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Mef (lemmy.world)
submitted 2 years ago by to c/politicalmemes@lemmy.world
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[–] 14 points 2 years ago (2 children)

Very similar experience with Americans. I've spent about 6 months in the country over my life so far. Lovely folks generally. We get loads of American tourists here and they're all lovely.

Obviously there's the occasional cunt but sure everywhere has those.

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  • [–] 5 points 2 years ago (3 children)

    Americans think everyone else hates them when in fact it's usually just all the countries they've lost wars to.

    Europeans literally couldn't care less what the Americans think of them because our day to day lives are so much better in almost every sense, and all they could come up with is "Europoors" 😂

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

    Europeans literally couldn’t care less what the Americans think of them

    Ah that's a bit harsh. I like Americans. Americans like the Irish. I like that we like each other. Makes the world a nicer place to have other nations friendly to you.

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

    That has been my (limited) experience as well. For me as an extremely introverted European, visiting US was quite a culture shock.

    All the American people I’ve met have been very kind, easy to approach and hold a conversation with, and ready to help out a stranger in need. Honestly the last part was what stick out with me the most. Here in my country, I have no doubt that if I collapsed on the street, there would be 10 people stepping over my body before someone decided to check if I needed help.

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  • [–] 2 points 2 years ago

    America has horrible social services, but the reality is that everyone needs help now and then. Since we can't count on government to help out, we minds have to fill the gap with private non-profits and personal giving.

    In a way it's great so see people willing to help others, but the problem is that we can't help but discriminate in how we help each other.

    And we're shockingly conflict-averse on the individual level. We value being friendly and non-confrontational over pretty much anything else. And that brings a host of problems.

    One of the big ones is our desire to stay civil creates a false echo chamber for many people. They think that everyone agrees with them because nobody openly disagrees. And that can get dangerous.

    When someone tells a racist joke, you nervously smile and nod to avoid staring a fight over an "impolite" topic, and you've accidentally encouraged bad behavior. That behavior is repeated until it becomes normalized, and then it escalates.

    We've somehow managed to be so friendly and kind we're sliding backwards on civil rights. We're weird.

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