I think the real problem of how the world perceives Americans can be summarized as an issue of marketing. Most cultures openly admit defeat and have learned to play second violin rather than being star all the time. This is, I think, what most Americans (and yes, I generalize because I do think it applies to most) have problems with but they still MARKET themselves as the top brass. American culture teaches that no matter how mediocer as long as you put a positive spin to it then you can still sell yourself for top dollar. From birth onwards they are told that their culture, country, capitalist system, freedom of speech is superior to ANY other system in the world. They ergo conclude that Americans must also be better citizens than the rest of the world. However, life is much more complex than that. Americans love black and white, good and bad. But its not that easy. People outside the US expect apologies for things done wrong my Americans because most also apologize for mistakes made (please dont pick one nation or some leaders who dont, we cannot have a meaningful discussion if we cannot generalize to some extent). Americans are educated to try to always come out on top. Some other cultures do not emphasis that because it is actually being seen as bad and is seen as destructive to a meaningful and respectful society (Japan is a good counter-example to the US). I am not speaking in an economic sense here but about daily life. People who cant admit their weaknesses, who always try to beat others, who always try to convince others that their way of life is superior without even spending the time to evaluate other systems are simply people who are disliked by most. Sorry, I had to generalize otherwise we should not even start talking. Of course this can never include ALL.
Since this is the 'Psychology' forum. Europeans and others "Project" onto Americans, and Americans project onto others. So do most groups. Projection is virtually universal. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Psychological_projection
guys, guys, everybody just calm down, and let us remember whats really important that americans are better than everyone else. keep it simple poeple, its been working for a while, why change anything? also what IS this american arrogance your talking about, facts are facts, and thats a fact. ps: you europeans really should start listening to us about terrorism and the iranian nuke thing, you guys are a lot closer to them then we are. and i really want to go to rome some day, even though i herd it was overrated.
To some extent this is correct, but what you see as a "trying to beat everyone all the time" is what I see as a "never accepting your limitations" aspect. It's trying to better oneself and never accepting a limit, shooting for the stars, whatever. Pick your cliche'. As for arrogance, the Americans are NOT the only ones who have it. I've been to many countries where arrogance is the main theme in society. Try Russia. Or France. Or the UK. I can cite many examples where the superiority complex comes into play, and if you're going to call one nationality out on it, make sure you do so all inclusively with others that are guilty of the same. Now, much of this anti-Americanism has resurfaced as Bush squandered what personal equity we had with the rest of the world after 9-11. Anyone remember that time? "Everyone is American Today" was the slogan just about everywhere as the world stood with us. Fast forward a few years and what do you have? A mass exodus of that sentiment as Bush runs around the world in his "Bull in a China Shop" manner. Wanna blame someone? Blame the administration. As for hating the US, hate Bush. Most of us Americans (over two-thirds) agree with you!
Brilliant as usual. I used to live in SouthAmerica myself for long periods of time, and in most culture down there is a BAD thing being successful. One Thing I learned, is that EEUU is like the Sintesis of the world, Dont forget that we are a nation of inmigrants since day 1. (LEGAL inmigrants) 25 millions italian's, 45 millions hispanics, 40 millions african's, 40 millions german's and millions of eastern europeans, british, irish, spaniards,Asian, Indians etc etc.. (even 12 millions of middle easterns). Also,from the political point of view, the states have the most fragmented system in the world. I have a friend, who i met in the dominican republic, he used to be a irresponsible guy, once he came to the US, he changed 360 degrees because he felt that in the US he got a chance, a Real one. About Bush, well.. the world will hate the US presidents no matter what until they leave office. They used to hate FDR,Harry,JFK,Johnson,Nixon,Ford,carter,reagan, even Clinton and now bush and so on.
Hey, to all of you Bush bashers-He is not your supreme being. He is not your commander. I assume that much of this "lying" and social standing detioration starts with the war in Iraq. You blame Bush. You claim he lied. Well stupids, he didn't. He made a decision based on intelligence that turned out to be incorrect. Intelligence corroborated with your Euro governments' assessments at the time. We (western intelligence) all believed that Iraq had weapons of mass destruction. Specific intelligence aside, Saddam's own behavior gave us reason to believe that he did. I saw the UN meeting where Colin Powell presented the audio recordings of Iraqi military members talking about moving WMD. I remember thinking to myself, "well the intelligence isn't that bad, maybe we should go to war over it." Personally, I'm not sure that I'd go to war over it, but it certainly was not without merit. It's up to our leaders to decide whether they think it's worth war. You have elected officials. They made the decision to go to war based on the intelligence provided. If you say they went along to get along with Bush, your elected officials are idiots and thus (based on previous posts) so are you for electing them. The truth is that they made that grave decision based on the intelligence they heard which turned out be wrong. Have you ever been wrong? Ever been wrong about something major? Do your leaders gather intelligence personally so they know beyond a doubt it's accurate or do they trust their agencies and make decisions based on their findings? I'd go out on a limb and venture to say it's the latter. There is also evidence that potential WMD were trucked into Syria during the months leading up to the invasion. Maybe all of our intelligence agencies weren't wrong and we just got there too late? Can't say for sure. What I can say is that if you think Bush unilaterally took this nation and all the allies to war because he "lied," you're an idiot. There is a system of checks and balances. The senate passed a majority vote to go to war. They all heard the intel presented at the UN. They didn't overwhelmingly agree to an invasion so that they would get smiles from Bush in the hallways. Their job is to make sure that big decisions don't occur based on one man's whims. The buck stops with your governments if you entered a war based on lies. Your governments not doing their due diligence on something that important is condemnation enough. Your governments all have the same basic structure as ours. No one man did anything. They went in because they heard and believed the same intel. It turned out to be wrong. Man up, accept that you were wrong. Our intelligence agencies as a whole got it wrong. Don't reinvent history because memories have faded in order to absolve yourselves. Noone "lied" you into believing the recordings. Accept that being wrong about this has really bad consequences, but do not, do not panzy your responsibility onto one man. Bush did not do this by himself, Blair did not do this by himself, it DID NOT happen that way. Admit that, and you can start rebuilding your dignity as men. And for those claiming Americans are arrogant-You're full of it. We don't spend our time thinking about how we can one-up you Euros. We handle our own lives and take care our own business. We work long and hard to get ahead. If you had reason to be jealous take a look at yourselves. France's former 35 hour work week limit doesn't help your competitiveness. You're not going to cover as much distance going 35 mph as 40+. Don't get mad for falling behind. If you're ok being "C" workers when we're "A" workers that's fine, but don't sneer at us for the shortcomings the lifestyle that you CHOSE has compared to ours. We don't whine about how great our lives would be with your work system. That law was there because Euros chose it despite the tradeoffs. Unfortunately, it looks like we're becoming more like you and you more like us and what a surprise, the penduluum is swinging and your economies are doing better. Socially speaking, we aren't the ones persecuting homeschoolers in Germany. We aren't the ones setting up kids to be confused and miserable by teaching 8 year olds how to be faggots to get a "total view" of sexuality in England. It was the French who went into Algeria and massacred people to "integrate them". You are no better than us. You Euros are NOONE to be telling us how what we do is inferior. To even have that line of thinking shows your inferiority because you're worried about how what we're doing is either better or worse than you. Have some self-confidence and take responsibility for your own actions. You Euros have plenty of big problems that you're not answering for. I'd be willing to go into those if you want, but I'm a man, I don't feel validated for detailing the shortcomings of others, I get validated from doing what I'm supposed to do. Wilt
You ain't wrong, majority elects, who is in the majority? You have to think of our world as of a childrens nursery. An adult working in a nursery is obviously a lot smarter than kids in that nursery, considering age difference, education, life experience, etc. Kids will behave and perform all instructions given by an adult, at times some children will not want to go along, so instead of physically making them there are other ways to influence their decision making which is based on psychology. A fully developed adult can also be influenced by others into making a decision he can not fully comprehend, though would still make that choice as he has been influenced into making it, that works fantastically well on an average adult with an average IQ, who form majority of our nations and who are indeed responsible for electing governments. Terrorists can also be influenced by others, others are the ones that are set to benefit from a terrorist act, most of the time that benefit is a financial one.
Yep and if it weren't for America back in the 40's you'd all be goose-stepping over and you sure wouldn't be worried about the free markets. Keep talking that shit, but facts are facts.
Reaver, I agree. I get so tired of this trash talk from countries that get billions from us. Let them scream after we pull our billions (maybe trillions) away.