Gwyneth Paltrow Backtracks Wildly Over ‘Stupid Americans’ Line

Well, that was quick. When Gwyneth Paltrow decided to open her heart to a Portuguese newspaper recently, she said that all British people are cleverer, more civilised, more interesting and 38% better in bed than any American that has ever lived.

Or something. Understandably, America flew into a giant tantrum about Gwyneth Paltrow's reputedly anti-American sentiments, jamming up talk-show phonelines to holler Gwyneth-targeted abuse, saying that View From The Top wasn't especially meaningful and pointing out that they are too as civilised as the British because their cousin Bobby Dwayne came third in a regional unironic mullet-growing competition once. And faced with such an overwhelming wave of outrage from the people of her homeland, Gwyneth Paltrow acted like the decent, hardworking American she is and blamed the filthy Portuguese.

Poor old Gwyneth Paltrow - her mouth just keeps bypassing her brain and makes all sorts of trouble for everyone. Gwyneth herself has admitted that having a baby has fried her brain, which at least goes some way to explaining why her kids have crap names and she sends Rabbis round to clean the ghosts out of her house and she thinks she's as gangsta as Jay-Z, but surely even Gwyneth Paltrow knows not to go around slagging off entire counties, right?

Well, obviously not. After Gwyneth Paltrow's attempts to complain about Britain paid off bigtime - thanks exclusively to Gwyneth Paltrow, everyone who lives in Britain can now see that it's cold and it rains here sometimes - Gwyneth decided to scale up and bash America, apparently telling a Portuguese newspaper:

"I love the English lifestyle, it's not as capitalistic as America. People don't talk about work and money, they talk about interesting things at dinner. I like living here because I don't fit into the bad side of American psychology. The British are much more intelligent and civilised than the Americans."

So speaks a woman who's never been in Woolworths on a Saturday afternoon. Nevertheless, these remarks kicked off a surge of anti-Gwyneth Paltrow sentiment in America, with plenty of outraged "We don't need you" and "She thinks she's so civilised with her macrobiotic scones, drizzle and neverending bowls of Oliver Twist-style gruel" comments being thrown about. In fact, Donald Rumsfeld said he would have even gone as far as invading Gwyneth Paltrow for control of her undemocratic mind if he was still in charge of that sort of thing. At least we think it was Donald Rumsfeld - these homeless types all start to look alike after a couple of weeks, don't they.

Anyway, fearing for her safety and reputation, Gwyneth Paltrow has put out a statement saying that she loves America! She's proud to be American! Though not really proud enough to live there very much any more! And those anti-American comments that Gwyneth Paltrow made? She didn't make them. The Portuguese twisted her words, which she tried to tell them in Spanish in the first place. Here's what Gwyneth Paltrow told People:

"First of all I feel so lucky to be American. When you look at the rest of the world, we're so lucky, and that's something my dad always instilled in me. I feel so proud to be American. I felt so upset to be completely misconstrued and I never, ever would have said that. I definitely did not say that I think the British are more intelligent and civilized than Americans. I am a New York girl, that's how I always think of myself and see myself. I live in England half the time because I'm married to an English guy. It's not like I've left America… This is what I said. I said that Europe is a much older culture and there's a difference. I always say in America, people live to work and in Europe, people work to live. There are positives in both. Obviously I need to go back to seventh-grade Spanish!"

But words are easy, and some Americans are clamouring for Gwyneth Paltrow to back up this garbled apology with a day packed full of real American behaviour that includes the purchase of a pair of jeans that have an elasticated waist, having a scrappy fight with one of Chris Martin's ex-girlfriends on Maury, going to some kind of dull-looking prom and at least one extended period of whooping. Not that Gwyneth Paltrow thinks she needs to do any of this, of course - she's so American that she only ever wipes her bum on stars and stripes loo roll anyway.

Read more:

Gwyneth Paltrow: I'm Proud To Be American - People