The Trouble with English-American Relationships (& why ours works anyway)
My husband and I discuss our former neighbors, Lily and David, American versus British masculinity, and loving without demanding sameness
Not so long ago, Joe and I sat at our local brunch date location next to Lily Allen and her recently disgraced ex-husband. Their now-infamous brownstone even shares two of the three numbers with ours. We lived on the same block. This proximity does not qualify us to say anything interesting about them, but another similarity led Joe to say this about their breakup…
Joe: It’s no surprise. The relationships that way just don’t work.
Abby: American man and English woman?
Joe: Yeah, it exacerbates the gender dynamics.
**
I used to think “gender dynamics” was a problem to solve. This came from a good place – I thought humans were more similar than we believed. Or, we could be. Or, we should be. Many aspects of our humanity are constructed from where, and how, we were born, sure. But the idea that we can think, communicate, act, and be the same is not helpful. Our differences aren’t a problem. When we recognize that our differences aren’t the problem itself, we have the opportunity to foster sympathy and compassion instead of frustration at the distance between us.
Being in a long-term relationship with an Englishman has helped me remember that, as he has quirks learned from his upbringing across the pond, he, too, has innate characteristics of an equally great distance, albeit not geographic. We speak a different cultural language, and we work in distinct biological styles. Noticing the one I can’t ‘change’ reminds me I ought not try to ‘change’ the other.
In the following interview, Joe and I discuss how, although we both speak English, the similarities stop there, and how that presents a challenge for cross-cultural couples, yet a blessing for cross-gender ones. Caveat: We’re obviously speaking from our own (hetero, cross-cultural) vantage point, not a universal one — but difference is difference, and every couple has to find its way across it.
**
Abby: Tell me more. What is it that you believe makes the American Man, English Woman relationship complicated?
Joe: American masculinity is really fucking weird to an outsider. It’s really one-dimensional as well, so it’s easy to pin down. It’s all about being assertive, and more specifically, it’s about ‘taking’ as much as you can get away with. Taking up physical space with a big truck or walking with your arms flexed and jaw clenched. Taking up metaphorical space time by talking loudly. Taking as much money as you can from whoever you can. Taking someone’s life by shooting them with a gun.
More positively, it might be about ‘taking care’ of your family by providing a house or whatever, or taking an opportunity, and seizing a chance to better yourself. But ultimately, American masculinity is all about taking.
This is a tangent, but Trump’s famous ‘grab ‘em by the pussy’ comment is the ultimate shadow form of American masculinity - taking away other people’s bodily autonomy and agency, and getting away with it. Americans love getting away with things, too.
I don’t think this Taking mindset really works in the UK, where the whole concept of maturity is essentially built around the idea of acceptance, accepting your lot in life, accepting yourself, accepting your class, your fortunes and misfortunes – this isn’t a masculinity thing its literally how I think most people would describe what becoming a mature adult means - which includes women of course. So I think an English woman, who is mature and thinks being a grown-up means accepting what you’ve got, is going to find a man who always wants to ‘take’ very annoying after a while.
You see this [in Lily and David’s relationship] with the whole open relationship thing. Lily sings about it in her album. In the framework of American masculinity, taking more is a positive quality, but clearly, for an English person, that idea is far more dissonant.
Abby: I can see that ‘taking’ idea – and its positive and negative manifestations. I think that checks out. Even in its healthy state (i.e. American rule-bending activism and art (think Jenny Holzer)), you think it’s off-putting to an English woman?
Joe: Yeah, we’d even use the phrase ‘taker’ as an insult. ‘He/she is a right taker.’ It’s similar to ‘user.’ I would put being a user/taker in the top tier of worst things you can be, alongside being two-faced.
Abby: And the alternative — like us — why does that work?
Joe: Well, I think English masculinity is much more multidimensional. It can be about honour, and it can be about subversiveness, and it can be about refinement. These can be frustrating, I guess, for English Man, American Woman couples, of course. For instance, you don’t like being teased and ribbed – that’s ‘banter,’ which is all about subversiveness through language. Whereas that’s probably the number one quality English women look for in a man. And thinking about it, it’s also sort of funny that there is such a big deal made with American women who seem to look for a man being tall – taking up more physical space with their bodies.
The refinement thing, though, is an all-out positive.
Abby: Everyone loves a gentleman.
Joe: Which explains the popularity of period dramas!
Abby: That, and the comfort of a predictable plot.
Joe: English honour is more complicated. Sometimes you get confused when I will make a point of being principled about something that incurs a negative, like not pushing into a queue when we could get away with it or whatever.
Abby: Um, I am from the Midwest. I would also never push into a queue. But I am an American who likes to get away with things in a rule-bending manner, so I would just avoid the queue altogether, find my alternative, and feel superior. But, yes, I get it – you wouldn’t jaywalk even on an empty street, and I do find that annoyingly principled.
Joe: Yeah, but in general, the features of British masculinity are more positive in a relationship.
Abby: And what do you think about American women?
Joe: They are way more direct than English women, which probably means less stuff is brushed under the rug or left to become a bigger problem, which is good and healthy for a relationship.
Besides, when you’re obnoxious, I can just say, “Keep your hair on.”
Abby: I honestly wish you’d say that more.
Joe: There are many American phrases that, to the English ear, are highly suspicious. Like when people approach their colleagues and say, “Hi, friends.”
Abby: Because you all would say dickheads.
Joe: “Alright, dickheads,” or if you’re being polite, “I can’t believe they let you lot in here.”
Abby: It’s like when we were courting, and I called you ‘cute and sweet.’ You took offense.
Joe: Yeah, and you want ‘sweet nothings,’ but I think to an English woman, the things you want me to say would sound manipulative and alarming.
Abby: Manipulative?!
Joe: Yes, even this morning when you said that about the towels — you forgot to bring the towels. If an American man said that to an English woman, I think they’d find that abusive.
Abby: Hahahaha. I can’t promise I’ll change, but I’ll consider this feedback.
Joe: We’d say a polite — oh, it looks like we forgot the towels.
Abby: We Americans are much more straightforward. Direct. You ‘lot’ are indirect. For you, that signals status. You’re a class-based culture. Whereas we prefer efficiency and to cut through differences. We value productivity over status.
Joe: I’m not sure it’s status so much as honour. British culture is very honour-based, people are an ends, not a means to an ends. Directness implies using. If somebody only focuses on the things they want someone else to do or the business at hand, that sort of says they are more interested in that thing than the person, almost like they don’t see them as a person and just a way to get something they want. Like when you hear self help influencers tell people ‘Ask if relationships are serving you’ – literally psychotic thing to say in my opinion, totally sociopathic.
Abby: You love to rib on American directness. But Lily is famously straightforward. I’m really obsessed with it. Listening to her interviews has been the only thing that’s made me actually miss London life in a while. But, how do you view her truth-telling in comparison to American directness?
Joe: Yeah, but there’s more nuance than just directness.
Like if I had to say the big five no goes in Brit culture, it would be:
Being two-faced
Using people
Being entitled (think you deserve more than others)
Going along with others (doing things you don’t agree with and not at least saying your piece)
Thinking you have different rules from other people
Abby: That could be a list of American characteristics, sadly.
Joe: The problems with British culture are we’re pessimistic, assume the worst, and we’re not dynamic and entrepreneurial. You might say, ‘hey, there's this thing on later, let’s go,’ and the Brit response will be ‘nahhhh, it might rain’ or ‘nahhhh, Love Island is on later.’
Abby: Yes.
Joe: This is why Brits are better at music, and Americans are better at modern literature. It’s punchy, direct, forceful.
Abby: Almost like sexy music and sexy literature require different personalities.
Speaking of sexy music. I think anyone who’s heard Lily’s album will know the two of them were clearly not meant to be. Even in the opening track, West End Girl, you can tell Lily could see that. In hindsight, at least. Perhaps she was filling a hole in herself with him. He was clearly filling lots of his own holes, too.
Joe: Maybe, but I think sometimes people want to create a narrative around things like this when it’s often a bit simpler than that. People with low empathy seek dopamine. They need stimulation and don’t like to be alone with their thoughts because they get lonely so they’re constantly finding ways to stimulate themselves. You can’t really trust people who can’t just sit down and daydream for ten minutes. People will say they’re dealing with a wound or filling some missing piece - but really they’re just shits.
I’m not sure about the red flags because I haven’t listened to the record closely, but I’d guess that it’s something like that? And this goes back to the point about seeing people as a means to an end, but these people low in empathy and high in dopamine seeking tend to just view other people as a way to stimulate the dopamine they crave, rather than seeing them as people. David, as evidenced by the weird flower message, has this about him.
Abby: You and I have a different approach to arguing. You hold your feelings back longer than I do – the Englishman’s self-censoring of feelings gets exasperated by the stereotypical male emotional distance from themselves. It sometimes frustrates me when you can’t respond as soon as I’d wished. But I am grateful to know that there is a reason you’re like this, and that helps me have sympathy for your approach, instead of thinking you need to ‘fix’ this about yourself.
We talked about this with our new friends Rod and Allison, who were on Couples Therapy. They have that dynamic, too (made a little more intense from Allison’s New York roots, and Rod didn’t grow up with 90s Spice Girls girl-power-culture, like you). People watched them and thought Allison talked too much, and Rod didn’t talk enough. But they were both products of their environments, and that made sense… So long as they have compassion for the other, it isn’t a problem in and of itself.
Joe: Yeah, I think in general American culture is way more about externalizing things. They want to validate how they feel by saying it aloud and have other people acknowledge it. Not sure Brits are into that.
Abby: The common judgment would be that you’re suppressing feelings. But, I’ve learned that at least with you, it is much more Buddhist. You’re noticing feelings, but not treating them like anything worthy of your time.
I love feelings. It’s part of the richness of life, to me, yet I do practice more impermanence, with age. Yet, still, I feel and express. The harder ones for you to understand are fear, worry, and stress. You interpret my stress as anger and get defensive. I think you’re doing your best to remember that when I don’t meet your expectations, it doesn’t mean I’m being cruel. And vice versa. And even if our cultural differences aren’t to blame, it’s nice to have that excuse to soften us and remind us to be sympathetic and patient with each other.
Joe: Yeah, again, I think that Americans are much more comfortable with aggression. There’s a reason the murder rate is six times higher here! I think Brits feel that anger is quite aggressive and is reserved for extraordinary situations, so it’s not something you’d associate with everyday feelings of being stressed or worried. Also, I don’t think there’s really the same etiquette around it, like if someone’s being angry, then you might joke or something, or just avoid them, but you wouldn’t assume that person is in need of affection.
Abby: These differences in expression can happen for any couple, of course, and I suppose that’s the real point of this chat. People too often assume that if we get along so well, we must see eye-to-eye on everything, and when they discover communication barriers or differences in communication, they see it as an affront to the relationship instead of evidence of its humanness.
You and I have a permanent reminder that we’ll never be fully aligned. Which helps us (ok, me) accept our differences aren’t a problem, while still hoping that we’ll meet each other in a more understanding place with time.
Joe: Being aligned would be boring.
Abby: Ha! It’s true… why is culture so obsessed with matchy pairings?
We also have our Midwest - Midlands dynamics. I’ve spoken before about how you laugh at things that I cry at. I innately knew this wasn’t a problem, but the first time I cried while you laughed, you thought it was because I wanted to break up, right?
Joe: Yeah, I find the crying thing really disorienting.
Abby: With my family, I used to flinch when you’d say something, and I’d know how they’d misinterpret it. Like when you once mentioned that a sandwich shop looked good, and my dad took a U-turn thinking you wanted a sandwich right then and there.
We Midwesterners are very literal. We also have a point to most of our small talk, whereas your small talk is the point itself. And we Midwesterners have this aim to please people and show we’re thinking of them, so the chat always has a deeper purpose.
All these minor differences come from good places, but they can create major disconnects. Even the ways we help get misinterpreted as disrespect.
Like when you ask me to grab you something, and I set it down near you. But when I ask you to bring me something, you stand and wait for me to grab it from you. I used to think you were expecting something from me by standing there and waiting for me to grab the cup of tea, and that nullified the ‘help’ in my mind. And you thought I didn’t care quite enough to pass the cup of tea directly to you.
It reminds me of when we were renovating our place in Minneapolis. You’d be sitting down, not helping, and I thought it was terribly rude. But you would’ve found it disrespectful to jump in on a project without an invitation, as that would imply you didn’t think they had it covered. While my family would’ve never asked you to help, because they figured you’d do it if you wanted to.
But since we respect and love each other, we’re dedicated to navigating these gaps in understanding. To do our best to support and appreciate one another.
Joe: Yeah, it’s already disorienting being in another country that is so different culturally. But the whole point of tolerance is that you might not understand something, but you let it be that way anyway.
Abby: Back to Lily and whatshisface. There are times when people are just too terribly different that the communication, expectations, and overall life compatibility are muddy and tough to navigate. You can see their communication differences in Lily’s lyrics. It’s painful to hear that disconnect. It looks to me, with the grain of salt that peeping on neighbors implies, that they didn’t have the mutual commitment, the honor, the seeing-each-other-as-the-ends, to commit to understanding each other.
I think I’ll blame whatshisface for that one. Anyone who guilts someone into an open relationship does deserve the blame, I think.
Joe: I come down hard on Lily Allen’s side here, too. I get the impression that he was probably approaching the whole relationship quite transactionally, ‘what can I get out of this?’ I’m not sure how someone in Lily’s position can get around that, to be honest.
Abby: In the spirit of this interview, if we were going to come up with an antidote to the ‘Ask if relationships are serving you’ platitude, what would it be?
Joe: Ask yourself if you’d rather be analyzing shit or enjoying it. And if analyzing, maybe it’s not right.
Abby: Perfect. That is our public service on behalf of all English-American couples. The failed, and the still hanging on.
I’d love to hear from you in the comments. Do you think we’re talking bollocks? What is your take, or experience with, cross-cultural relationships, or being in a couple with major differences?
Brilliant! I enjoyed this a lot, will not be analyzing.
such an interesting piece abigail! especially as an american living in london haha <3 i wrote about the album too but didn't have the insight u do, and i really appreciated reading this!