It appears our covert plan to recapture our empire has been publicly discovered! In light of this, it seems only right to fully disclose the facts.

A few years ago, England’s scientists discovered that nations are so insecure and petty that their nationality is based purely on the sports their countrymen enjoy. We realized we could secretly infuse other nations with “Britishness” by spreading rugby throughout the world. How mistaken we were.

Once again, the great nation of America thwarted our plans for world domination. It seems ridiculous now that we thought the U.S. would fall to our devious plan. The U.S. has been set up to reject it in every way — if you trip on a curb, it’s the curb’s fault and the city should pay for the scratch on your knee; how could we have ever expected Americans to play a sport without padding? We should have heeded history — when presented with rugby previously, it was too complicated and tiring so they altered it, removing rules like “no forward passes” to simplify things, utilizing copious padding to avoid bruising and adding breaks for players to catch their breath. Finally a sport was born that had been adapted to the weakest of all players.

It was naive to expect this great nation to accept rugby; it goes against all their principles. I promise from now on we will keep the men’s sports to the men and happily leave you powder-puff-fairy alternatives. Besides, now we’ve got an in with health care, so we’ll soon be in charge again anyway.

Stuart Rogers
Kent, England