On 15/10/2011 01:39 PM, Warp wrote:
> 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.

In fairness, the USA is larger than all of Europe put together. If you 
imagine each US state as being like an EU country, there's no /that/ 
much difference. How many Europeans are really aware of anything 
happening outside Europe (and the USA)? Let's face it, there's Africa, 
Asia, Australia, *South* America, and those are just the places that I 
actually know the names of. Nobody talks about those much... and they're 
not exactly small or insignificant.

What I /have/ noticed about the USA is that they tend to assert that 
their way of life is the only /correct/ one. Like, the way they live is 
the best way, and the rest of the world just hasn't learned how to be as 
awesome as them yet. Whereas in Europe, each country has roughly similar 
laws and so forth, but there are several areas of fairly drastic 
difference. And then there's culture and so forth. And overall, nobody 
seems to be sitting there saying "we're the best in Europe, and we pitty 
all those other countries who haven't learned how to be like us yet".

Also: The USA is huge. I can't help feeling that somewhere within it, 
there must be some intelligent people. And those people must feel really 
embarrassed that they live in the same country as the morons who make 
America look so bad to the rest of the world with depressing frequency...

(I remember when the London riots where happening. And then they started 
happening all over the country. I felt ashemed to be British that day.)

-- 
http://blog.orphi.me.uk/
http://www.zazzle.com/MathematicalOrchid*

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