Posted by Tamar on August 27, 2005, at 17:57:19 [reposted on August 29, 2005, at 17:13:27 | original URL]
In reply to Re: Rant continued » Declan, posted by ClearSkies on August 27, 2005, at 16:44:31
> > It's the combination of dogeatdog with high minded religiosity that gets me about the US.
> > Declan
>
> Woah! Please don't paint an entire country with the same brush! I mean, I'm not American, but that's quite the blanket statement you've made, isn't it?
> Can I be offended on behalf of a country?
> your Canadian babbler comrade, living in the US,
> ClearSkies
>Y'know... offended or not, I get the impression that many people outside the US see US culture in just the way Declan has described. I'm speaking as a foreigner myself, eh?
I know that culture is neither uniform nor univocal. And yet it's easy for the stereotypes to persist. I think it's partly driven by the media... Anything that seems quintessentially American (particularly in a negative way) is newsworthy.
Two things spring to mind: French responses to the Lewinski story, and Scottish reponses to Pat Robertson's comments along the lines that Scotland was a dark land teeming with homosexuals (or something like that; I can't look it up because my computer's being annoying). Both those stories were so newsworthy because they seemed to involve a combination of politics and religion that symbolises the sstereotype of US interests. Whether that's fair is perhaps another question. But in France there seemed to be genuine amazement ("The president was having an affair with an intern? Of course he was!") and in Scotland there seemed to be much rolling of the eyes in response to Pat Robertson ("Aye right; awa'n bile yer heid.").
I guess in today's political climate it's easy to criticize American culture. But I hope that foreigners who criticize American culture will be equally ready to apply similar critiques to their own cultures.
Rant over for now...
Tamar
poster:Tamar
thread:548278
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/poli/20050728/msgs/548278.html