What Does The World Really Think Of America?

[LensmanZ313]

http://hometowncleveland.com/forums/index.php?showtopic=224


I'm quite active in this local online forum. It's mainly dominated by Republicans--some of them are okay, though.

A short while ago, one of them posted this "essay" that touted the greatness that America has offered the world. I did some checking on www.snopes.com and found that it was an urban legend.

I just want to know what do some of you really think of America and Americans. Hell, if you want, log onto www.hometowncleveland.com, take a few minutes to create an account, and tell people on that forum what you really think.

On this forum, I'm known as Number Six--in honor of The Prisoner.

[Foxbat]

I have absolutely nothing against Americans or America itself. That being said, I believe that their foreign policy is naive to say the least as they try to impose a democracy on Iraq.

There is no doubt that America is the greatest military and economic power on Earth - but where they go wrong is assuming that that always makes them right. The country as a whole had gained a great deal of sympathy after the atrocity of 9/11 but now that sympathy is blown away in the wind of a war that is still to be properly justified.

Their Human rights record is getting worse - just look at the treatment of prisoners both in Guantanamo and Iraq. Their respect for other cultures is practically nil - again Iraq is a prime example. I blame the Bush administration for this and not the people.

Unless the USA starts to realise that no country can go it alone nowadays then the resentment will just keep on building towards them. I believe that their naive blundering through the world will lead to yet more acts of terrorism against them (I hope that I'm wrong).
America may have offered the world 'greatness' but what it cannot (and will probably never) understand is why the world has rejected that offer.

[LensmanZ313]

Thanks, Foxbat. I, too, think that my fellow Americans--the really arrogant ones--don't have a clue about what Islam is about, its culture, many things. Many Americans are narrow-minded, intolerant; and, at times, just plain ignorant.

Look how popular the mullet is still popular here in the States.

As a Libertarian, I clashed with fellow LP members over the Iraqi war. I supported it . . . no WMDs, no links to the 9/11 terror attacks . . . plus, the hypocrisy of it all that my government had supported Saddam--and other thugs like him--years before.

It's sickening.

[Leto]

As a continent, America is fine a bit too cold in the North or the extreme South but that's OK.
As a country, USA is as any other country of the world : some people are arrogant,stupids, narrow-minds and so on and they shout the loudest. Some people are just fine, intelligent, nice and so on. Unfortunatly, they are quieter and that's not the ones you hear the most of.
Current US governement is not IMO the best thing that happened to the world in general and this country in particular. But as this is not my country, i don't vote there so my opinion doesn't count.

[Foxbat]

It's certainly the case that each nation has its flaws. We Scots, for example,
were always far too busy killing each other to mount much of a threat to anybody outside our own borders.

With a country as powerful as America though the old adage of America sneezing and the world catching a cold is true - and in that sense, what happens in America affects us all whether we like it or not.

[McMurphy]

While I believe that foreign gripes and passive-aggressive complaining about the United States have existed far before the Bush Adminstration, the criticisms in regards to current events and the current adminstration is absolutely founded and should be heeded.

[Princess Ivy]

In honesty i'm a bit sick of all the 'are the yanks good or bad' rubish out there at the moment. they are people. thats all. i rather like having them around, they are good for a laugh at any rate. yes, i wish bush hadn't won, and i don't like his governments policies, however i don't think that he is representitive of all americans, just as i am not representitive of all imagrants to Britain. Americans are people, yes, a little arrogant, but then we brits can't be accused of modest humility, nor the rest of europe for that matter. but they are basically well meaning. Like the teenage scout leader, picking up old ladies and rushing them over the street when they just wanted to go into the bakery next door. in other words young, impetuous and a little overbearing, but theres no harm in them.

[cymric]

I Lezman agree with you about how most Americans are small minded. I am a conservative and I am active on tis board (I hope I never come across as small minded). In my travels across the world I have found that 90% of the people on this earth are small minded and ethnocentric. It is a natural state of the human mind to simplify that which we cannot understand and break it down into the most negative terms. It does not matter where you are from. I have a friend at my college from lebonan(sp? damn dslexyia) after getting to knowme he began to ask questions about the culture of this country(some I was not really qualified to answer and you can understand this if you have ever been a yankee living in Texas). It is disscusion like this broaches understanding and trust. Yet some cultures remain so ethnophobic(N.Korea,Most of the middle east, and yes some parts of America) that this becomes difficult. I will finish this my wife needs to eat.,

[knivesout]

Big country. Reminds me a lot of my own country in many ways - the colonial past, the shaky but more or less intact democracy, the internal racial tensions, even the political currents to an extent. On the other hand, it's a country that is simply so powerful economically and militarily that it's hard not to feel a bit scared of it at times, while I doubt India really scares anyone much.

I'm alarmed at the dominance of US consumer culture to an extent - it's sad when people will queue up in 100s for the launch of a McDonald's in India, when a chicken shavarma roll, available all over already, is tastier, and at least as dangerous to your health. US corpocracy alarms me far more than the current phase of military interventionism, because it's far more consistent and is just as capable of great long term environmental and economic damage to other countries like mine.

I think that, while the idea of a sort of 'Pax Americana' had its merits, they've lost the chance to impose any such status quo without more resistance and open hostility than will be worthwhile.

OK, one little rant if I may: I also think the US media has a certain tendancy towards paranoia that is just plain silly. I've seen a program on CNN where some smarmy woman spoke for about half an hour about whether people from the US should consider settling abroad, and her argument boiled down to 'well, we don't know if they have good plumbing, and they could go mad like wild beasts and kill us anytime because, after all, they're not like us, so why not just play it safe and stay right here in the greatest nation in the whole wide galaxy.' Arghhh. Why not just print 'here there be dragons' on every place on the world map except the US? Considering the US' uniquely high annual rate of armed murders I'd think that Americans are just about as unsafe at home as they are elsewhere!

Lastly, I'd like to agree with Princess Ivy that sweeping generalisations don't help anyone and apologise if I've made any.

[hodor]

i pretty much fully agree with you knivesout. i am an american who is living in france and they are really nice to me and make no generalizations about me. i have learned alot just living in another country. also i had never thought about it before but now that i live in france it is sad to see mcdonalds popping up everywhere. the french have their own culture and foods and traditions which i have had to adapt to but i actually like.

i also agree that the american govt is way too paranoid i mean the way they advised ppl against going to vacation in france a while back was absolutely appalling. but on the other hand my wife (french) and her parents came with me on vacation in arizona and later to oregon and the american ppl were very nice to them and seemed rather genuinely happy they were visiting the usa.

[Morning Star]

Originally Posted by cymric

I Lezman agree with you

Hmm. Well, that's interesting.

[hodor]

okay after a few days now i have actually asked around so i could give an answer as to what residents from where i live think.... even though there is only between thirty and forty of us LOL. Most say well the govt has problems but so do theirs so they didnt say much about that... what i really picked up is how they look at the cars americans drive and how much gas they use; they pretty much all think americans in general waste alot. LOL and i couldnt disagree with that because when i lived there i had a chevy 4x4 extra cab v8.

i did however point out that there are more diesel cars on the roads in europe and they we aloof to that.

[angrybuddhist]

I would imagine Americans are just like everybody else; okay in small doses, but collectively our loud, obnoxious flaws tend to attract the most attention.

[Circus Cranium]

When I went to England (three times), I got to see a lot of the outside looking in view of America (my own country). I was baffled by one thing. A lot of them didn't quite grasp, for lack of a better word, the 'bigness' of our country. What I mean by that is, not only is the country divided into states, which are in affect tiny countries of their own in many ways, but the regional differences from East to West, Central, North to South, coastal to inland are SO incredibly different. In culture, in attitude, in beliefs, it's really like many small countries. So it's very difficult to coin what 'Americans' or the country as a whole is like, because diversity is paramount.

[hodor]

Here here circus! I am from the west USA and only been in the west (extreme west: oregon california and arizona). We are NOT New Yorkers, or Floridians, or even like ppl from Chicago. You would have to just each american separately. However, how the outside world judges us is differently. Since I have lived in France I think alot of ppl have changed their minds about us. Or at least about me. I am not what they would typicalize an american as.