back to article $6,000 for tours of apocalyptic post-Brexit London? WTF, NYT?

Stuffy American broadsheet the New York Times is offering disaster tourism-style package holidays of Westminster for $6,500, capitalising on Britain’s popular vote to leave the European Union. The incredible (and we mean that literally) “Brexit Means Brexit!” tour lets excessively well-heeled Americans delude themselves into …

  1. John G Imrie
    Trollface

    For a real post brexit apocalypses

    Send them to Manchester.

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: For a real post brexit apocalypses

      I think they'd feel right at home in Gunchester.

    2. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: For a real post brexit apocalypses

      Yeah but we have gravy and pies and that's why we'll survive the apocalypse long after you soft southern warm shandy drinkers.

      Send them to Liverpool though I can't see much changing pre and post brexit.

      Disclaimer: Post contains intentional light banter/humour.

      1. wolfetone Silver badge

        Re: For a real post brexit apocalypses

        No one's mentioned Bradford yet? Or Hull?

        Suppose you'd want the Yanks to come back at some point. Best not to scare them off with our top level shit holes too soon.

        1. John Brown (no body) Silver badge
          Coat

          Re: For a real post brexit apocalypses

          "Or Hull?"

          You mean the 2017 City of Cultcha?

          1. wolfetone Silver badge
            Joke

            Re: For a real post brexit apocalypses

            "You mean the 2017 City of Cultcha?"

            The only culture in Hull are the one Danone sell in the supermarkets.

      2. Anonymous Coward
        Joke

        Re: For a real post brexit apocalypses

        > Send them to Liverpool though I can't see much changing pre and post brexit.

        I'm sorry, but Americans are only allowed to visit Liverpool as part of tours that have the words "The Beatles" or "Beatlemania" in their titles. "Post Brexit Apocalypse" doesn't count.

    3. phuzz Silver badge

      Re: For a real post brexit apocalypses

      Most of the big cities, including Manchester and Liverpool, voted in favour of staying in the EU. For a proper brexit tour they should go to a small town somewhere.

      1. werdsmith Silver badge

        Re: For a real post brexit apocalypses

        In fact most places with a Russell Group Uni were innies.

      2. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        Re: For a real post brexit apocalypses

        They could come to the former South Yorks coalfields, where they can that the EU invested millions into building new infrastructure and business premises to employ thousands of people. Then try to work out why the vote was >65% to Leave.

        Not sure how true it is, but I did read about an inverse correlation between EU investment into an area and the Leave vote in that area.

    4. HAL-9000

      Re: For a real post brexit apocalypses

      Even better, send 'em to Sunderland: extra-sepecially after Nisan finally decide its too much and back out ... Laugh I nearly cried

  2. A K Stiles
    Coat

    travel included?

    I wonder if the price includes transport from the airport to whatever hotel it is they're staying in? Maybe a few black cabs with the opportunity for some extra cash?

    Does £200 sound about right to you guv?

  3. Rich 11

    Missed opportunity

    I'm kicking myself for not taking advantage of the tourist opportunities raised by 9/11. Back then I'm sure I could have persuaded some of Blair's Cool Britannia friends to splash out on a trip to Manhattan and a guided tour of Ground Zero. The starry-eyed local tour guide hired on the cheap would rightly extol the courage and heroism of all those who helped the injured on that terrible day, assuring the spellbound tourists that the resolve of America's leaders would never waver until the culprits were brought to justice, regardless of how many countries needed to be invaded and broken, regardless of how many more Americans (and maybe some brown-skinned foreigners somewhere) would die to little clear purpose, regardless of how many US citizens would be brought into the purview of the massively-enlarged surveillance state, regardless of the wave of authoritarian countries using the excuse of terrorism to clamp down upon protestors within their own borders, regardless of the number of black sites, extraordinary renditions and newly-employed torturers it would take to bring the whole sorry business to a rapid conclusion.

    Oops. Did I say rapid?

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: Missed opportunity

      I like the cut of your jib sir however I think all that was going on long before 9/11. 9/11 just accelerated the process.

      1. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        Re: Missed opportunity

        "9/11 just accelerated the process."

        ...which, according to some, was precisely its purpose.

        1. Tom Paine

          Re: Missed opportunity

          And according to others it was just an attempt to clear a landing site for the flying saucer bearing the alien deputation to invite us to join the Galactic Empire.

    2. Chairman of the Bored

      Re: Missed opportunity

      "...bring the whole sorry business to a rapid conclusion.

      Oops. Did I say rapid?"

      No, I think you meant to say "profitable conclusion". FTFY.

  4. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Brexit Tour

    We just got back from our post-Brexit London tour which primarily meant $1.25 for £1 which was nice since the last time we went it $1.60.

    1. Stoneshop
      Boffin

      Re: Brexit Tour

      We just got back from our post-Brexit London tour

      Where did you get that time machine?

      1. Uffish

        Re: Brexit Tour

        Have to get in before brexiit 'cos when that happens no foreigner will be allowed (or want) to come here.

    2. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: Brexit Tour

      >We just got back from our post-Brexit London tour

      Easy mistake to make granted, but the actually London apocalypse isn't going to kick in until 2019/20 - until then you can still glimpse the future at any larger Northern UK conurbation.

      1. Doctor Syntax Silver badge

        Re: Brexit Tour

        "until then you can still glimpse the future at any larger Northern UK conurbation."

        You might glimpse the future of London that way. In any manufacturing centre that's providing a UK base for some foreign investor there's a decade long slide to something worse coming along.

  5. Anonymous Coward
    Go

    You can add some local color to the tour

    You'll need a guy with a cart rolling past the front of the hotel yelling "Bring out your dead! Bring out your dead!" And then during the walking tour, you route the group through a local theater group re-enacting the Monty Python "She's a witch!" scene.

  6. tiggity Silver badge

    They could do a real brexit tour

    .. as the article said, London not representative of pro brexit

    They could nip around a few pro brexit areas of the country, even grabbing a few scenic seaside places, visiting pro Brexit areas such as Sunderland, parts of Cornwall , Wales etc.

    The LSE guide could have great fun explaining why areas that benefit from lots of EU funding voted to leave the EU, and could then discuss how remote the possibility of a Mayhem government providing additional funding those areas to anything like the degree they benefited from the EU.

    Or they could just use census data and do England only, pick English areas with a big majority of white "natives" and older demographic, chances are they were heavily brexit ()

    1. Pen-y-gors

      Re: They could do a real brexit tour

      Good idea - leave it a few years for things to settle down then visit

      Cornwall - picturesque former fishing villages, their harbours full of tied-up, rusting old boats

      East Anglia - vast prairies of empty grassland, with not a veg-picker to be seen

      Industrial North-East - empty former Japanese car factories, surrounded by zombies trying to get in

      The Scottish Marches - smile at and photograph the cheery Scottish Border Force staff behind their wall.

      1. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        Re: They could do a real brexit tour

        ......And the Irish borders. (Shudders at what might occur there).

        Hey, the could even do a tour of Gibraltar, if the Spanish would let them in.

    2. Chris Miller

      Re: They could do a real brexit tour

      As this BBC graphic demonstrates, apart from Scotland and London (and a few associated commuter towns), almost every area of the UK voted to Leave.

      1. Dan 55 Silver badge

        Re: They could do a real brexit tour

        The BBC graphic in the middle shoehorns a proportional vote into FPTP by area. When nationally the results were 35% of the electorate voting to remain vs 37% voting to leave, it makes little sense to claim that almost every area of the UK voted leave.

        1. EnviableOne

          Re: They could do a real brexit tour

          Which basically means that 28% didnt care and which ever way you swing it, over half the country didnt vote for one or other of the options.

          1. BoldMan

            Re: They could do a real brexit tour

            > Which basically means that 28% didnt care and which ever way you swing it, over half the country

            > didnt vote for one or other of the options.

            Or more likely were not allowed to vote because they were a furriner (aka EU citizen residing in the EU, ie someone most likely to be affected by any chance), similar to how no UK citizen living in the EU were allowed to express their preference...

            1. codejunky Silver badge

              Re: They could do a real brexit tour

              @ BoldMan

              "Or more likely were not allowed to vote because they were a furriner (aka EU citizen residing in the EU, ie someone most likely to be affected by any chance)"

              The EU population voting if a member can leave? Do the countries of the EU vote our general elections too?

              "similar to how no UK citizen living in the EU were allowed to express their preference"

              Wasnt the rule something like 15 years in the EU but not in the UK? People who spent 1 and a half decades living outside the country and already living where they prefer to be?

      2. Tom Paine

        Re: They could do a real brexit tour

        <mode="kindly">

        Hey Chris, what a lovely map that is! I've got an idea though -- what about plotting the ten or twenty largest British cities on that map? Hmmm?

        You also might like to reflect that the map only shows the regional winner; it doesn't show the size of the win. 52-48 could, very literally, hardly have been any closer (49/51).

      3. Glen 1

        Re: They could do a real brexit tour

        "apart from Scotland and London"

        Soo nearly half the UK by area, or half the UK by population.

        Or to put it another way...

        Apart from the parts of England, and Wales that stand to lose the most, most of the country voted to remain.

  7. Chris Miller

    The Eye have ...

    ... the brochure cover

  8. SnowPatrol

    Yanks on holiday

    They'd better be quick before Maybot steps up her war on tourism.

  9. disgruntled yank

    Yes and No

    "Proudly "liberal" (in the American sense) in outlook, the NYT mainly caters for the sections of American society who imagine themselves to be a cut above the little people who vote their carefully selected sons and daughters into safe seats."

    For actual news, the NYT is pretty good. The softer sections of the paper cater to groups who live in a pretty small world, it is true. If you don't, e.g., regard Lena Dunham or Jeff Koons as major cultural figures, you might find the arts pages baffling.

    But Londoners have it easy. Every since the election, the Times (among other eastern newspapers) has been sending reporters out to the Midwest to find out whether Trump voters have repented yet. I have to think that the Midwesterners find it as tedious as one would find evangelists knocking on one's door every week; but the Midwest is a big place, and maybe they don't go back to the same diner very often, maybe they just describe them all in similar terms.

  10. Will 28

    that well-known hotbed of pro-Leave activists, the London School of Economics

    Wasn't that Tim W's Alma mater? In fact, if you hadn't said "History Graduate", I'd be advising you to check the name of the guide :).

    (I know... he lives in Portugal)

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Go

      Re: that well-known hotbed of pro-Leave activists, the London School of Economics

      Did David Cameron go to the LSE? I know he's not doing anything otherwise.

      Maybe while leading the group, he should wear a little nametag saying "Call me Dave"

      1. Tom Paine

        Re: that well-known hotbed of pro-Leave activists, the London School of Economics

        No, PPE at Brasenose. LSE's most famous politician alumni would be the Rt Hon Jim Hacker...

  11. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Mind the gap

    Stand clear of the brexit

  12. codejunky Silver badge

    Hmm

    I wonder if they will have alternative facts from Cameron and Osborne. Maybe even Carney. I am sure the EU would stump up to support the propaganda. They are getting desperate in their negotiating/begging. Not sure if they would contribute statements like 'the end of western civilisation' or the various comments of brexit bringing down the EU. Nor do I imagine the EU's pleading for us to change our mind to be mentioned.

    1. Glen 1

      Re: Hmm

      "They are getting desperate in their negotiating/begging"

      Talk about alternative facts!

      The EU saying repeatedly they're not going to renegotiate (and sticking to it) and the UK having to *ask" for extension after extension tells you where the desperation lies.

      The only thing the EU is desperate to do is protect the four freedoms.

  13. Andrew Meredith

    "Have to get in before brexiit 'cos when that happens no foreigner will be allowed (or want) to come here."

    Do you genuinely still believe this ??! It looks like #ProjectFear really did a number on you then. You might like to branch out and read something other than the usual Remainer echo chambers then.

    1. werdsmith Silver badge

      Andrew, did you seriously believe he was being 100% serious? Or are you not being 100% serious yourself?

      Of course foreigners will be allowed to come here and want to in the future. They do own the place after all.

      1. Terry 6 Silver badge

        Yup, most of the "foreigners" buying properties and leaving them empty, buying football teams and leaving them in debt or buying factories and leaving them in tatters aren't from the EU. Whereas the "foreigners" keeping the NHS running often are, as are the ones picking veg in our fields and the ones serving in our hotels. Jobs which the UK born don't seem to want, preferring instead to aim to get on the X-Factor and become famous. Or at least not work for a living.

        The sooner we're out the better - then we'll see the pigeons coming home to roost.

        1. Glen 1

          I dunno, you hear the brexit lot saying all these (announced, not yet happening) factory closures and job losses are nothing to do with brexit.

          "we knew what we were voting for"

          I will remember those words as I pass the job centre.

    2. Tom Paine

      I suspect you might want to recalibrate your expectations about the blowback on tourism that will result from the measures that will be needed to get net immigration below 100,000. Still, it doesn't sound very likely you'll change your mind based based on a commentard exchange, so... well, I have this retirement project on the drawing board: spidering newspaper and other commentard fora, locating the most devout Leavers, and tapping them on the digital shoulder to see how they feel about the situation once the dust has settled and we're at an approximate long term equilibrium. (In theory this will be in 15 years' time.) Who knows? Maybe I'll be telling them that I was all wrong and they (you) were right. We shall see...

    3. Uffish

      @Andrew Meredith

      Maybe I should have included a JOKE icon but I thought that Reg readers were too intelligent to need it, most are.

      Mind you, the average foreigner that I meet has gone from pained puzzlement to straight out scorn when contemplating the brexiteer's antics. The prices will have to be very low indeed to attract them to this septic isle.

      1. codejunky Silver badge

        Re: @Andrew Meredith

        @ Uffish

        "Mind you, the average foreigner that I meet has gone from pained puzzlement to straight out scorn when contemplating the brexiteer's antics."

        Probably something to do with the average comments of a militant remainer who either wants the EU or to be cut off from that big bad scary world. It amuses me that racists and xenophobes dont have the support of leavers but of the extreme remainers. I always said too far left and too far right leads to the same place but this is disturbing. Hopefully the moderates can hold out, complete brexit and be outward looking instead of nationalistic within the borders of the UK or the EU. I cant imagine the toys flying out of the prams and tantrums will appeal to foreigners.

        1. Glen 1

          Re: @Andrew Meredith

          "militant remainer who either wants the EU or to be cut off from that big bad scary world"

          We would not be cut off, merely negotiating from a massively weakened position.

          "It amuses me that racists and xenophobes dont have the support of leavers but of the extreme remainers"

          Citation needed

          Since when was Tommy Robinson an extreme remainer? Or were you referring to the far right MEPs who have seen what Brexit is doing to our country and want no part of it?

  14. spacecadet66

    I am personally an American (no autographs, please), and this reminds me of a pearl of wisdom from one of our greatest sages:

    "There's [a sucker] born every minute."

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      A birdie tweeted .... Don't wait for Brexit, have 'Acopalypse now' !!!

      As a citizen of this septic isle :) , I can only enquire ......... What happened re: The Trump situation ?

      Your sage and his knowledge appears to have been 'forgotten' on your side of the pond !!!

      I repeat for real .....What happened for gawds sake !!!???

      A slip of the brain doesn't quite cover it !!! :)

      I think that Brexit pales in significance/concern.

      Brexit means our (UK's) future is at stake while the 'Trump' situation is your 'now' with the world getting the 'fallout' (bad choice of word.) for free !!!

      My Brexit concerns are strictly on the backburner, as I am concerned if we all manage to reach the promised Brexit apocalypse in one piece !!! :)

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