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Chapter 25: Real patriots ask questions

#136: Feb. - Mar. 2015 (Non-Fiction)
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Chris OConnor

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Chapter 25: Real patriots ask questions

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Chapter 25: Real patriots ask questions

Please use this thread to discuss Chapter 25: Real patriots ask questions.
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Re: Chapter 25: Real patriots ask questions

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This chapter is very political and not really about science at all.

I really did find it interesting though and very relevant to today.

He seems to be accusing a large proportion of the American people of hypocrisy, but from what I can see, they can't compete with the English.

Our National Treasure, Playwright Alan Bennett, on what the English excel in: He is echoing this final chapter I think.
"I thought, why not Swaledale? Or medieval churches. Or even, with all its shortcomings, the National Trust. But what I think we are best at in England - I do not say Britain - what I think we are best at in England, better than all the rest, is hypocrisy.

Take London; we extol its beauty and its dignity while at the same time we're happy to sell it off to the highest bidder. Or highest builder.

We glory in Shakespeare yet we close our public libraries.

A substantial minority of our children receive a better education than the rest because of the social situation of the parents. Then we wonder why things at the top do not change or society improve. But we know why. It's because we are hypocrites.

Our policemen are wonderful, provided you're white and middle class and don't take to the streets. And dying in custody is what happens in South America. It doesn't happen here.

And it gets into the language. We think irony very English and are rather proud of it. But in literary terms it's how we have it both ways. A refined hypocrisy.

And in language these days, words which start off as good and meaningful, terms like environment and energy saving, rapidly lose any credence because converted into political or PR slogans, ending up the clichéd stuff of an estate agents' brochure. A manual for hypocrisy.

A memorable phrase in Hamlet, and one of the few that hasn't been picked up as a quotation or a title for something else, is when Claudius is arranging for Hamlet to be arrested and executed when he gets to our shores. And in his letter he says; "Do it England". And we say we do it, or we're going to do it, but we don't. Scotland does it. And Wales. But not England.

In England, what we do best is lip service. And before you stampede for the Basildon bond or rather skitter for the Twitter I must say that I don't exempt myself from these strictures. How should I? I am English, I am a hypocrite. "
Only those become weary of angling who bring nothing to it but the idea of catching fish.

He was born with the gift of laughter and a sense that the world is mad....

Rafael Sabatini
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Re: Chapter 25: Real patriots ask questions

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Every Rose has it's thorn. There is england, then there is England.

We carry in our hearts the true country
And that cannot be stolen
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Re: Chapter 25: Real patriots ask questions

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but yes imperialism sucks, england and america were both stolen (again) long ago.

perhaps one day they will be stolen yet again by a better class of warrior.
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