‘Silicon Glen’ Rather Than Dingley Dell

After 209 years, one would imagine that a nation that prides itself in being forward thinking would cease denigrating its mother country. However, the leader by William Tuohy in The Times (July 23) gives the lie to this. To spend nearly a page of a mass circulation newspaper attacking a class system and, by inference, Britain itself, is downright ridiculous in this day and age.

If Britain was truly in the Dickensian state portrayed by your article, would the flights from LAX to London be as packed with American tourists as they are?

As one who has spent the last five years based in Southern California, commuting regularly to Britain, I found your article to be a most patent collection of half-truths and old wives’ tales, on a par with the belief that London is permanently shrouded in fog, a la Sherlock Holmes.

The truth about the British class system is that, while it exists, it is not the all-powerful force that many American believe it to be. Indeed, it never was. The British middle class, not the aristocracy, was responsible for the foundation and administration of the British Empire, and that middle class still is at the helm.

After all, is not Margaret Thatcher the daughter of the 1930s equivalent of a “yuppie”? True, the “Hooray Henrys” tend to dominate certain aspects of the social scene at Oxbridge, but the examination results are equally dominated by the offspring of doctors, lawyers, shopkeepers and miners.

Many prominent American politician or industrialist are proud to point out that they were once Rhodes Scholars. The fact that Princess Diana has a will of her own should not be taken as reinforcement of the ruling oligarchy. Her manners are a great deal better than those of any of the “princesses” who adorn your society columns. And if she were not there, whom else would the world’s press have to write about?

Unfortunately, your writer made the mistake of listening only to the social apologists who adorn the corridors of the “best” universities. Secure in their ivory towers, these left-wing drones are as far removed from normal life as the upper classes they criticize, and a great deal less entertaining.

The depiction of an impoverished north versus a sleek, overpaid south is only about 50 years out of date. If one is to believe that all the electronics industry has located in the south, why is part of Scotland referred to as “Silicon Glen,” and why do the valleys of Wales ring with the lilt of Japanese accents? I also doubt very much that Britain is importing computer engineers. Rather, the opposite is the case.

It is a strength of the British education system that British engineers are highly sought after here on the West Coast. Check out the upper echelons of many computer corporations here, and you will find that a certain accent predominates.

The sad part about your article is that it could so easily have been written about this great country we live in.

After all, employment in Pittsburgh is as poor as that in Tyneside, and for the same reason: outdated industries. The society matrons of Beverly Hills flaunt their riches on Rodeo Drive in a far more blatant manner than their counterparts in Belgravia, if indeed such a comparison could be made. The average auto worker in Detroit (or Van Nuys) has far less say in running his union’s affairs than his counterpart in Coventry--and dissent on his part is liable to end up in physical retribution.

Our two nations face many of the same problems, be they financial, cultural, racial or evolutionary. After 209 years, isn’t it time to bury the hatchet?

JOHN CHASE McMILLAN

Studio City