Then how come you have an Armenian flag on your profile, if I may ask? ---------- Post added 2010-09-13 at 02:00 ---------- It has to do with the idea of British 'reserve' and manners I think, middle class people will tolerate insults from foreigners about 'larger lout Brits' because as far as they are concerned such insults refer exclusively (and in fairness they probably do) to lower class Brits, and not them. They like to think the nice little foreigners in Spain or Portugal like and respect them (the middle class tourists) because they dabble in the local language and culture- they're racist in their own way, regarding the locals as very much a tourist attraction, whereas lower class visitors (i.e. the easyjet stag night types) are indifferent to the locals and only want the weather and the chance to behave like delinquents (which many do when at home in England anyway) by getting hammered and being rowdy/causing damage. Plus, we haven't had the kind of turbulent political history in recent generations that other places have, our sense of identity is pretty strong. Interesting point on the Englishness thing, a lot of middle class people do feel 'English' identity is something for the working class. Its a tendency to think if we call ourselves English then that's somehow excluding the Scots & Welsh.