Why do people in the UK often pretend they're not in Europe?

[Final-Fan]

Kasz216 said:

Lord Flashheart said:

The UN say that "continent" can refer not only to a geographical continent, but it may also be defined on grounds of culture and politics, and Europe's culture and politics is undoubtedly different from Asia.

Or as someone else said "because they made the first textbooks"

I've already rebutted that point twice in the thread as to why Europe ISN'T culturally distinct from asia... to which nobody has offered a proper reply. If you were to divide Asia and Europe into two continents by culture... the Middle East and Indian areas would in fact be part of "Europe". Due to those nations being closer to Europe culturally then asia. When people make the cultural arguement... what they really mean is "White people live here! Non white people live in Asia!" It's an artificat of past racism.

Isn't it true that, although people often think of Asia as "entire Eurasian supercontinent minus Europe", if you actually ask them about it they'll consider India and the Middle East separate entites from "Asia"?  IMO that both supports your point and undercuts your position. 

At the very least wouldn't you agree that when you say "part of Europe" you mean that only if forced to choose between "it's Europe" and "it's Asia"?  BTW I think this whole culture argument is a big mess you might well be underestimating; well, the Middle East is probably closer to Europe, but India ... I dunno, it's pretty different from both IMO.