A Bit Old ..... But Still Funny
 

a letter from John Cleese to America

To the citizens of the United States of America: In the 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 today. Her Sovereign Majesty Queen Elizabeth II will resume
monarchical duties over all states, commonwealths and other territories.
Except Utah, which she does not fancy. Your new prime minister (The Right
Honourable Tony Blair, MP for the 97.85% of you who have until now been
unaware that there is a world outside your borders) will appoint a minister
for America without the need for further elections. Congress and the Senate
will be disbanded. A questionnaire will 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". Check the pronunciation guide. You will be amazed at
just how wrongly you have been pronouncing it. The letter 'U' will be
reinstated in words such as 'favour' and 'neighbour', skipping the letter
'U' is nothing more than laziness on your part. Likewise, you will learn to
spell 'doughnut' without skipping half the letters. You will end your love
affair with the letter 'Z' (pronounced 'zed' not 'zee') and the suffix "ize"
will be replaced by the suffix "ise". You will learn that the suffix 'burgh
is pronounced "burra' e.g. Edinburgh. You are welcome to respell Pittsburgh
as 'Pittsberg' if you can't cope with correct pronunciation. Generally, you
should raise your vocabulary to acceptable levels. Look up "vocabulary".
Using the same twenty seven words interspersed with filler noises such as
"like" and "you know" is an unacceptable and inefficient form of
communication. Look up "interspersed". There will be no more 'bleeps'in the
Jerry Springer show. If you're not old enough to cope with bad
language then you shouldn't have chat shows. When you learn to develop your
vocabulary then you won't have to use bad language as often.

2. 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".

3. You should learn to distinguish the English and Australian accents. It
really isn't that hard. English accents are not limited to ****ney,
upper-class twit or Mancunian (Daphne in Frasier). You will also have to
learn how to understand regional accents - Scottish dramas such as "Taggart"
will no longer be broadcast with subtitles. While we're talking about
regions, you must learn that there is no such place as Devonshire in
England. The name of the county is "Devon". If you persist in calling it
Devonshire, all American States will become "shires" e.g. Texasshire,
Floridashire, Louisianashire.

4. Hollywood will be required occasionally to cast English actors as the
good guys. Hollywood will be required to cast English actors to play English
characters. British sit-coms such as "Men Behaving Badly" or "Red Dwarf"
will not be re-cast and watered down for a wishy-washy American audience who
can't cope with the humour of occasional political incorrectness.

5. You should relearn your original national anthem, "God Save The Queen",
but only after fully carrying out task 1. We would not want you to get
confused and give up half way through.

6. You should stop playing American "football". There is only one kind of
football. What you refer to as American "football" is not a very good game.
The 2.15% of you who are aware that there is a world outside your borders
may have noticed that no one else plays "American" football. You will no
longer be allowed to play it, and should instead play proper football.
Initially, it would be best if you played with the girls. It is a difficult
game. Those of you brave enough will, in time, be allowed to play rugby
(which is similar to American "football", but does not involve stopping for
a rest every twenty seconds or wearing full Kevlar body armour like
nancies). We are hoping to get together at least a US Rugby sevens side by
2005. You should 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 2.15% of you are aware that there is a world beyond your
borders, your error is understandable. Instead of baseball, you will be
allowed to play a girls' game called "rounders" which is baseball without
fancy team strip, oversized gloves, collector cards or hotdogs..

7. You will no longer be allowed to own or carry guns. You will no longer be
allowed to own or carry anything more dangerous in public than a vegetable
peeler. Because we don't believe you are sensible enough to handle
potentially dangerous items, you will require a permit if you wishto carry a
vegetable peeler in public.

8. July 4th is no longer a public holiday. November 2nd will be a new
national holiday, but only in England. It will be called "Indecisive Day".

9. All American cars are hereby banned. They are crap and it is for your own
good. When we show you German cars, you will understand what we mean. All
road intersections will be replaced with roundabouts. You will start driving
on the left with immediate effect. At the same time, you will go metric with
immediate effect and without the benefit of conversion tables. Roundabouts
and metrication will help you understand the British sense of humour.

10. You will learn to make real chips. Those things you call French fries
are not real chips. Fries aren't even French, they are Belgian though 97.85%
of you (including the guy who discovered fries while in Europe) are not
aware of a country called Belgium. Those things you insist on calling potato
chips are properly called "crisps". Real chips are thick cut and fried in
animal fat. The traditional accompaniment to chips is beer which should be
served warm and flat. Waitresses will be trained to be more aggressive with
customers.

11. As a sign of penance 5 grams of sea salt per cup will be added to all
tea made within the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, this quantity to be
doubled for tea made within the city of Boston itself.

12. The cold tasteless stuff you insist on calling beer is not actually beer
at all, it is lager. From November 1st only proper British Bitter will be
referred to as "beer", and European brews of known and accepted provenance
will be referred to as "Lager". The substances formerly known as "American
Beer" will henceforth be referred to as "Near-Frozen Knat's Urine", with the
exception of the product of the American Budweiser company whose products
will be referred to as "Weak Near-Frozen Knat's Urine". This will allow true
Budweiser (as manufactured for the last 1000 years in Pilsen, Czech
Republic) to be sold without risk of confusion.

13. From November 10th the UK will harmonise petrol (or "Gasoline" as you
will be permitted to keep calling it until April 1st 2005) prices with the
former USA. The UK will harmonise its prices to those of the former USA and
the Former USA will, in return, adopt UK petrol prices (roughly $6/US gallon
- get used to it).

14. You will learn to resolve personal issues without using guns, lawyers or
therapists. The fact that you need so many lawyers 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.

15. Please tell us who killed JFK. It's been driving us crazy. Tax
collectors from Her Majesty's Government will be with you shortly to ensure
the acquisition of all revenues due (backdated to 1776).

16. Last but not the least, and for heaven's sake.....it's Nuclear as in
"clear" NOT Nucular.

Thank you for your co-operation and have a great day.

i think you eat dîck.


sorry, i just had to let that out.

Hahaha....WE SUCK. (please feel free to send as many cases of Harp,Bass, or Guinness as you see fit)

did you really have to quote the entire thing?

my thoughts entirely.

It is just great, isn't it.

hehehe, i actually read the whole bloody thing. hilarious. every single point he makes is so true. "frozen knats urine". quote of the century. long live john cleese.

John Cleese rules! That whole thing made me piss myself. Yay im cheerful again.

YES!!!!!

oh my God..my thoughts verbatim!!

looool. john cleese. comical mastermind. along with the others in the monty python crew.

jen xx

Monty Phyton's great indeed!
 

Oh, I love Monty Phyton...
"Life Of Brain" is one of my favourite comedies...

'Are you the peoples front of judea'
'f*ck off'

and many more

Holy Grail is my favourite.

Though at Mum's, she's got a vinyl of 'The fyling circus' and that's eqaully hilarious.

jen xx

He's wrong in that speil about Baseball though. Japan plays the game rabidly. And you guys play cricket which is almost as bad.

it is funny though.

Guess I'm done drinking Tea.

And as for the baseball thing; Its not just Japan that plays it, everything south of us feels it might be the only sport.

Also, I know this was lighthearted, but when people carry on as if Americans were a hegemonious streamlined culture, I have to wonder how many places in America they've been.

Most of America calls for the North East Region of the States to be erradicated. Just FYI, no one likes New York/New England.

I long for the days when John Cleese was actually funny *reminisce*

No guns, no lawyers, no therapists. :nono:

;)

I'm just asking, Mr. Cleese (sp?) never said anything against asking.

haha, i like that, would love for it to acually happen, with the acception of taxes....mm, but being that some where over there is still a ton of family we kinda for got about ... who knows

and yes people need to learn to properly speak and read even, i mean come on, i nearly got a perfect on my reading SAT (680 out of 710) maybe people won't look at me so funny for using "bigger" words and the fact i have a slight(very slight) German accent

soccer is played in my countries south of here, but Cuba, Japan and Puerto Rico play baseball( i don't even watch it) umm... BTW can any one tell me how it played in the first place(base ball)

i have more to comment on in a few

This was dry as hell, even if it was true it wasn't that funny. Some of it was straight up stupid, poking fun at americans for spelling 'colour' color? We were taught to spell that way, so trying to play it off like its lazy and moronic of us is pretty dumb.

What? Each SAT catagory is out of 800...

and this thing is damn funny.

that was the old one now it 710, because of the fact its now 3 tests insted of 2, they seperated writing into it own category there by making it count seprate, i'm just posting what it says on my paper

The old test was out of 1600 total. Math = 800 max, Reading = 800 max

New one is out of 2400. Math = 800 max, Reading = 800 max, Writing = 800 max

So I have no idea what you're talking about and I don't think you do either.

Actually all the words we have spelled diffrently in the states are because we hate the brittish. We just took letters out to be diffrent. This need to be better than them because of hatred is also why "ain't" isn't a word.

I'm a word nerd like that, I study this **** all day long. it gets me off academiclly.

Bill Gates will find some way to combat the changing of his spellcheck

American "football" should be banned. Any sport baring any simularities to it should also be outlawed.

Second Amendment right to the US Constitution allows us to bare arms. I interpret this amendment the Conservative way. The only thing I ask is that anyone with a gun or any other weapon be certified to use it. They should pass a test proving they know how to use it and that they are accurate.

German or Italian cars.

Sometimes violence is the answer. We need lawyers to mediate these sorts of situations and therapists to help us decide on which course of action is best. if not the homicide rate would sky rocket.
And Brits are one to talk anyway.
I think their homicide rate rivals America's.

JFK's brother setup his assissination. Case solved.

i'm just saying what the paper said.., either way i scored high enougth that the bitch in the office shoved her foot up her ass again, becuse all the other scored had been low

Egregeous sin.

no, his lawyers would come up with a way, but he isn't alowed to have them anymore

nah, rugby can be fun (not as good as football but still fun)

balls to you're constitution, England doesn't have one

nope, we have a lower murder rate

Dave Lister set up JFK's assasination, JFK himself was the second gunman



:)

^ haha, it was the mob, capone's goons shot him

i wish we had a lower murder rate, and less spying thingys.....(wiretaps ect...)

I love this thread.

John Cleese is usually so funny, but this...no. The first paragraph is funny, that's about it.. Who the f*ck cares how we spell color or that you call soccor football- no one. And I have no idea what he's talking about with the letter u stuff, but I really don't care cuz he just comes off sounding arrogant.

Hey hold on, do we actually know he wrote this? There was alot of **** circulating the internet 8 years ago that was written by "adam sandler" in amusing cutsy font and stupid buble letters.

Believe nothing.

This 'letter' pretty much sums up British humour to a tee. It's telling that all of you who have questioned the funnyness of it are American. Its what Brits love doing, taking the piss out of America in as petty a way as possible. Same as we love goading the French, Germans and Australians. Its all lighthearted.

With the exception of the French and Germans, which of course is deadlly serious.

This is beautiful.

John Cleese is godly.

oh yes, we have been knowwn to nuke the odd french village, as for germans, swines.

'i spit on your grave' was kind of naff.