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I hate how anything without "world" in its name is just about the US (lemmy.zip)
submitted 2 years ago by to c/lemmyshitpost@lemmy.world
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[–] 3 points 2 years ago (1 child)

Well, yeah, but it's not anecdotal. There is data to tell you how big Facebook is and was outside the US, in what territories and by how much relative to their US popularity at what point. My personal experience just happens to match those numbers (India, by the way, is Facebook's current biggest market).

I would also point out that by your own data, which is accurate as far as I can tell, 49% of Reddit is not American, so even with its more US-focused audience the assumption that users are American unless proven otherwise is wildly ethnocentric.

Now, I agree with you that assuming things about anonymous accounts, and especially anonymous accounts writing in English, is foolish. Lots of people are fluent in English who are not native speakers and definitely who are not from the US. Most, in fact, depending on how you define your parameters.

I disagree that this is "human nature", though. I don't assume the same thing from people who speak my native language online. I also don't assume the same thing about English speakers. The reason the OP is asking is that US ethnocentrism stands out. That's not to say it's not natural. We non-native dwellers in anglocentric social media will often comment on US cultural and political minutia, because US cultural and political minutia is present and relevant to us in a way ours isn't to Americans (thanks for that, cultural imperialism). We pass for Americans in more situations than some American lurking in a German-language forum would, and we're likely many times more numerous than... well, Americans lurking in German-language or Chinese-language socials.

But it being natural doesn't mean it isn't notable or an issue or a symptom of a dysfunction. Which it is, and it does annoy me for that reason.

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  • [–] 1 point 2 years ago* (last edited 2 years ago) (1 child)

    49% of Reddit is not American, so even with its more US-focused audience the assumption that users are American unless proven otherwise is wildly ethnocentric.

    The assumption that the 51% of reddit constitutes a monolith of non-Americans is wildly reductive and offensive /s. The majority is irrelevant, Americans still constitute the plurality of users, and thus inevitably become the default.

    I absolutely agree that it's a symptom of dysfunction, but I just think it's unfair to blame on the average American. We didn't ask for this either.

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  • [–] 2 points 2 years ago (1 child)

    Wait, what?

    We're talking about assuming that a site's default user is from the US. I'm saying if 49% are not, then that assumption seems ethnocentric. That doesn't require every other user to be part of a monolith of non-Americans, they all share the trait of being... you know, not American.

    That's a big chunk of your users that don't conform to your default use case. If this was about anything else you would not a default at all in that scenario, but that's not what happens. Also, it's not blamed on the "average American", it's being blamed on Americans as a whole, culturally, on the aggregate, which is fundamentally different.

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  • [–] 1 point 2 years ago* (last edited 2 years ago) (1 child)

    As I've already explained, you're talking about the general case of assuming where someone is from. Because otherwise, you're suggesting that we should assume someone is from a different country than the US? Which country? I honestly don't understand what your point is.

    they all share the trait of being… you know, not American.

    Yes, this is the most important trait among humans, it is known.

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  • [–] 4 points 2 years ago (1 child)

    Alright, let me take a step back to the OP.

    The claim here is that unless something is flagged as being "world" something, it's assumed to be specific to the US. The obvious example is politics forums with no qualifier in social media (including here and on Reddit) being about US politics where everywhere else is qualified with either "world" or a specific country/region.

    That's the claim.

    The counterclaim is that makes sense for US-based social media where most users are American. I dispute that because... well, most users are not American in many of those sites, or a large enough proportion aren't that the assumption is not justified.

    The logical way to organize that would be for the US politics channel, forum, magazine or whatever to be flagged "US politics" while everything else keeps its own qualifier. There is no default nation for politics. If anything, "politics" without a qualifier should be fair game for all world politics. That makes logical sense, but it's often not what happens in social media unless the specific social media site is heavily restricted to a specific non-English language or territory.

    That's the observation here.

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  • [–] 2 points 2 years ago* (last edited 2 years ago)

    Ok, good.

    I'll respond to this tomorrow. Gird your loins.

    The claim here is that unless something is flagged as being “world” something, it’s assumed to be specific to the US. The obvious example is politics forums with no qualifier in social media (including here and on Reddit) being about US politics where everywhere else is qualified with either “world” or a specific country/region.

    As far as I'm aware, this only applies to /news and /politics. Those are the two communities out of thousands that have a default unlabeled US community and a separate community for world topics. /games isn't specific to the US, /film isn't specific to the US, and so on.

    So the claim that "anything without 'world' in its name is just about the US" is obviously incorrect, or that the very least a huge exaggeration. If you literally only use Lemmy for politics and news, that's the only way it makes sense. And many people tend to do the opposite and try to avoid those communities.

    So the claim is wrong regardless, but even to the extent that it is valid, I would still defend the counterclaim.

    most users are not American in many of those sites, or a large enough proportion aren’t that the assumption is not justified.

    How do you define 'a large enough proportion'? I would argue that 50% is large enough to justify such an assumption by a significant margin.

    There is no default nation for politics. If anything, “politics” without a qualifier should be fair game for all world politics.

    I think it's certainly possible to argue that the US is the default nation when it comes to news and politics, because our domestic events have by far the most global impact of any nation. Due to the $25T GDP and 11 aircraft carriers, what happens here has massive implications for other nations. If Trump gets elected, that has huge ramifications for European politics, Middle Eastern politics, you name it.

    However, I ultimately do agree that it would be more logical to have the communities be flagged US politics/news. Unfortunately humans are rarely logical creatures, and our behavior can often be better understood in social terms. And socially, this just kind of became the default because it was mostly Americans on reddit at first, and then there's never been a compelling enough reason for it to change.

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