Forty years ago Britain (on it's own) decides to start the process of going metric, stalls halfway along and then blames the EU for trying to force it to finish the job. Then claims victory for a totally messed up hodgepodge where you measure miles per gallon but buy petrol in pence per litre.
Amusingly the US is considering becoming fully metric for the purposes of clarity and trade which will leave the UK somewhat isolated.
I have no problems with going metric where it makes sense for trade reasons. i.e. weights / dimensions for packaging - but the existing dual system labelling works fine for that purpose.
Going metric for say distance is more complicated. Every road sign in the UK would need replacing.. which would be a complete waste of money. And old car dashboards would be dangerous. (Reading km/h off current UK cars is hard)
Describing ones height in cms / weight in kgs is shite. The units are too small to be easily visualised. Feet and stones are superior in this regard.
I have no problems with the non-cultural stuff like packaging - but I object to writing off elements of UK culture just "because they do it this way elsewhere" sorry but in that sense I am anti-globalisation - if everything is the same it is boring.
The fact that British road signs are in miles, pubs serve beer in pints and we discuss our height in feet - affects no one, and has no impact on trade. So we'll keep it thanks :-p
2 comments:
Yeah, rubbish isn't it?
Forty years ago Britain (on it's own) decides to start the process of going metric, stalls halfway along and then blames the EU for trying to force it to finish the job. Then claims victory for a totally messed up hodgepodge where you measure miles per gallon but buy petrol in pence per litre.
Amusingly the US is considering becoming fully metric for the purposes of clarity and trade which will leave the UK somewhat isolated.
I have no problems with going metric where it makes sense for trade reasons. i.e. weights / dimensions for packaging - but the existing dual system labelling works fine for that purpose.
Going metric for say distance is more complicated. Every road sign in the UK would need replacing.. which would be a complete waste of money. And old car dashboards would be dangerous. (Reading km/h off current UK cars is hard)
Describing ones height in cms / weight in kgs is shite. The units are too small to be easily visualised.
Feet and stones are superior in this regard.
I have no problems with the non-cultural stuff like packaging - but I object to writing off elements of UK culture just "because they do it this way elsewhere" sorry but in that sense I am anti-globalisation - if everything is the same it is boring.
The fact that British road signs are in miles, pubs serve beer in pints and we discuss our height in feet - affects no one, and has no impact on trade. So we'll keep it thanks :-p
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