I wouldn’t want to criticize the British too much about prejudice. Appalachians have their own prejudices to deal with, and a fair amount of pride too. We are proud of our God, we are proud of our Country, we are proud of our guns and our children, not necessarily in that order. In fact the things we are most proud of are probably the very things that really rub the British the wrong way.
Let’s take our children for example. I have read that here in England, proper British parents don’t eat supper with their kids. The story is that they give them something starchy with out vitamins or protein around five o’clock called 'Tea' (its the name of the meal time, not the beverage) and send them to bed at 7:30, then sit themselves down to a hot meal of potatoes, meat and vegetables. While they love their children and are just as proud of them as we are, they would never come right out and say it. And since they don’t like having a meal with their own kids, they are not going to be terribly enthusiastic about coming over to the house having a meal with yours. Likewise, since they don’t brag about their own kids the last thing they want to hear is us brag about ours.
Gun ownership in America rubs the British fur the wrong way too. Out in the farm land British farmers are allowed to have guns to fend off predators, which I think is a bit of a ruse by the farmers. The only predators they have are foxes and badgers and the occasional ferret. The wild animals here look like they crawled out of a Beatrix Potter illustration, so I am not real sure why a farmer would need to shoot one. If they had rattle snakes and copperheads, coyotes and black bears, or even skunks or rabid raccoons it would make sense to me. Someone did point out to me that farmers here do need a way to do in Mad cows and those with Blue Tongue Disease, but I digress. So the only people to own guns in Cambridge are farmers and criminals. Since most people here don’t want to be associated with farmers or criminals, guns are bad. If Americans are proud of owning guns then they are bad too, hence the prejudice. The government helps to foster this notion because a couple a hundred years ago the world’s greatest standing army was defeated by a bunch of farmers with guns. In light of that I am surprised that Farmer McGregor doesn’t have to beat old Tommy Brock and the Fine Whiskered Gentleman with a stick.
The bottom line is this, if you really want to get “up their nose” as the British say, just brag about how your boy can shoot a pop can off a fence post at a hundred yards.