English town says deeply shameful tradition is worth saving actually
You don't need to watch the video. Tom Scott/None of the interview subjects ever point out how fucked this is, but basically the story is rich sadists would put coins in boiling water and then throw them at poor children to watch them endure injury for small amounts of money as a form of entertainment.
lol people bringing up the extremely obvious eye safety hazards in the comments are being screamed down by whimsical brits
We have a long tradition of doing silly and dangerous things. Particularly in small towns. Some have formed out of old oagan (pre-Christian traditions), some for more questionable or objectionable reasons like this one. They keep going because a lot of people have good memories of them and it becomes part of a local identity.
I watched this video, and lots of people make mention of how the tradition started, and how the pennies used to be actually hot. And why. Its referred to multiple times. Your post implies this was glossed over, but you clearly got the info from the video, so it's not exactly hidden. Maybe that's why OP says, "no need to watch it", bevause they know they're telling fibs for outrage bait?
Look up The Cooper's Hill Cheese-Rolling and Wake. People get really hurt doing that.
I summarised the video and didn't do outside research. The point is that they're celebrating something that should be shameful. They explain the mechanics of how it's horrible but not that it is or that it shouldn't be celebrated. The closest they get to a condemnation is saying they've adjusted the tradition to be safer.
but basically the story is rich sadists would put coins in boiling water and then throw them at poor children to watch them endure injury for small amounts of money as a form of entertainment.
I could easily see a version of this done by "MrBeast" with
framing in the thumbnail and it being called the "hot penny challenge" or something horrid like that, with "KIDS COMPETE FOR (.01%; of the rich asshole's accumulated riches to date)" hype text.
Least pyschopathic day in Britbong Land
not every tradition need have a nice origin for it to be ingrained into the community.
this particular tradition is not still nobles trying to hurt poor people for their amusement, it's the townspeople throwing their pocketchange at each other in a vague remembrance, so long as they're having fun with it and wish to continue i don't think it's very problematic.
I was thinking about this video for some time now. Wonderful, old, quaint custom my ass. I'm sure all those collected pennies add up to a decent sum of money, couldn't that be used for idk at least feeding the homeless or smth? Also what's that mayor even wearing? The brits really went ahead and saved every deeply shameful tradition they ever had.
Jesus fucking Christ, I knew there was something wrong with brits but not this wrong.
There is a pattern I have seen in Tom Scott videos, he only makes videos about the "international community" countries.
Ah, western culture
Edit: I watched the video and the op actually does misrepresent it. Both Tom Scott and another interviewee both separately mention the origin of it. Also, I thought it was going to be folks just pegging pennies at each other on street corners, but no it’s a one day festival that people willingly participate as Pennie’s are tossed from balconies in an organized manner.
So although the origins are shit, it doesn’t seem to be the worst thing. The main issue I can see is safety. Tom Scott gets hurt at one point, and at another says “I hope I don’t get hurt.” You can see a couple shots of people covering their heads in the crowd, and Tom Scott also notes one of the throwers is not tossing pennies but rather throwing them down on people. One of the interviewees even says “we just have to hope nobody gets hurt.” So sort of fucked up, I probably wouldn’t participate, but not the worst thing that exists
For a whole bunch of "Good salt-of-the-earth Christians" WASPs are some of the most gleefully evil shitbags in human history.
The barbaric traditions of western tyrannical monarchies
I want to know which psychos idea it originally was to heat up a penny to scalding temperatures before tossing it to be fought over by the desperately poor?
"Traditions deserve to be preserved."
A YouTube link was detected in your post. Here are links to the same video on Invidious, which is a YouTube frontend that protects your privacy:
And the Lord said, whack ye all the serpents which crawl on their bellies and thy town shall be a beacon unto others