I'd like to comment on a couple of faintly disturbing situations that recently occurred on American TV, which has led me to want to say something about being British at the same time as being an engaged citizen of the USA.
Firstly, let me talk about the "tweens" show iCarly, which my six year old daughter loves and watches every day on Nickelodeon. A recent episode (actually the highest rated TV show last week) centered around a singing competition as a way of putting
American Idol runner-up David Archuleta on a TV screen. The premise this time was that in this made up reality show he won with the support of iCarly fans, and Carly then feels bad for the runner up and invites him on the show to even things up.
The problem for Carly, and for me as a viewer, is that the runner up Wade Collins is a complete douchebag, and very evidently, British. Now, I don't generally have a problem with British actors portraying less than nice people. We have a great tradition of acting 'villians' - Peter Cushing, Ian McKellern, Alan Rickman, Robert Carlyle, and so on. What made me more uncomfortable was that the show's producers seemed to be trying to associate the way this guy talked and his manner and expressions with the fact he was a douchebag. Then his "mum" came on, talking in that
Hyacinth Bucket kind of way, and coming across as a condescending douchebag and using expressions like "blimey" and "you silly Americans". I found it quite embarrasing, actually.
I then read yesterday about the storm of protest generated towards a man called "the worst husband in the world", one Stephen Fowler who recently appeared on a reality TV show called
Wife Swap. As the show actually originated in Britain before being transplanted to the USA, I'm confident a lot of people will be familiar with the premise - two wives from disparate households trade places for a couple of weeks and try to make sense of very different domestic environments. As you might imagine, the producers play on the extraordinary diversities of families to create tension, drama, and hopefully some kind of realization that there is no place like home, and everyone learns a lesson or two in the process.
Apparently the lesson learned from Mr. Fowler was that he was a snob and an obnoxious douchebag, and also British. According to the edited show (and I use that caveat not to defend him but merely to reiterate that any reality show is edited and therefore interpreted to some degree) he denigrated Mid-America, the hardworking, the unschooled, the military, and many others as well.
In isolation, I supoose one could laugh and shrug it off. Taken together, I feel attacked as a Briton that because I have a certain heritage, accent, and means of expressing myself, I could, possibly, be a douchebag as well. While there may be people who agree with that sentiment, I'd like to redress the balance, if I could, so that there is no doubt that in reality (and not realityTV) there are in fact many, many expatriate Britons who contibute wholeheartedly to their chosen home country.
I have three stepchildren, two of whom proudly serve in the US military, one in the Army and one in the Navy. I know what it's like to have a son deployed to Iraq and facing combat.
Whilst I am a professional, and have the certificates to prove it, I did not go to college. Not everyone from Britain went to Oxford or Eton. I chose to go to work and support myself and studied at night and on weekends.
I live in the Southern US. It's probably one of the most hospitable places I have ever been, especially compared to London, or Paris or Seattle for that matter. Southern folk are direct, intensely hard working and abundantly proud of their country, in much the same way as people I have met from the Midwest and other heartland States. As evidenced by a recent
American Idol episode, even the most innocent and genuine valediction from a Southerner can be interpreted incorrectly as something odious and malicious. Misunderstanding has arms that reach across the whole of American culture.
I've lived here for ten years. While I occasionally miss my hometown (and obviously all my family who still live there) I am proud of what I have achieved and the way of life I've enjoyed here in the US, even if those years have been beset by a flailing economy, the specter of 9/11 and the widening gulf between the American middle class and the economic elite.
Perhaps I'm reaching a little. But, here's the thing. I've brought my young daughter up on a diet of
Fireman Sam,
Bagpuss,
Rubberdubbers and other British shows. I don't ever want her to associate the way I talk or the language of my heritage with that other, alien, tongue - the language of bigotry, insensitivity and intolerance that has no place in this or any other country.