Category: Society & Culture

Over at the Washington Post: Forgetting a child in the back seat of a hot, parked car is a horrifying, inexcusable mistake. But is it a crime?
It’s kind of a moot question since it might be hard to find a worse punishment than the guilty are already going through… This was one of the hardest articles to read in recent memory. I tried to relate to the parents in the story, but it’s just hard for me to believe that people can completely forget about their own babies in their cars.

To the citizens of the United States of America:
In light of your failure to elect a competent President of the USA and
thus to govern yourselves, we hereby give notice of the revocation of
your independence, effective immediately.
Her Sovereign Majesty, Queen Elizabeth II, will resume monarchical
duties over all states, commonwealths and other territories (except
Kansas, which she does not fancy), as from Monday next.
Your new prime minister, Gordon Brown, will appoint a governor for
America without the need for further elections. Congress and the
Senate will be disbanded. A questionnaire may be circulated next year
to determine whether any of you noticed.
To aid in the transition to a British Crown Dependency, the following
rules are introduced with immediate effect:
1. You should look up “revocation” in the Oxford English Dictionary.
Then look up “aluminium,” and check the pronunciation guide. You will
be amazed at just how wrongly you have been pronouncing it.
2. The letter ‘U’ will be reinstated in words such as ‘colour’,
‘favour’ and ‘neighbour.’ Likewise, you will learn to spell ‘doughnut’
without skipping half the letters, and the suffix “ize” will be
replaced by the suffix “ise.”
3. You will learn that the suffix ‘burgh’ is pronounced ‘burra’; you
may elect to respell Pittsburgh as ‘Pittsberg’ if you find you simply
can’t cope with correct pronunciation.
4. Generally, you will be expected to raise your vocabulary to
acceptable levels (look up “vocabulary”). Using the same twenty-seven
words interspersed with filler noises such as “like”, “know whad I’m
sayin’?” and “you know” is unacceptable and inefficient form of
communication.
5. There is no such thing as “US English.” We will let Microsoft know
on your behalf. The Microsoft spell-checker will be adjusted to take
account of the reinstated letter ‘u’ and the elimination of “-ize.”
6. You will relearn your original national anthem, “God Save The
Queen”, but only after fully carrying out Task #1 (see above).
7. July 4 will no longer be celebrated as a holiday. November 2 will
be a new national holiday, but to be celebrated only in England. It
will be called “Come-Uppance Day.”
8. You will learn to resolve personal issues without using guns,
lawyers or therapists. The fact that you need so many lawyers,
self-help gurus and therapists shows that you’re not adult enough to
be independent. Guns should only be handled by adults. If you’re not
adult enough to sort things out without suing someone or speaking to a
therapist then you’re not grown up enough to handle a gun.
9. Therefore, you will no longer be allowed to own or carry anything
more dangerous than a vegetable peeler. A permit will be required if
you wish to carry a vegetable peeler in public.
10. All American cars are hereby banned. They are crap and this is for
your own good. When we show you Japanese, Korean and German cars, you
will understand what we mean.
11. All intersections will be replaced with roundabouts, and you will
start driving on the left with immediate effect. At the same time, you
will go metric immediately and without the benefit of conversion
tables. Both roundabouts and metrication will help you understand the
British sense of humour.
12. The Former USA will adopt UK prices on petrol (which you have been
calling “gas”) – roughly $6/US gallon. Get used to it.
13. You will learn to make real chips. Those things you call French
fries are not real chips, and those things you insist on calling
potato chips are properly called “crisps.” Real chips are thick cut,
fried in animal fat, and dressed not with mayonnaise but with vinegar.
14. Waiters and waitresses will be trained to be more aggressive with
customers.
15. The cold tasteless stuff you insist on calling beer is not
actually beer at all. Henceforth, only proper British Bitter will be
referred to as “beer,” and European brews of known and accepted
provenance will be referred to as “Lager.” American brands will be
referred to as “Near-Frozen Gnat’s Urine,” so that all can be sold
without risk of further confusion.
16. Hollywood will be required occasionally to cast English actors as
good guys. Hollywood will also be required to cast English actors to
play English characters. Watching Andie MacDowell attempt English
dialogue in “Four Weddings and a Funeral” was an experience akin to
having one’s ears removed with a cheese grater.
17. You will cease playing American “football.” There is only one kind
of proper football; you call it “soccer”. Those of you brave enough
will, in time, will be allowed to play rugby (which has some
similarities to American “football”, but does not involve stopping for
a rest every twenty seconds or wearing full kevlar body armour like a
bunch of nancies).
18. Further, you will stop playing baseball. It is not reasonable to
host an event called the “World Series” for a game which is not played
outside of America . Since only 2.1% of you are aware that there is a
world beyond your borders, your error is understandable.
19. You must tell us who killed JFK. It’s been driving us mad.
20. An internal revenue agent (i.e. tax collector) from Her Majesty’s
Government will be with you shortly to ensure the acquisition of all
monies due backdated to 1776.
Thank you for your co-operation.
John Cleese
/////////////////////////
(forwarded from my dad)
UPDATE: As Erik notes in the comments (thanks!), this wasn’t written by John Cleese, and it’s from two election cycles ago!