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Shame, or arrogance, or what?
I've been on the internet since early 1998, with many websites of my own and many forums. I also visit, and contribute to, lots of other forums, all with an international membership - literally worldwide. In those ten years a big question hatched and has been growing bigger and bigger every day: "Are US Americans ashamed of their country, or are they arrogant about it, or what?" Lemme explain. When on any sort of international forum contributors are invited to state their whereabouts, all nationalities always mention their country, and often their city and state/province - with the exception of US citizens who always mention their city and/or state, but never their country! I don't get that. Is the whole world supposed to know that for example "Painsville OH" is a town in the USA so it doesn't need mentioning? Or are such posters ashamed of their country and prefer to hide it? In just about every communication between "the world" and the USA, one misunderstanding after the other crops up. Only a few days ago, on some admittedly silly forum, a lady casually mentioned that she lives in LA. Now that's the international code for the country of Laos, just like US is the international code for the United States, NL for my own country the Netherlands, SE for Sweden, etcetera. So I asked what kind of work she was doing there, how she came to finish up in that part of the world, and if she would (please!) be kind enough to exchange some Laotian postage stamps for Dutch ones. Her reaction was fairly amusing (grin)! She didn't have the faintest idea what I was talking about, wouldn't have any inkling how she could obtain Laotian stamps in Los Angeles, and even if she could, she certainly wouldn't send them to a complete idiot like me! And if I would be so kind as to never react to any of her postings again, for she didn't want to waste any time on a rambling moron. I left it at that. Stupidity, especially of the provincial kind, is not worth arguing with. Another situation where US Americans consequently refused to state their country, was a couple of years ago. I was the administrator for an international aid organization then, and since our members and contributors came from all over the world, we asked them to fill out a form with the usual stuff like name, address and... nationality. Well, the latter became a disaster! On forms from the USA everything imaginable was entered in that particular box, from "Caucasian" via "African-American", "Hispanic" and "White" to "Native American" and "Black", but not once, literally not once, did any inhabitant of Uncle Sam's dear country enter "US American", or even "American" or "United States". They simply refused to, and even became angry when mildly pressed. I never could figure out what is behind this reluctance of Americans to 'fess up to their country or nationality. Are they ashamed of their country? Do they think that as Americans they "don't have to" state these things? Are they just stupid? Is it possibly even illegal for Americans to state their country or nationality in public? Or do they simply not care about the world outside their own nation? Been wondering about that for many years now, and I guess I'll keep wondering for many years to come...
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I just hate those drop down lists where you are asked for your country. Ever noticed how frequently the great U S of A is put at the top....
Thanks for a very amusing intel.  I remember a segment on the BBC World Service many years ago, where the interviewer, in his crisp English accent, asked some locals in Kansas (I think it was Kansas, it may have been some other state) if they had ever been abroad. "Oh yeah," came the reply. "Where?" prompted the interviewer. "Colorado. Nevada. Ohio," said one guy. "Oklahoma," added his companion.
 | | nick Mar 10, 2009 16:24 | |
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