Not living in the US, only seeing what's happening there from far away,
my notion may very well be really biased and limited, but I get the strong
impression that many Americans seem to live in some kind of social bubble
where they subconsciously think that they are the only people in the world
(or at least the only people with a modern western culture and society).
In other words, they have an extremely US-centric view of the world.

  Three examples:


  1) Many critics of the "occupy Wall Street" movement accuse the protesters
of opposing capitalism.

  I don't understand this accusation at all. It seems to imply that the only
possible form of capitalism is the one which is enacted in the US, where
the government is largely lobbied by large corporations, where these
corporations (in large part thanks to this lobbying) can get away with
screwing up people, where basically everything is privatized (including
things like the healthcare system), where banks and other corporations whose
only goal is to make money with money (and which do not produce anything)
deliberately screwing up the economy by shady (and sometimes outright illegal)
tactics and for their own benefit at the cost of others is normal, and where
individuals have basically no rights over big corporations.

  This kind of mentality completely ignores the fact that the US is not the
only capitalist country in the world. It might be unique in its particular
form of capitalism, but it's certainly not the only capitalist country.
Most other western countries have a form of capitalism that is much more
controlled by the government, where large corporations are not free to do
whatever they want, and it works just ok.

  I get the feeling that these people seem to think, at some level, that
the US is the only "true" capitalist country in the world, and the rest is
just socialist countries or banana republics, and that eroding anything in
the current US capitalist system is going towards socialism and communism.


  2) If you do a bit of searching, you will find tons of conspiracy theories
about how the FDA is shutting down, hiding and attacking alternative cures
for all kinds of diseases. Miracle cures for cancer seem to be the most
popular ones. You can find lengthy "documentaries" about this very subject.

  These conspiracy theories are *so* US-centric that it gives me nausea.
Apparently to these people the FDA either controls the entire world, or
alternatively the US is the only country in the world where any kind of
medical research is performed (under the tight grip of the FDA, of course).

  I don't remember any of these conspiracy theories trying to explain how
it's possible that there exists a miracle cure for cancer (or whatever),
yet no other country has started using it. Countries that have absolutely
nothing to do with the US and the FDA.


  3) Many Christians in the US (at least in some parts of it) have
this conviction that atheism leads to complete immorality, anarchy,
every-man-for-himself attitudes, violence, crime and complete chaos.
This is one of the reasons why they vilify and discriminate against
atheists so strongly (way more than believers in other religions). They
are seen as absolutely immoral monsters and beasts who would immediately
go in a violent crime rampage if it were not for all the Christians keeping
law and order.

  These people seem to be completely oblivious to the fact that there
are many countries where Christianity is not predominant. Moreover, there
are countries where *no* religion is predominant. For example in the northern
European countries something like 85% of people are secular, many of them
outspoken atheists. Similar numbers are true for most of Europe. While in
the US the atheist is the odd-man-out, the exception to the rule, the
reverse is true here.

  Yet these countries have not fallen into chaos and anarchy, their societies
crumbling under the lack of morality, order and law. In fact, there are
statistically *less* crime in most European countries than there is in
the US (regardless of the type of crime). Yet these American Christians
seem either completely unaware of this, don't want to think about it,
or actively ignore or deny it.

-- 
                                                          - Warp

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