The new year got off to an anticlimactic start for hundreds of people in Birmingham who were tricked into attending a non-existent New Year’s Eve fireworks display. Again.
Crowds of revellers gathered in the city’s Centenary Square, hoping to catch a glimpse of a pyrotechnics display to welcome in 2026.
They were left disappointed, however, after they discovered no display would be taking place and that they had fallen victim to false news spread online.
A similar incident happened last year, when thousands of people gathered in the city centre after claims online promised a spectacular display with food vendors and performances.
Not to be elitist, culturalist, or anything but they’ve not exactly got a reputation for crafty and bright – like Cockneys – do they?
Here’s hoping they can get plenty of people to show up in 2027!
A cursory glance at the faces in that photo confirms the ethnicity of today’s “Brummies”.
However if one sticks to the sound of Bow bells definition today’s “Cockneys” are pretty much indistinguishable from their second city cousins other than by their accents and religious affiliation as white births taking place in the East End nowadays are rarer than hens teeth.
To be pedantic, Bow church is Cheapside so the bells wouldn’t have been heard much past Whitechapel. Thus most of the East End isn’t Cockney but Soho is.
Since I was born in the London Hospital, I am. Us Cockneys used to have an annual get together. We were using phone box in Aldgate but we had to find somewhere smaller.
Since the white population of London’s now down to under 40%, can’t help wonder how many Londoners actually still live in London. By the time I left it was mostly riff-raff from the provinces. I think I know 5.
Even when I lived there in the 90s, most ‘Londoners’ were up from the provinces. Your genuine Laaaaaaaandan guttersnipe was a rare sight. However, in 1991 it was 80% white….
There is a decent-sized housing estate about 200 yards north of Bow Bells with a thousand flats (built by the Corporation of London on a bombsite) so you’ld need a very big telephone kiosk
If you’re talking about the Barbican, John, you won’t find many Londoners living there. It was originally built for those working in the City. I paid a deposit & was on a waiting list for a flat for a while. Got a couple of updates on when it would be available & then it all went very quiet. Surprising (no, actually unsurprising) who got those flats. Various politicians, union leaders, company bigwigs & other dregs of the Establishment.
I presume you’ve seen this:
https://mapoftheweek.substack.com/p/the-cockney-sound-map
Yeah. The sound shed’s been shrinking for years. But since I was born in ’50…
Actually, it’s always been a thing. London always had a lot of churches with a lot of bells. Since they all tended to ring them for the same reasons, how would you know you were hearing Bow’s over the others?
And there’s that important thing about over the river. We know it’s there. The Woolwich Ferry has to go somewhere. You can even see it on a fine day. But what’s over there… Is it inhabited?
.
I see whoever perpetrated this hoax as providing great awareness training. Hopefully the people who turned up will now be be less gullible and willing to accept things they see online. The measure as “Steve across the Pond” pond alludes is how many will “attend” next year.
If my name were Fagan, that’s exactly how I’d do it.
Not many (zero) English people in the photo…
Birmingham has to be thought of as two things. There’s the city, and then there’s the outskirts and towns and villages around it. No-one who makes it lives in the city proper. They move out to Solihull, Balsall Common*, the Ardens, Sutton Coldfield. Edgbaston is the only really nice bit that is in the city. See, it’s not like there’s this particularly strong commercial centre to it which would lead to gentrification to save a commute. A lot of commerce is on the outskirts like car factories, engineering companies and so forth.
So central Brum, thickos. Outer Brum, pretty smart people.
*Not to be confused with Balsall Heath. Think Bradford, and Bradford-on-Avon.
Thanks Western Bloke! I’m in the city centre.
Figured out when I moved here that since it’s all a shit-hole I may as well live in the centre of it.
As for the fireworks – the main displays round here are for Diwali & Chinese New Year. Birmingham city council couldn’t give a toss about native English, non-immigrants & non-spongers.
I’m amazed that people seriously believed that the Council had two pennies to rub together to put on a display, or that that they had the competence to.
Last official fireworks display that I remember in the City was probably at least 15 years ago.
They used to put on a bonfire in Lightwoods Park, dunno if they still do. Could google it I suppose.
When I was a boy the reputation of cockneys was that they were nasty crooks who reckoned themselves amusing and endearing. Everyone else thought they were noisy twats.
The image of Cockneys for those who aren’t Londoners is Chas & Dave, and for an earlier age, Jimmy Jewell, or even Flanagan & Allen.
Jimmy Jewell a Cockney? WTF are you on about?
Dick Van Dyke has so much to answer for.
Dreadful cockney but great performance nonetheless. Apparently Julie Andrews could not stand him, but I find that difficult to believe considering their respective performances in Mary Poppins.
DvD’s job wasn’t to sound like a genuine Cockney, but to sound like what an average Merkin (who’s never left Iowa) thinks Cockneys might sound like. Gor blimey, guvnor!
Yeah Jimmy Jewell was from Yorkshire & Chas & Dave From Edmonton & Enfield. Not even London. Most people are thought of as Cockney’s aren’t. It’s most definitely not E. London. That’s Essex.
Viz magazine’s Cockney Wankah comes to mind.
Guardian is saying “Don’t trust what you read on the internet. Get your facts from us.”