Comment by VeejayRampay | Hacker News Reader

Comment by VeejayRampay | Hacker News Reader

quick anecdote:

I'm a Frenchman but I hold no particular dumb grudge against the English, I actually like them, their style, their music, what I perceive as their refinement as much as their capacity to be hilarious, quick with the banter, overall good lads

so a few years ago, I booked a trip to London, then a train to Northampton cause I wanted to see the city where all the good shoe manufacturers are based (I own a pair of Crockett and Jones and enjoy other brands like Cheaney, Trickers, etc).

what a BRUTAL wake up call, what was on paper a thriving manufacturing town with rich history turned out to be a completely derelict place, with boarded windows in the main streets, beggars, dollar shops, litter absolutely everywhere and the signs that the golden age of the town is LONG gone. I don't know what happened there, recession, Brexit, I really don't know but I ended up taking the train back to London earlier than anticipated, completely shocked by what I saw

40 years of Thatcherism.

Good manufacturing jobs were gutted and sent overseas with no thought or care what the impact on communities would be. In some places families are now on the third generation on benefits because there simply aren't any jobs and the ones that are available require skills that people don't have because they aren't taught them in school due to the obsession with the Victorian education model and the shortage of skilled teachers and training opportunities for young people.

At this point nothing except for a total economic rebuild will save the UK high street and there is zero political will to do that because the current broken system makes certain people money.

Thatcher reportedly hated unions so much that she'd rather destroy unionized industries than have unions. She wasn't called an evil witch for nothing.

This’ll cheer you up: Northampton is used as a case study for a successful post-industrial town. Below average unemployment, above average services and citizen satisfaction.

And it’s true. Northampton is doing pretty great compared to a majority of the U.K.

>This’ll cheer you up: Northampton is used as a case study for a successful post-industrial town.

That same bent of evil people came to my town to peddle some "looks good from my ivory tower" type municipal trash policy that incentivize all the wrong things. They cited an adjacent town that adopted their stuff and is renown locally for its filth as a "success story". The public's reaction was literally "hahahaha, oh wait you're serious, hahahahahahahahahah". City councilor literally had to bang the gavel a bunch and tell the crowd to be serious. It was glorious. The city council is not likely to adopt it at this point.

As a frenchman living in London for 10y+, I am always shocked when I go to medium sized cities in the UK. I love the country side though. Joke is that UK is a third world country bolted onto London, obviously exaggerated but if you look at numbers and you go there yourselves there is some truth in it.

Brighton was not like that at all though to be honest, felt more continental, affluent and modern

there's a chance that London money flows down there though, like Nice and the Riviera for France, I don't know

Perhaps it's improved in the last few years, but Brighton is the only place I've personally seen someone sitting on a street shooting heroin in the early afternoon.

...and Brighton is supposed to be a posh beach resort town, no?

That depends of the era you learned of its reputation I suspect. I'm not sure I've ever heard that idea despite growing up in the neighbouring county.

Expensive != posh -- the proximity and relatively easy trains to London probably help make it expensive.

It was when I looked up what's behind Fatboy Slim's "You're not from Brighton". That was well after its release date (1998). Let's say 2010-2015?

Ah by then it was likely on the way to being gentrified - I'm thinking of 2003-4 kind of time.

The profits derived from privatisation and the policies of de-industrialisation were concentrated in one city…

Unfortunately the British elites know how to colonise and extract, they’re just terrible at administering and building anything sustainable

Such money as there is is spent at malls on the ring road.

The manufacturing employees, such as there are, drive everywhere, often live far from town, shop online or at out-of-town megastores.

It's an individualist, selfish culture since Thatcher or before, there's little of the pride in local businesses or local culture that France enjoys.

Dumb Brits became pure consumers since 1982, and blame black people and Muslims for why there's "no British culture anymore", instead of recognising their role in making it happen.

London has been basically subsisting off the remains of the empire while everything else just crumbles.

Also for Frenchman to say re les Anglais "what I perceived was their refinement"... there's a joke that the only people who think the English are refined are Americans (as we are a savage people).

for me English people are a mix

it's the drunken brutes, the burping, clanic, air max 95-wearing savages, but it's also a culture where entire musical genres emerge, the country of Richard "Aphex Twin" James and Boards of Canada, the appreciation for gardens, the relentless success of great authors and directors

Boards of Canada are Scots, but let's say "UK" and not "English"

slightly different mix and I don't want to mistake one from another (total faux pas) but for me as an outsider, there's less of a difference

Huh? The French are even more savage and less refined, as can be seen in their history.

The great thing about towns like this is the journey leaving them. This isn't an isolated example either. Most towns I've been to have a derelict High Street.

What was your impression of London ?

London is beautiful, I really want to go back and spend more time there (I want to visit Kew ASAP for example), but I felt two things very strongly:

- it's extremely diverse, in a way that no other big metropolitan cities I've visited really are (and way more varied and diverse than Paris). You feel that variety crossing a street, where you go from "oh what a nice place with great heritage buildings and all" to "oh I should keep my eyes open, sketchiness has increased dramatically in the past second"

- London during the day and London at night are basically two different ecosystems, love it during the day, not for me at night (too rowdy / wild)

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