The BBC has apologised for the remarks in the car show Top Gear after a presenter said that the Mexican car would be like Mexican people, lazy, feckless, flatulent and overweight.
In a letter to Mexico's ambassador in London, it said that it was sorry if it had offended some people, but said jokes based on national stereotyping were part of British national humour.
Very true because we Brits do like to bash other countries over the head with national sterotypes but we always assumed that they quite liked it.
Living in a very metropolitan City, i was in the perfect place to find out just what other nations thought of our gentle ribbing of their characteristics.
I began by trying to ask my Jamaican neighbour but he didn't answer the door. Obviously he was washing his dreadlocks or he just had his Bob Marley CD turned up too loud to hear the doorbell so i moved across the hallway to Mick the Irishman but remembered that the month had a day in it and he would be drunk and trying to get into a fight somewhere.
The doorman is Spanish and i quietly tiptoed past him on the way out as not to disturb his siesta and was lucky enough to meet a German gentleman entering the building.
After exchanging small talk about what type of schnitzel he had bought for his dinner, i asked him if he found the British depiction of Germans as offensive. He replied that he had to be at home to iron his leiderhosen at 11:56 and as we had been talking for 3 minutes and 27 seconds he would not have time to answer but he had 4 minutes to spare between 19:33 and 19:37 this evening. I thanked him and as he walked into the building humming oom-pah music, i continued on my search for more nationals to question.
I asked the dirty, lazy, unshaven, curly moustached French man wearing a beret, striped jumper and carrying a baguette under the arm at the park but he just rudely ignored me as did the Scotsman but to be fair i did call him Miss and complement him on his skirt.
The Indian gentleman who runs the local newsagent was normally very chatty but his wife told me that he had packed up the family elephant and gone looking for Tigers on the South Downs but she expected him back soon because a good Bollywood film was on TV.
I considered asking the Italian man who runs the Pizza Shop his thoughts but he was busy adjusting his shirt to show his chest hair so headed to the Park instead where i found a few clog wearing homesick Netherlanders gazing at the tulip flower bed and discussing how there was just not enough windmills in Britain.
I decided what i needed was an Australian so on my way home i dropped into a random pub and as expected, found an Australian barman.
We got along fine at first until I inadvertently offended him by asking him if he had ever tried low alcohol lager and he angrily picked up his boomerang and stormed off saying something about taking the rest of the day off, i think he said he was going surfing or to find a crocodile to wrestle.
Suddenly realising that i had not drank a cup of tea for almost two hours, i made my way home and sat down to watch 'allo 'allo and reflect on how lucky the rest of the World is to have us Brits to disguise extreme, racist, bigoted xenophobic views as humour. God bless us
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