced civilization”, I think it's fair to say that we worshipped them as much as the Native Americans worshipped the American invaders who stole their land, murdered their people, and raped their women.

Number 39 – Their archaeologists pander to and defraud the public

First of all I'd like to point out that archeologists is the US spelling, I have spelt the word the English way (or rather, the correct way) above.
The example given by Mr Grasse is that of the Piltdown Man, and I have to say, he is correct in stating that the Piltdown Man is a fraud, however it did not just fool British archaeologists, it fooled people the world over for 40 years.
All that being said Mr Grasse is wrong on a couple of counts firstly the jawbone was from an orang-utan not a chimpanzee, the teeth were from a chimpanzee.
The reason it fooled people the world over is because it was remarkably well done, it proved the theory of the time, that we developed the large modern brain before the modern omnivorous diet.
Can anyone name any other hoaxes that have fooled people for years, but then turn out to be hoaxes? How about the famous video of the Bigfoot taken by Roger Patterson? Or maybe the the Cardiff Giant, which American people flocked to see in their thousands until it was discovered that the Giant was no more than a crude modern statue that had been buried to make it look old (this happened in 1869, 43 years before the Piltdown Man).

Number 38 – They never got over the war of 1812

What Mr Grasse fails to point out is what the war of 1812 was actually about, it was caused because America, at the time, was trading with Napoleonic France, and murdering thousands of Native Americans just so they could get a foothold in the potentially valuable farmlands of the Northwest, because the British didn't agree with this behaviour we tried to stop it, causing the Americans to declare war.
The national anthem “The Star-Spangled banner” was actually a poem written about the attack on Baltimore, when Francis Scott Key saw the American flag waving above Fort McHenry. It was set to the music from an old English drinking song called “The Anacreonic Song”. The fact that this song was made the American national anthem in 1931 shows that it is the Americans who never quite got over the war of 1812, and not the British, who seem know very little about this period in their history.

Number 37 – They polluted sincere, freethinking discourse with sarcasm, irony, and other forms of pernicious wit

So we “polluted sincere, freethinking discourse”, this is blatantly not true, I know lots of Americans who are just as witty as the British, because they understand sarcasm and irony. Most American comedians use this form of wit to shut up drunk and unfunny hecklers. Obviously only intelligent people will understand the complexities of this particular form of wit, I'm sorry to inform the readers of this blog Mr. Grasse is not as intelligent or witty as he likes to think, maybe he is one of the drunk, unfunny hecklers that frequently get put down by comedians the word over.

Number 36 – They befouled the world's stages with incomprehensible dramas

Shakespeare is, according to Mr Grasse “way overrated”, if that were so then people would not queue up to see the latest adaptations, whether they be on film or on stage.
Apparently , according to Mr Grasse “good stories should be like a gangster movie: accessible, excessively violent, and easy to understand”. I suggest you take a look at “O” the 2001 movie by Tim Blake Nelson, or Al Pacino's 1996 “Looking For Richard”, or even “Prospero's Books” Peter Greenaway's 1991 movie, all of which contain violence and nudity, and are easy to understand (Even for Mr Grasse's limited intellect), they are, surprisingly, all adaptations of Shakespeare plays.

Number 35 – They couldn't stand up to Napoleon

Four words - Battle Of The Nile – Napoleon was defeated by the British.
Three words – Battle of Trafalgar – Napoleon again defeated by the British, causing him to give up plans to invade Britain.
Another three words – Battle Of Waterloo – Napoleon defeated for a third time by the British. In fact, Napoleon never defeated the British, ever.