This Meme is COMPLETE Bullsh%t

[00:00:00]Today, I have three things to talk to you about, or should I say three things to talk about. Fun fact, I don't know what I should say. I have no idea. Um here here's why I think so. Obviously, you know what this meme is, right? This meme is from uh the the Tarantino movie where there are some um American spies who have gone into um Germany during the 1940s and you know that they're being spies, but the thing is one of them one point indicates the number three. And I believe they do it like that. I could be wrong though. And even though like yeah, you'll you'll have just seen the meme, but I can't remember the exact meme. But I think they do it like that. And this exposes them as spies because actually in Germany they don't they don't say three like this. They say three like this. So, what fools they are. Now, obviously, I can maybe believe that back in the 1940s uh the these individuals these Germans did have such a strong idea of like a culture and they're all kind of connected to each other in a way where they did have all of these things they could just relate to. Um now, obviously, the Germans at this time one of the things they kind of all agreed on, which it is you know obviously not not a good thing to agree on, is that they thought that the Jews were basically trying to erode German civilization and basically erode like European civilization in general and sort of create this global order where uh basically it's kind of all controlled by global financiers and there's not really like individual culture or anything like that. Like basically everyone's the same. You have mass migration uh and all of these kind of cultural things get watered down. That's basically what um you know these these Germans were concerned about. They thought the Jews were trying to do that.

[00:01:43]So, anyway, the Germans lost, so now we have a society where um there are no individual cultures. That's the thing though. That's actually what my point is when I say like this is nonsense, that's the point. We live in a globalized society now and I have no [ __ ] idea what as an English but like what is the English way of saying three? I don't know.

[00:02:04]I I've no idea. People like there are so many situations where people say like oh what what's the way that XYZ group that I belong to does XYZ thing. I'm like what why would I know? I I've no idea. I don't I see far more stuff from like people online and like on in the media from all over the place. And even even my friends, you know, I went to university. So my friends are from various different places. Obviously mostly all I mean entirely all from the UK. My wife is from America.

[00:02:37]Basically the thing is we now live in such a globalized society that this idea that you can see someone doing something a particular way and say oh that must mean that they're not from the country they claim to be from. It just doesn't run anymore. Because basically I this is what inspired it, right?

[00:02:54]I saw this It was like a tweet. And the tweet says like oh blah blah blah football. And then it says something like oh you know, I was talking to me nan about it and she said blah blah blah whatever. And then someone threw up that meme.

[00:03:09]And I think this is because in Germany they would say migran.

[00:03:15]Or as as I I don't know. Like I think they they'd be more likely to call her gran than nan. I'm not sure. But here's the thing, you know, there are people in the comments say oh bloody bloody yanks.

[00:03:23]Oh cuz this is the thing, right? It it seems to be a thing where uh people don't like how Americans like there's there's a thing where like Americans will pretend to be from different countries.

[00:03:35]And I feel like uh this is two things. Number one, it can be Americans who are kind of like right-wing racists who basically want to suggest that like Europe is just overrun with um too many foreigners. So you'll see someone be like, "Yeah, I'm from a I'm from France and in France there's too many Muslims and it's terrible. I wish we had Donald Trump over here. Uh, yeah, in France I just wish we had Donald Trump, dudes." Uh, which obviously, yeah, that that's the thing that happens, apparently. But then, of course, there's also the the Americans who, you know, maybe they they but uh, have an Italian family and for some reason they're just really upset about the fact that their family moved to America. So, they like to lump as like, "I'll know I Hey, I'm actually Italian, you know, uh, so, when I was growing up in Sicily, cuz I'm an Italian and I definitely am not a smelly New Yorker, uh, we used to eat pizza and I really liked it. Uh, let me tell you. And I think that, um, but let me let me say I I think if I I ate a pizza from a guy who came from New York, I would think that it was also pretty good, you know, because, um, I feel like I'm kind of going like weirdly like Minnesotary. Like, "Hey, you know, I was uh, basically I came from uh, Minnesota and I had a good time there. Uh, but yeah, anyway, like that's the thing, right? Uh, [snorts] that there's reasons why there's this phenomenon of and I think it plays broadly, like people like to pretend they're from other places, but especially like Americans. But here's the thing, at the same time, how much of a phenomenon actually is that? Because let's be real here, there are going to be lots of people all over the world who have certain American ways of talking because American culture is incredibly global. And I'm sorry, but I just don't believe for a second that there isn't a single Scottish person who says "nan" instead of "gran" or whatever the reason is why this is supposed to be evidence of this person not actually being Scottish. Um, the reality is that we just live in a world now where many people from all over the world have different ways of talking because again, if you watch like let's say you are a American, but you watch loads and loads of Australian media. Or like I mean obviously this is the other one, you know, Australian media. I feel like it's more women who watch more Australian media cuz of like "Oh no."

[00:06:03]All that kind of stuff. Um if you're a dude though, maybe you watch loads of Japanese media. And in that case, but you might actually do pick up certain ways of speaking that are just because you've encountered that enough. So this idea of like well, I know, you know, this person says he's he's Scottish or you know, to apply to me maybe, this person says he's English.

[00:06:30]But I can tell that he isn't actually English. He must be an American because he said something that's slightly American.

[00:06:40]And only an American would speak in a way that's slightly American. No.

[00:06:48]No no person in the rest of the world would have any idea of how to speak in a slightly American-sounding way. No, obviously that's ridiculous. By the way, there are some people who weirdly think I sound American. It's weirdly happened more so since I've moved to you know, I I used to live somewhere else and now moved to a different city. And here more so people will say to me "Hey, are you American?" Like um it's very weird. And I actually had a comment recently.

[00:07:17]It was from someone who English wasn't their first language. Um but basically uh in my recent video about the World Cup uh there was a comment from someone who said "Oh, American accent detected.

[00:07:28]Opinion discarded." Uh so I don't I don't have an American accent. And obviously I do realize that every single American is going to think "What do you mean?

[00:07:38]You don't have an American accent at all." Yeah, absolutely 100%. But there are like English people, like several English people in my life who have come up to me and been like, "Why do you have an American twang?" Now, if I do have an American twang, you might say it's because I owe it to my wife, or you might say that it's just because I've consumed more American media. I mean, again, everyone consumes some American American media, but maybe I'm particularly susceptible to it, I don't know. What I can say though, it would be kind of annoying for someone to notice me saying something in in a kind of American way, and then be like, "Oh, you you you you spy, you're not you're not getting it past me, buster, cuz I know that secretly you must be American." No, obviously not. People have exposure to other cultures to such an extreme degree now that I would say like I would not be suspicious of anyone based on any way that they behave, even if it was somewhere that I or a specific way that I knew that people from a certain culture tend to talk more so than people from my culture, cuz I would just be like, "Well, they they maybe just watched that show or whatever." Again, I'm sure in the 1940s, people had much I mean, obviously wasn't even the concept of watching a show. You had like movies and stuff like that, but again, even the movies not people wouldn't really know.

[00:08:53]Like, I don't think people had that much exposure to movies uh because obviously you'd have to like go there and sit there and watch it, and it wasn't as much something that was consuming every waking aspect of your life in the way that YouTube is. But, yeah, it it's just nonsense to me. Like, individuals have their own idiosyncrasies. Something that I'm often asked by my American in-laws is, "Oh, is that like a an English way of speaking?"

[00:09:16]Like, people are you know, like ask me about like English slang and things like that. And I often find myself saying, "I think it might just be specific to my family, or indeed just specific to me." Does anyone else that get this? If you've ever had any sort of international interaction or something like that, or even like interregional interaction within your own country, people have kind of queried that whether the way you speak is or they'll in some way give an indication of their thinking that a particular way you speak might be due to the accent of the area you're from or the dialect of the area where you're from. And you're like, "No, actually, I think this is just a a me thing or my family thing." A good example of this is I say scrum bumbo when I think something's like like good. I'm like, "Mhm, scrum bumbo."

[00:10:02]And I've actually had people say By people I mean my in-laws, but is that like a Is that like an English thing? Do English people say scrum bumbo? And I'm like, "I promise you no other English person says scrum bumbo. Scrum That's a That's a dialect of one. It's me." Um the other thing I realized is that I've got a you know, a language shift happening in my my own life.

[00:10:24]I used to say like thanks instead of thanks, and that became tankies, and that became tonkies, and that became big tonkies, and then it became big tonkos, and now it's um big donkos. But like, it's also in an American accent. So like, "Well do, big donkos." That was like you know, it's if you if you do something nice like, "Hey Hey guys, big donkos for subscribing. Big donkos for giving on Patreon."

[00:10:49]Yeah, so there we go. That's You might be thinking you know, someone is like, "Whoa, you know, is that Is that like a a Southern California surfer thing saying big donkos?" I'm like, "No, it's not. Southern I'm the only Southern California surfer who says big big donkos, dude." Well, big donkos to the the surf gods for letting me catch that epic wave, man.

[00:11:12]Point is that we don't really know what We We don't know anything. You You don't know. Like, you see someone do something kind of weird, you can't just assume they're a spy. That's the point I'm making. And the thing is like genuinely I don't even know cuz I remember seeing on like Reddit. Yes, I was on Reddit. I know.

[00:11:30]I'll do my penance. But I remember seeing on Reddit like a a post that was like, "Oh, what is your country's equivalent to the how do you say number three in Germany thing?"

[00:11:41]And I like there were people saying things, but like the the answer is there isn't one. There isn't one. Like I there's nothing that I could say that is so essentially British that every British person does it. Not anything that is so obviously anti-British that no British person does it.

[00:11:59]I And like yeah, I had people saying things like "Oh, you know, Americans say, 'Oh, can I get can I get such and such?'" And therefore, if a if a British person said, you know, "Can can I get?" We know that they're secretly American or whatever. But, it's like no, cuz maybe they've seen any amount like of the huge amount of media of Americans where they will say all the time, "Oh, can I get?"

[00:12:23]Like that's the thing. There are especially amongst like millennials and and Gen Zs, and I realize obviously that American media has been a thing since like the boomers, but I I feel like especially millennials and Gen Z I I would be not at all like if there was a British person in front of me who was I don't know at a McDonald's or whatever, like somewhere where I obviously order things and said, "Oh, hi there. Can I get a blah blah blah blah?"

[00:12:49]I wouldn't think anything of it. I mean, there's also other things people say that are kind of like very self-congratulatory. Like "Oh, in the UK we say please, you know, so a British person would say, 'Oh, please please may I have such and such and such. Thank you.'" Um and yeah, I think we do tend to in the UK say please more often. Like I think I say please more than my wife.

[00:13:08]But, um I couldn't I I wouldn't therefore say, "Oh, well, if someone doesn't say please, that must mean they're not actually British. Like they're something else. Like that person must have been born somewhere else or whatever." No, again, it's entirely possible that it's just a personal thing. You know, obviously maybe they're just not really polite on a personal level. Uh yeah, there's so much else going on that I would just I can't think of anything where I would be like, "Oh, that [snorts] That person, they can't actually be They must secretly be not English because no English person would speak the way they do."

[00:13:44]The only thing I can think of that actually there is some logic to would be This is This is something which I think would catch out an American spy. Sorry, a British spy in America.

[00:13:59]And it would also catch out So, I know this because I know that it catches out British actors.

[00:14:07]Which is in the UK uh let's say, and this is the example I would give, dear as in idea and deer as in the animal, a deer, are both pronounced the same.

[00:14:24]Obviously, in America, they're pronounced differently.

[00:14:26]A deer, meaning the animal, would be called a deer. Deer. Whereas deer, as in idea, would be idea. Oh, that's a good idea.

[00:14:38]What I have noticed is when I imitate American accents, I will constantly do that thing of inserting R's into words that in English sound the same.

[00:14:51]So, I'll definitely all the time be like, "Hey guys, I've got an idea. Let's do this."

[00:14:58]Or or, "That's awful. Oh, that's so awful. I can't believe how awful that is." Because obviously again, in the UK, or as in awful uh and or as in and or um are pronounced the same. That That is it. That is the main thing I can think of where probably for a British person, they would think that that imitating an American accent because in their mind Americans just add the R sound to words or or or sounds like or and ear and are that those kind of sounds like yeah, you know, we say ear, we say we say ear, they say ear, we say or, they say or, we say um are, they say are.

[00:15:44]So, if I'm going to speak American, I'll just add the R sound to those uh vowels.

[00:15:49]But, obviously no, because actually Americans, shockingly, only add those R sounds to those words when they're in fact not adding the R sound at all. They're reflecting the fact that there is actually an R in the word. So, there we go. That's the one example I can think of and it doesn't even apply to my country. So, but yeah, and I don't think there's even like a I don't think it works the other way with Americans. I think the only thing I can think of is that Americans don't say certain vowels that we do.

[00:16:21]Like, probably the best example is that Americans will they don't really have the aw vowel. They say like um aw.

[00:16:29]So, yeah, like there there's certain words that Americans say differently. But again, I think if they were doing an English accent though, they would probably do it right. So, I can't really think of anything in um an English accent that would trip up Americans in the way that um the ear ah or sorry, ear ah or thing in an American accent would trip up British people.

[00:16:51]So, and also by the way, I'm kind of being racist cuz I do realize that there are many British people who have rhotic accents. I'm talking about my accent specifically. Anyway, so, but the overall point is that yeah, we we don't have there are no um established individual cultures for different countries anymore uh that are so well defended from outside influence that you can meaningfully say of anyone, "Oh, they can't possibly actually be from this country because otherwise they wouldn't talk like that or they wouldn't do that particular action. They wouldn't say three like that. Again, to clarify a point, just to to go back to where we started, I have literally no idea or should I say no idea, I have no idea how I'm supposed to say three in English. It wouldn't even occur to me. And to be honest, I'd probably change it. To me that feels more natural. I'll say this, that feels more natural. That feels a little weird.

[00:17:45]But I can do either.

[00:17:47]Ooh.