America in the eyes of non-Americans

Warbsywoo

Warbsywoo

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(This is an idea I garnered from another forum)

For all you non-American folk out there, what do you really think of US?

I used to be non-American for a long long time in my life and I thought that the United States was practically the best place in the world to live in, the most protected country, and also the country that held the most promise, as I've learned has been the case for a long long while.
But then again, what with all the entanglements the US has had over the past say couple decades, it's sort of turning my view into a more realistic and more extroverted view of the nation.

Now, do you really consider that a true statement?
Post your opinions on the United States here.

Remember:
1.) No flaming. (Don't let this degenerate into one either)
2.) Opinions are opinions, so any comment short of absolutely horrendous should be fine.

We can debate about this along the way, however.
 
I don´t mean to offend any american member here but i don´t have a great image of America.

Fo starters it seems that most American people are completely anaware of the rest of the world, as far as they are concerned there´s America who rules everything and then there is a little piece of land called Europe...


You see the american government as to mess with all of the other countries domestic issues they think they are the leaders of the world and it amazes me, that they always use the same excuse: "America wants to help other countries in a civil manner and help institute peace in it!"
What i find amuzing is that the USA as one if not the biggest problems when it comes to civilisation.

Sure America is one of the most advanced countries in the world but in terms of mentality, violence and so on...it can almost be compared to a 3rd World country and i might be exceding myself a bit but that´s half the truth at least.

But perhaps i am influenced by what i see on the TV and Youtube about America and it´s people...but i think we all agree Mr.Bush pretty much sucks big time!:P
 
I enjoyed my visit to the U.S. back in 2001... but i would prefer Australia. Easy going people, we don't have many shootings, we are relatively isolated so therefore pretty well protected especially from illegals...

But mainly when I think of the US, I think NASCAR and Laguna Seca... and Seinfeld and a whole lot of other TV shows. Alot of Australian TV shows are crap lol. So I like your TV shows and movies.

Also, respect to your Marines... watched this video on their recruitment and training and man i'd be pretty nervous.

In fact while I'm at it, respect to all armed forces. They fight for the person beside them, not necessarily for Bush so don't hate them.
 
I love Americans, and beleive me, I don't make such statements lightly. But, every American I've met, I've liked.

My problem is with the American government, not its people. And talking to Americans it seems like the government does not conform to the people.

Hey, I'm English and you yanks had a bit of a scrap with us a couple of hundred years ago, didn't mean much to us but you an an IDEAL.

That IDEAL was wonderfull, I think thats why we still like you, but the ideal has been tainted since Vietnam and more since Iraq. The US is no longer a country to be admired, it's to be feared.

Personally, I don't think thats a good legacy. Bring back Clinton, his cigar didn't kill anyone.
 
I am an American, born and raised. I can almost say that I am proud to be an American. However there are a few factors that keep me from being proud. First of all is the Government. There are entirely too many stupid and corrupt politicians that run this country. We have some of the most crazy and outrageous laws that I have ever heard of. One of them is the legal drinking age. You have to be 21 years old to purchase or consume an alcoholic beverage. This is probably one of the reasons that there are so many alcoholics living in this country. And I don't mean just any alcoholic, I'm talking about the ones with major problems. If we would just let our teenagers get all of their partying out of the way before their college years, then maybe we would have a fairly decent and educated culture. But no, we gotta have restrictions so that by the time someone is old enough to drink, they're all like, "OMG, where has this sh1t been all my life?" and they never wanna turn back. We also have a VERY bad gun control problem. If the U.S. would just ban guns altogether, then the crime rate would drop DRASTICALLY. Not too many people rob stores or banks with pocket knives. They always gotta have a gun. There would also be fewer killings. And now to Marijuana. I love it. In fact it is the only drug (alcohol is a drug, too) that I like. I have never heard of anyone overdosing on Marijuana. If everyone smoked this stuff, then this country would be a lot more peaceful. I also don't like how our government gets themselves involved in other country's affairs. We have enough problems on our own soil to be messin around in someone else's backyard. I absolutely HATE George Bush. (His hometown is just 20 miles away from my hometown and I still think he's no good.) As for the common man that inhabit this country's borders, most of them are a fairly decent people. The hospitality is pretty good. The gas prices suck. Good selection at the grocery. Excellent technology. Public education is somewhat decent. Can't really think of anything else and this post is quite wordy.
 
I agree with some of the statements you guys have made here.

The bad things about America:

The bad things about America most prominently are associated with the free speech and other freedoms allotted to the American people. It seems to be a trend nowadays and has been for some years that the legal action is an American's best friend. What I mean by that is lawsuits and people suing each other for really silly and unnecessary things. Suing someone for doing something that there was absolutely no control over is not really what I think the justice system is for, but we can do it anyway, and that's the point.

Another thing, the high divorce rate. It seems that more than half the families in the USA have been broken because of divorce, and it seems it happens the most often during the early years of marriage. Many factors involve into it, of course, but that doesn't explain why the US has a higher rate than most other countries. Maybe it's the money, or maybe it's something else, but that fact is undeniable.

Also, the ideal of 'policing' the world. It's not only America that can protect the world though it seems America has the notion that it does. And it's understandable. America couldn't prevent WWII from happening because of a blunder made after the WWI. And now, in order to prevent a massive war again, we're policing the world in order to do that, and it doesn't seem that our neighbors want it.

I'm not saying I hate America, in fact, I think it's a wonderful country, but I think it's headed towards a more extreme pathway than it traditionally has and the power has just illusioned the national politics. America is possibly the strongest country in the world, but I think Washington is doing just too much, unwarranted acts in the mix there too.
 
Warbourne said:
The bad things about America most prominently are associated with the free speech and other freedoms allotted to the American people. It seems to be a trend nowadays and has been for some years that the legal action is an American's best friend. What I mean by that is lawsuits and people suing each other for really silly and unnecessary things. Suing someone for doing something that there was absolutely no control over is not really what I think the justice system is for, but we can do it anyway, and that's the point.
Click to expand...


Very true. The legal system here in the U.S. is so ****ed up. Did you know that burglars have sued and won over their victims? Say somebody breaks into your house to steal your hardearned stuff. You wake up from the noise, grab a baseball bat and take it to his knees and cripple him for a coupla weeks. Then you call the police to arrest his arse. When he finally gets out of jail he can sue you for the damages to his knee and also for punitive damages and WIN a huge chunk of change, just for protecting your own home. Here is another scenario that has scored lotsa money for burglars. Say you have windows in your ceiling (skylights for example). A burglar decides this is the only way to get in your house unnoticed. In the process of climbing in he falls all the way to the ground and breaks an arm or a leg or anything else. He then sues the victims for the same things from scenario #1 and he will WIN! Both of these scenarios have happened. I'm sure the story about the drycleaners who lost the pants made it around the world. For those of you who don't know, here's the story. A man, who is a judge in the U.S. legal system, takes his nice expensive pants to a drycleaners. They end up losing the pants (they did find them later about a week before the court hearing) and the guy sues them for $54 MILLION. He ended up losing, though, which is cool IMO. Since he is a judge and has seen all the stupid lawsuits going around, I guess he figured he should cash in on the action as well. Pretty sad country I live in isn't it?
 
My problem is with the American government, not its people. And talking to Americans it seems like the government does not conform to the people.
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It doesn't, which is so irritating when many non-Americans think that all Americans are gun toting, nascar loving, hicks that have no idea what's going on in the rest of the world.


I have to be honest about something, most Americans do know what's going on in the rest of the world, regardless of what foreigner's think, but a lot of us figure that everyone hates us anyway, so what's the point?

I've gotten yelled at by several non-Americans in the past, by either:

a.) Saying something about how I'd do something in the world

or

b.) Not saying anything about.....anything.


I've noticed that's a trend with some non-Americans. If we say something they don't like, they say that we're just trying to control the rest of the world because of our 'supreme American-ness', but if we don't say/do anything, then we suddenly don't know what's going on/don't care what's going on. So there are many (not all) foreign individuals, who have close minds, and already have made their minds up, that you just can't win with.



It's nice to see every once in a while, a non-American that sees not all Americans are the same.
 
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Well what we're shown from you guys in britain by the media is not particulary nice:

TERRIBLE president, somehow voted for a 2nd term when a straight up guy like al gor in my opinion is left on the back bench

shootings, all this bullshit bout your "right" to own a gun

ignorance about the rest of the world

masssive racism

fat people and fast food.

luckily we're mostly above that and ill make my mind bout america when ive been there / met a few more people from there. im sure its a loud minority that cause all that sorta thing... ill list the nice things now i hear from america now for your though! :

your music, some of that is lush!

the fact your ancestors were clever enough to move off this crap island to another much nicer continent.

your accents

your technology

some of your tv (scrubs <3) the rest is crap
 
We have to remember that most of our opinions of any other nation are influenced by the media. And that goes for American perceptions of Brits too. Watch any mainstream hollywood blockbuster and if there is a Brit in it then they are either evil, gay or evil and gay.
 
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