I'm not sure if "insulting to the intelligence of X" jokes generalize to what I'm about to say, but I've noticed that geographically-related social prestige in Europe is not purely compass-direction oriented, but radiates out from a center somewhere between the Low Countries and Switzerland, and is relative to your location. Thus, in the British isles prestige decreases to the north and the west, in France and Spain to the west and south, in Italy to the south, and in Germany to the east.