Starting a fight between metric and imperial units of measurement seems, at first, like an odd choice for Boris Johnson. From a political perspective. The move is obviously pure piffle: a dumbshow designed to placate (or at least entertain) the conservative base while distracting and antagonising rivals. But knowingly or not, by reigniting what 19th-century observers once called the “Battle of the Standards”, Johnson has tapped in to a long and wild history of anti-metric feeling that encompasses xenophobia, pseudoscience and fears over lost political sovereignty. » | James Vincent | Tuesday, May 31, 2022
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