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The US, Canada, and Australia are three former colonies of the British Empire as I hope most of you know. Which nation do you believe has the most in common with the UK? Feel free to rank them.
National psyche - the US seems to share the UK’s sense of history and today is no more a migrant nation than the UK. But It does of course have a history of migration. Canada doesn’t seem to have the same gold rush/strike it rich strand that Australia and the US have.
Natural environment - the US, Canada and Australia are all far, far larger and varied than the UK. The UK doesn’t have any wilderness areas, where being eaten by a wild animal is a real possibility. But perhaps parts of the US would be most similar in climate and landscape, and in terms of population density.
The built environment - some cities in the US northeast with their row houses and old public building look very British influenced. But otherwise the UK doesn’t seem to be marked by car dependent urban sprawl like the others.
Business and institutional bonds - probably Canada. The US seems as much Asia as Europe focussed, while Australia doesn’t really look much beyond the Pacific.
Political systems - while they are all federations with strong constitutional traditions, unlike the UK, Canada’s take on that is more British influenced.
Sport - due to cricket and rugby in NSW and Qld, I’d say Australia.
Overall, probably parts of eastern Canada or maybe New England in the US.
Culturally, Australia by a long shot. It has to do with settlement history. North America was settled by the British from the early 1600s, while Captain Cook only arrived in Australia nearly 200 years later. Australia was very much tied to the 'motherland', and was both a penal colony (or rather separate colonies) and free settler's colony. The colonies were united in 1901, but we retained the monarchy, so Britain's head of state was ours, and are still not fully independent (though we are in another sense, it's confusing). So weirdly our head of state is the Queen, who lives halfway around the world, represented by the governor general.
Plus while we're a multicultural country our European-descended population is overwhelmingly British and Irish, while the US has more diversity with Germans.etc representing. We do have a lot of Italians etc though, as well as non-Europeans. British migrants still come in in large numbers.
Our accent is more similar to British since it split off a lot more recently than American/Canadian, we drive on the left, our parliamentary system, cuisine (meat pies, fish'n'chips, roast), planning, every city has a Victoria, Albert, Elizabeth, King, Queen Street.etc, a lot of older people have portraits of the Queen. We have about as many UK born as America which is a bout 15 times larger, to give you some idea.
I feel like Americans hate to admit we're a former British colony, but it's a fact. However, Americans adore Britain. The Beatles, Rolling Stones, James Bond, Harry Potter, etc. I've never met anyone anti-British here in the US, and I hope it's the same case over in the UK but I wouldn't be surprised if that isn't quite the case. Maybe Brits feel bad because their nation is becoming more Americanized, which they hate to admit like we hate to admit we technically came from Britain.
I feel like Canada is too hung up on Britain, the Queen is on their money! They need to find their own identity, time to move on from some of their British roots.
I'm not trying to offend, but I don't understand why the Queen is on Canadian and Australian money. They're not the UK anymore, so why cling onto that heritage? I know we Americans rebelled, but we're also a former British colony and you don't see us putting the Queen on our money. Point is, UK money should be the only money with the Queen on it IMO.
I'm not trying to offend, but I don't understand why the Queen is on Canadian and Australian money. They're not the UK anymore, so why cling onto that heritage? I know we Americans rebelled, but we're also a former British colony and you don't see us putting the Queen on our money. Point is, UK money should be the only money with the Queen on it IMO.
Its like asking why the US still uses British weights and measures. Only in the UK and US will you see road signs in MPH. Somethings just turn out that way...
I realise that, but we're talking national flag. It says something about how we've retained these connections. I do think after the Queen dies we'll finally become a Republic though.
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