Vocal Voices

For over 40 years I have been berated by smug and self satisfied mainland Europeans who have, lecturingly, told me:

"Britain is European and you cannot say Britain and Europe"

Really?

The UK is Europe’s biggest producer of film and TV programming, buoyed up by £1.4bn from the sale of international rights, but its dominance has been described as a threat to Europe’s “cultural diversity” in an internal EU document seen by the Guardian.

Under the EU’s audiovisual media services directive, a majority of airtime must be given to such European content on terrestrial television and it must make up at least 30% of the number of titles on video on demand (VOD) platforms such as Netflix and Amazon.

Countries such as France have gone further, setting a 60% quota for European works on VOD and demanding 15% of the turnover of the platforms is spent in production of European audiovisual and cinematographic works.

According to an EU document tabled with diplomats on 8 June, in the “aftermath of Brexit” it is believed the inclusion of UK content in such quotas has led to what has been described as a “disproportionate” amount of British programming on European television.

according to the European Audiovisual Observatory, the UK provides half of the European TV content presence of VOD in Europe and the UK works are the most actively promoted on VOD,

“Although the UK is now a third country for the European Union, its audiovisual content still qualifies as ‘European works’ according to the definition provided by the AVMS directive, as the definition continues to refer to the European convention on Transfrontier Television of the Council of Europe, to which the UK remains a party.”

“European works status continues to apply to audiovisual works originating in the UK, as the UK is a party to the Council of Europe’s European Convention on Transfrontier Television (ECTT).”

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2021/ ... own-brexit

So, in the end after having signed up to their "Council of Europe" (as did Russia) and all their other stuff, after all the years of berating that the UK is European, no matter what WE think:

When the chips are down, they don't really think we are European and are acting to make sure that we know it. The biggest threat to the EU "cultural diversity" is not that the UK has half the air time for that media. It is that the vast majority of young Europeans don't like the "local yokel" stuff and want the British and US stuff.

It has amused me greatly. Because I'm going to use this many, many, many times in the near future. Starting with the next German located Scottish Country Dance Ball I go to....