I'll second that - and please read down for the main point, let's keep the cachet of British irony and incorrectness, brother RegTards.
- when I worked in Germany, "proper" native English, with its accent, idioms, vocab and corruptible grammer, was highly valued.
However, what they really loved was our dark humour and irony.
Nationalities, like people, tend to undervalue their best, most effortless skills because they are intrinsic, and because it might be immodest. - Here best explained by Kate Fox, in her book "Watching the English".
The English are not usually given to patriotic boasting – indeed, both patriotism and boasting are regarded as unseemly, so the combination of these two sins is doubly distasteful. But there is one significant exception to this rule, and that is the patriotic pride we take in our sense of humour, particularly in our expert use of irony.
The popular belief is that we have a better, more subtle, more highly developed sense of humour than any other nation, and specifically that other nations are all tediously literal in their thinking and incapable of understanding or appreciating irony. Almost all of the English people I interviewed subscribed to this belief, and many foreigners, rather surprisingly, humbly concurred.
What took more time was introducing humour in meetings and discussions with more than two participants.
By convention in Germany this is strictly verboten. The definite upside being that annoying comic wankers, company clowns, are routinely and deservedly shot.
Downside is that the devices we love to slip in to see who's awake - like veiled insult, wrecking endorsements, blind innuendo, faint praise, helpful but catastrophic suggestions - will just cause confusion, cognitive dissonance. - Are we being clumsy, rude, inept, vicious, stupid or what?
It is of course soon remedied, they get it - it is a question of scope, not of understanding. We've broadened the rulebook and smuggled in a subtle, subversive, perpetual game, and it's a new, toe-curling type of funny.
Again, better explained by Kate Fox:
For those attempting to acclimatize to this atmosphere, the most important ‘rule’ to remember is that irony is endemic: like humour in general, irony is a constant, a given, a normal element of ordinary, everyday conversation. The English may not always be joking, but they are always in a state of readiness for humour. We do not always say the opposite of what we mean, but we are always alert to the possibility of irony. When we ask someone a straightforward question (e.g. ‘How are the children?’), we are equally prepared for either a straightforward response (‘Fine, thanks.’) or an ironic one (‘Oh, they’re delightful – charming, helpful, tidy, studious . . .’ To which the reply is ‘Oh dear. Been one of those days, has it?’).
Seriously though, Reg readers and creators, look at New Scientist - once excellent, British, highly read and enjoyed worldwide. It was taken over and infantilized, then peppered with American token-words: quadrillions, cellphones, holiday season, freedomheit.. to mention just a few.
It is now heavily paywalled and completely worthless.
The Reg, many thanks to Lester Haines originally, has been for years a beacon of quintessential British humour, irreverence, irony and wit.
The straplines alone are an absolute artform, seen here first.
Please don't spoil it by removing the linguistic tokens that identify it as English (UK).