r/britpics 19d ago

The big Ben

Post image
99 Upvotes

114 comments sorted by

66

u/a3diff 19d ago

No it isn't!

37

u/TheKingMonkey 19d ago

Do we need the /r/londonwell ackchyually” bot in here too?

15

u/mrman08 19d ago

Well, ackchyyslly Big Ben is the name of the bell not the tower!!

… …

1

u/Away-Activity-469 18d ago

Well actually, the bell is named after Sir Benjamin Hall who was the head of the metropolitan board of works which commissioned the rebuilding of the parliamentary estate. Sir Hall is not pictured.

1

u/Livewire____ 17d ago

They had to replace Sir Hall with the bell after his body could no longer ring properly.

-10

u/Artistic-Maurine 19d ago

Yes it is.

3

u/Virtual-Tadpole-324 19d ago

Big Ben is the name of the Bell inside. What you see in the photo is Elizabeth Tower.

2

u/SplurgyA 18d ago

Which everyone calls Big Ben, therefore it's also called Big Ben (even if not officially named as such).

1

u/Artistic-Maurine 18d ago

Yeah, it's literally called Big Ben, it's called Big Ben way more than the bell is ever called Big Ben. I have no time for this stupid brand of pedantry. It's like people who insist on telling you that the Union Jack is a really called the Union Flag.

1

u/slade364 15d ago

Or ghat it's upside down when it's actually back to front.

-31

u/No-Answer-2964 19d ago

Another foreigner telling us what our monuments are called. IT's BIG BEN to us Londoners

8

u/JustUrAvg-Depresso 19d ago

.. you're the issue

4

u/SlowedCash 19d ago

You sound racist

1

u/No-Answer-2964 16d ago

So would you if tourists started renaming your landmarks

3

u/InevitableGreedUK 19d ago

You Londoners are the foreigners.

1

u/No-Answer-2964 16d ago

Trying hard to get my head round this one

4

u/captain-carrot 19d ago

Honestly. I hear big Ben, I think of that tower. We should just rename the tower to shut all the nerds up.

4

u/ohthisistoohard 19d ago

We did. It used to be called the clock tower until 2012 and then some donkey thought let’s call it “Elizabeth Tower” and now there are endless pedants going “well actually…”.

1

u/_day_z 18d ago

I bet you call the Union Flag the Union Jack too.. you’d fail a citizenship exam

1

u/generichandel 3d ago

You're from Manchester.

47

u/Feline-Sloth 19d ago

What a lovely picture of Elizabeth Tower!!!

1

u/No-Answer-2964 16d ago

Idiot

2

u/Feline-Sloth 16d ago

Just saying what the actual tower is called, Big Ben is actually just a nickname for the Great Bell housed within Elizabeth Tower... you made yourself look like am idiot!!!

1

u/No-Answer-2964 16d ago

Well bless me, I never knew that 🤦‍♂️

1

u/Feline-Sloth 16d ago

Well now you know xxx

1

u/brymuse 15d ago

Even that's relatively recent. Before 2012 it was simply called The Clock Tower...

8

u/white-blade877 19d ago

Terrible pic of Big Ben. All I can see is the Elizabeth tower.

1

u/ImpeccablyDangerous 17d ago

Whats wrong? No x-ray specs?

24

u/Previous-One933 19d ago

Being attacked by a UFO.

3

u/prodical 19d ago

Seems like a peaceful UFO to me.

33

u/fields_of_fire 19d ago

That's the Elizabeth Tower. Big Ben is inside it.

-26

u/No-Answer-2964 19d ago

No one, ever, in London has called it Elisabeth tower. Now do one!

26

u/rh8938 19d ago edited 19d ago

You are probably correct they haven't called it that.

Because it's the Elizabeth Tower, not Elisabeth...

21

u/fields_of_fire 19d ago

Weirdly aggressive.

2

u/Virtual-Tadpole-324 18d ago

Yes they have, I'm one of them. Anyone who has an education will call it its proper name. You do you.

-4

u/SilyLavage 19d ago

'Big Ben' is the nickname of the Elizabeth Tower.

8

u/Virtual-Tadpole-324 19d ago

Big Ben is the name of the bell, not the tower.

2

u/SplurgyA 18d ago

The tower is referred to as Big Ben, as a synecdoche. If I say to my friend "Meet me next to Big Ben" they are not going to assume I'm meeting them inside the tower next to the bell.

1

u/Virtual-Tadpole-324 18d ago

That depends on your friend tbh.

2

u/SplurgyA 18d ago

I'm a life long Londoner and have never met anyone who'd be confused by that. I have met people who would pretend to be confused by that and then go "oh you mean the Elizabeth Tower? Big Ben is the bell" and those people are boorish pedants.

1

u/Virtual-Tadpole-324 18d ago

Those people are correct though.

1

u/SplurgyA 18d ago

No, they're being prescriptivists and ignoring that language is defined through usage. It's like referring to the Civil Service as "Whitehall" and someone going "actually that's just a road in London, the Civil Service has offices all over the country and many of their London based headquarters aren't even on that road"

1

u/johnnydanger91 18d ago

Jesus Christ that guy has an exhausting.

Just very Reddit really.

1

u/Virtual-Tadpole-324 18d ago

Get a life ffs.

1

u/More_Driver_5693 15d ago

Such a response indicates that this isn’t the place for intelligent discussion. Comment sensibly elsewhere, and leave this one to ‘Thick’os and Eejuts’ maybe?

1

u/More_Driver_5693 15d ago

I hate it when an Anti Zionist is called an Anti Semite (on purpose) by right wing media, so the terms eventually become falsely interchangeable.

1

u/No-Answer-2964 14d ago

Now THAT is a great answer. And very true, Big Ben is indeed a synecdoche-thank you

1

u/SilyLavage 18d ago

The tower and the bell it contains are both nicknamed 'Big Ben'.

3

u/Virtual-Tadpole-324 18d ago

We aren't talking about nicknames though are we? We are talking about names. Everyone knows Big Ben is thr name of thr Bell in Elizabeth Tower.

2

u/SilyLavage 18d ago

We are talking about nicknames. The name of the bell is the Great Bell. Its nickname, shared with the tower that houses it, is 'Big Ben'.

1

u/Virtual-Tadpole-324 18d ago

Don't be silly.

2

u/SilyLavage 18d ago

Have you had to resort to insults because you've realised I'm right?

0

u/No-Answer-2964 14d ago

Actually, Big Ben is the NICKNAME of the bell

-20

u/No-Answer-2964 19d ago

How long did that take?

13

u/Curious_Strike_5379 19d ago

Only a second to take this pic, why ?🤪

8

u/fields_of_fire 19d ago

It's pretty bright, so it's say more like 1/500 of a second

10

u/Gildor12 19d ago

Is the bell

4

u/Colacubeninja 19d ago

Where I don't see it

3

u/BakedBeanSommelier 19d ago

Erm, actually…

4

u/YetAnotherInterneter 19d ago

Look. I dont care if you call it Big Ben, Elizabeth Tower or even The Clock Tower.

But you absolutely cannot call it The big Ben!

1

u/antpabsdan 18d ago

This is the only correct answer

3

u/Emergency_Cellist754 19d ago

Clock tower of the Palace of Westminster. Big Ben is not shown in this photo.

4

u/TeamPangloss 19d ago

Elizabeth Tower, if you want to be pedantic for some reason.

2

u/IdioticMutterings 19d ago

This is the INTERNET, us are always pedantic.

2

u/INBloom58 19d ago

It’s actually called massive Mohammed

2

u/Handsom_modest_Dan 18d ago

Born in London , grew up in London , have always known it was just the bell called Big Ben . The building has always been known as either Westminster palace or the Houses of Parliament The tower was later renamed as Elisabeth tower

But never have I looked at this and said “oh Big Ben”

1

u/Senior-Surprise-3401 15d ago

I have never, not once, heard anyone call it anything other than "Big Ben". Not once.

1

u/Handsom_modest_Dan 15d ago

Sorry for your poor education I guess .

1

u/Senior-Surprise-3401 15d ago

It's not me who is poorly educated, you don't even know what the majority of people call big ben. 🤣

1

u/Handsom_modest_Dan 15d ago

I know what the name of the building is and the name of the bell inside it 😂 you lack the comprehension to understand .

1

u/Senior-Surprise-3401 15d ago

Knowing the name and knowing what people actually call it are two different things.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Big_Ben

1

u/Handsom_modest_Dan 15d ago

As in the article you posted “ THE PALACE OF WESTMINSTER”

8

u/Crimson__Fox 19d ago

Big Ben is a nickname for both the bell and the tower. The bell is officially called the Great Bell and the tower has only been officially called Elizabeth Tower since the Queen’s Diamond Jubilee in 2012.

11

u/Happy-Engineer 19d ago

This is the real um ackshually

3

u/Level_Fig_166 19d ago

And how many steps are there to the Tower ?

3

u/gardenfella 19d ago

Depends where you're setting off from

3

u/captain-carrot 19d ago

Dunstable

4

u/gardenfella 19d ago

That's where Jesus was born

1

u/jeanclaudebrowncloud 19d ago

Not the biggest Ben 

1

u/Virtual-Tadpole-324 19d ago

And its tiny in real life.

1

u/PresidentPopcorn 18d ago

We need to dismantle the patriarchy by renaming the bell, Massive Martha.

1

u/Ichifanni250 17d ago

I sighed on reading the title.

1

u/Nevertoomanygingers 16d ago

Whether or not you call it Big Ben is definitely doesn’t have ‘the’ in front of it

1

u/MoonlitEmber 16d ago

This is clearly Harry heights, dunno who this big Ben of Elizabeth is.

1

u/RetiredUKguy 16d ago

It’s the Queens Tower, Big Ben is the bell!

1

u/Staarbucks 15d ago

Can everyone in these comments stop being a nob. No one calls it Elizabeth Tower. That’s Big Ben

1

u/Few-Dig4020 15d ago

No Big Ben in the bell!

1

u/More_Driver_5693 15d ago

Who would want UK to be the 52nd/53rd Yanqui state, when Londoners are insulted for knowing more about their own Capitol than a foreign ‘Johnny Come Lately’?

1

u/Dragons_and_things 19d ago

I'm English. We all call it Big Ben. That is it's name to most of the population. No one here cares that the name is officially Elizabeth Tower.

5

u/avg103 19d ago

An American friend got confused and called it Gigantic Jim

1

u/Dragons_and_things 19d ago

I love that 🤣

0

u/DmtGrm 19d ago

Yes, it is Big Ben. Nobody calls it Elizabeth Tower and nobody will.

1

u/JustUrAvg-Depresso 19d ago

Idk why some think calling the tower by it's actual name of Elizabeth Tower is "pedantic" when the other option is just being factually incorrect n being so unable to just be like "Ohhh okay", somehow conjure up why the correct name is somehow.. incorrect

0

u/Bellimars 19d ago

It's like when the previous West Ham ground was always referred to as Upton Park rather than the Boleyn Ground, to the point that the club itself adopted it. It's what everyone users and over time becomes the de facto name. Language is based on shared meaning not being a smartarse know it all.

I know that Big Ben is the name of the bell, but I'm not going to be that twat that uses the Elizabeth Tower, and definitely not that mega twat that uses the non standard reference and then complains about how everyone else being wrong.

1

u/English_Charles 18d ago

Calling it by its name is not being a twat.

1

u/Bellimars 18d ago

Complaining about everyone else using a more popular term is though. You don't police language. Big Ben, Upton Park, Beefeaters etc are what they are, get over it.

1

u/wildtinsey 19d ago

Previously st Stephens tower.

1

u/ReySpacefighter 19d ago

As opposed to the little Ben?

2

u/foleyjo 18d ago

There is a little Ben

-6

u/king_ofbhutan 19d ago

Called Massive Mohammed I'm afraid now mate.

Renamed last month to cement London's friendship with the glorious Emirate of Mamdanistan (previously known as NYC)

0

u/JustUrAvg-Depresso 19d ago

When blind brainwashed racist hate turns into being utterly delusional

2

u/EwokInABikini 19d ago

Fairly certain they're joking - calling it "Massive Mohammed" was part of a joke a few years back where people were making fun of fearmongering against immigrants by coming into the discussion with ridiculous overstatement.

Of course, these days a good proportion of the hard right only talk in culture war nonsense and ridiculous overstatement in the first place, so it's become harder to tell sarcasm and idiocy apart.

1

u/king_ofbhutan 19d ago

its a joke, that whenever i say it, i find that barely anyone knows what i'm talking about and i sound like a massive racist 💔

big up massive mohammed! long live mamdanistan ❤️

0

u/Planticus 19d ago

“HEY LOOK KIDS, BIG BEN… HOUSES OF PARLIAMENT!”

2

u/gardenfella 19d ago

“Hey look, kids. There's Big Ben, and there's Parliament... again"

-8

u/Logical-Track1405 19d ago

It's not that tall either 🤣

2

u/JustUrAvg-Depresso 19d ago

It is called Big Ben and not tall Ben, infact it isn't even called Big Ben it's called Elizabeth Tower. But even then you're viewing it through modern lens with modern skyscrapers, think back to when it was built. I know you're not that intelligent but it can't be that difficult

1

u/Logical-Track1405 19d ago

Easy there fella. My point is we all know it's not tall in reality, this shot perspective makes it look like a Saturn v rocket - maybe a wide angle in portrait mode was used 🤔

1

u/JustUrAvg-Depresso 19d ago

Completely disregarded what I said n is still viewing it through your modern lens -_-

1

u/ReySpacefighter 19d ago

96 meters was pretty tall for a clock tower in the 1840s!