The image of women in Victorian times veered between that of madonna and whore, but nowadays in Britain it veers between harridan and slut. This is only natural in a country where vulgarity is not only triumphant, but militant and deeply ideological. The men, of course, are just as bad.
Recently, I flew to an Aegean resort now much favoured by our permanently bronzed proletarians. I was going to a conference of intellectuals there. The pudgy tattooed women en route to paradise had diamonds in their navels; the shaven-headed men, lager made flesh, had skimpy vests stretched painfully over their beer bellies, gold chains and an earring to prove their indelible individuality. One had the words ‘If found, please return to the pub’ inscribed on his chest; another, ‘Lager recycling unit.’ I shouldn’t have laughed, but I did.
As far as I am aware, however, it is only when the British go on holiday that it is deemed necessary to warn passengers in an aircraft that drunken violence will not be tolerated (though how it will be dealt with at 35,000 feet is less clear); and it is only in British airports that arriving passengers are warned that threatening behaviour towards immigration staff is ‘taken seriously’ and will, perhaps, end in prosecution.
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