h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Entry: What to think of an American - A3977878
Author: archr666 - U1528589

please, be as brutal as is necessary

Hiya Arch!

Brutality shouldn't be necessary, but it is a wide open topic.

First the normal suggestion, do a spell check (words like receive).

Followed the Constitution, yes pretty much. But you might want to admit that certain amendments have taken place, sometimes as the result of bloody civil war. (That would be the literal bloody.)

You could mention that one problem in stereotyping Americans has become obvious by how nearly evenly divided they are on so many issues; often diametrically opposed, in fact.

And that the cultural mix is less homogenously European than the first hundred years or so.

And maybe mention that dialects and accents seem to change with every 300 miles one travels over the east-west or north-south directions (often less). The difference between bible-belt conservative, less educated, rural areas and the academically advanced, liberal cities (as indicated by red-blue voting patterns of the individual states).

One final thing; Class systems. The whole world has 'em. You could point out the trouble all groups have with being stereotyped, including ecnomic classes, countries, occupations, education, ethnicity, etc.

Gee, maybe that was a bit brutal. If so, I'm dreadfully sorry. I hope to see this one fleshed out and completed. Good Luck with it and future entries.

this is really invaluable advice, and just so u no u werent brutal at all, acutually more like extremely helpful, no joke, thx a lot.

Another thing you might mention is the reaction some cultures have to one as vastly different as that of the typical American. While there may be different economic classes in America, this doesn't alter much in the way of personal interaction between them. A poor American generally won't hesitate to contradict a member of the middle or upper class. When this occurs, there is no violent reaction by the member of the "higher" class. No unspoken rules of propriety have been broken. To Americans, all men are created equal. When an American goes to another country, they behave in the same manner. They treat people of the lower classes the exact same way as those of the upper classes. To some non-American cultures this simply seems odd. To others it is highly offensive, even when a member of a lower class is treated as an equal by an American of the upper class. They are accustomed to their place in the world, and feel threatened by anything that appears to threaten that stability. Most Americans are so accustomed to behaving this way that the idea that someone would actually feel threatened by being treated as an equal seems completely absurd to them. If they are told that their actions are causing such a reaction, they often simply won't believe that it's true.

well many years ago a wise old man said to me the americans and the english will laugh at anything , as the years have went by i have found that america and england infact are alike ,the summer is just around the corner in scotland and we will soon have our guests from america england and many other nations ,as they love the scottish ,but what gets me is its only the americans that go home thinking the loch ness monster( http://www.theloch.com/)is real . ps i rest my case . ss

http://www.theloch.com/order.htm

Hey there!

The site is actually quite truthful. The Loch Ness Monster theories are real! The problem is whether or not the creature is real, eh?

Americans do tend to be believers. They will tend to be open-minded as long as there is some reason to be.

Conflicting stories have left Scotland on the subject for dozens of years, at least. One story said that Loch Ness never got more than 13 feet deep, and could not hide such a creature. Others have insisted the loch could not support any similar creature because of the finite food supply. Still others say that the loch is connected to a vast waterway where breeding and raising of young could take place.

All of these are likely false; but, like eye-witness accounts of UFOs, too many have come from ostensibly trustworthy sources to just dismiss them without investigation.

Certainly creatures such as Nessie may be more likely to be found hiding in nearly inaccessible depths of the ocean, if they could survive the salt-water; but keeping an open mind is a survival trait as well. One need not look foolish if they just entertained the thought and are proven wrong. It's those who stand firmly on one side of the issue or the other that risk looking foolish later.

Remember the story of the scientist who doubted the existence of meteors? He said that he'd sooner believe that a man would lie than that stones fell from the sky. Remember the first reports of the duck-billed platypus? biologists were convinced that a duck's bill had been glued onto a dead beaver.

Beware those who cannot imagine, for they may never understand.

Remember the story of the scientist who doubted the existence of meteors? He said that he'd sooner believe that a man would lie than that stones fell from the sky.

and they also mocked the person that was going to make man fly ,till the first plane was invented , but i was only adding a bit of humour lol,see most people will mock anything they don.t understand.ss

Hey there Shifty!

NP , I recognized the humour, and wasn't trying to 'defend' the Americaners, per se; in fact, I think it's quite appropriate that my comment about their tendency to believe stuff runs counter to my earlier assertion that they cannot be so easily pigeonholed.

Thanks for joining in.

no problem mate .ss

Well than who is there to say: Yes, but.. or what ever. I was very happy to see and read this Entry.
I have no country, I live in no man's land, but in any case:
I DO NOT LIKE SHOVINIZM from anybody from any side.

Particularly in these days of the Internet the World Wide Web -- eventually should bring humans closer in a friendly "neighbourhood" together.
No, I don't think it will happen soon or even ever! just because of human nature.

There is a lot to say, it would be nice to "believe" that utopia of an ideal human existence on Earth... but as we know the development of our species, forget it for now. Interested? Do some bio research and than say what you "believe" in.
In any case: I live in the US: happy and satisfied.
Also like to say Thank you for the Entry: A3977878,-- thank you for the comments as well. There are days when one thinks: It is really fortunate to get to this Forum of h2g2.
Blue bird

Couldn't agree more, Blue.

It would be a great world if everyone was accepting and tolerant. We're not, as a world, there yet; but I like to think we're evolving in that dirrection.

You may also have meant your comment in humorous fashion (it's so hard to tell sometimes with only text messages), but the word you were probably looking for is chauvinism. If the SHO spelling was a joke, forgive my pedantry.

Hope you continue enjoying the Guide for a long time to come!

thx a lot guys, i really enjoyed writing this and i figured this is what the guide is all about.

Thanks, Arch; and, you're welcome!

BTW: I did not spell check the whole thing, but *buisness* business.

Thank you Fords Towel! I saw you in the "Hitchhiker..."movie
You are certainly handsom! ( Don't worry I am much older than you and anyway I am here Only and exclusively on intellectual basis!)
But:
With the spelling stuff I am not standing on good terms!
You were born into an english speaking environment ( my humble
guess?) Forgive my comment: but english is considered a "hybrid" language putting together from a couple of other languages. It is OK, because it is very easy to learn if one speaks german, french and has education in latin, etc.

But the adventage of a homogeneous language is the phonetic speaking, writing even " thinking" spelling is a totally unkown human invention. How this came about would be nice to know.
You say something else than what you write? And when you think: do you spell your thoughts? Plse don't get angry with me, but one NEVER can learn english from reading a book! Somebody HAS to tell you how to say the words! Never-the-less:

english is so easy to learn in the western culture that it became an internationally recognized language for exemple in aviation.
It is a "must" to communicate up in the air in english!
So much a winning score for you! Also ( I guess) the language in diplomacy became english instead of french. You got an other score.

In any case I am not a writer I just do here what comes handy and entertaining for me! As a pro. visual artist at any time there is a lot of frustration with words, because my thinking in pictures is much faster, more expressive " to speak loud and clear" for me! And it is the same in my native language also.

The spelling difference in the above mentioned example is my PHONETIC writing but your spelling is from FRENCH origin. But where is the FRENCH word come from? he-he-he Ultimately: Where is the english???

I think that the Tower of Babel story is really true story! So much for fun Fords Towel. This is what I think is fun in h2g2!

My comment on the h2 movie will be posted in My Journal sooner or later. bird and hit the sack close to midnight. Zzzzz

You talk about people liking or hating Americans, but this seems to be completely divorced from liking or hating America. Most Europeans love Americans individually, but hate what their country does to the world. Do you think that it might be worth mentioning something about this in the entry?

Hello Gnomon! In your reply it is not clear what you say about the people and "the country".

Perhaps you mean by the "country" the leadership in a country?
This applies to every democratic country that the people are not always in agreement with the leaders!

Even though the people elect their leaders, as time goes on and events come about there could develope a wide gap, disagreement in important decisions between the people and their elected leaders!

So what can you do? It happens all the time and everywhere.
This is the nature of democracy, but certainly is much better than a totalitarian system!
Certainly there are lots of pros and contras in our life.

Yet in a democracy one can reason, can speak up,--- but not with a dictatorship for Heaven sake!

Sofar the humans on this Earth had only these 2 systems invented: live in freedom or live in slavery under the opression of a dictator!
I don't think there is any argument about the choice. bird

To Arch: you certainly have some "sticky" issues in a very broad subject! But in any case: I respect your courage to get involved in a difficult subject matter to discuss it in our Earthlink's environment. Keep up the good job! Bbird

i honestly think there is more hate for the english than the americans .

Blue Bird, hello and thank you for spotting me in the flik! Thank you for the compliment as well, though I doubt you are likely to be older than I am.

Spelling should never be a point within the conversational threads here, Thank you for seeing it as merely constructive, and nothing more. Feel free to speak phonetically when required, but spelling is very important in many instances to get one's meaning across.

English is indeed a hybrid language, and I'm grateful that some find it easy to learn. I think it would be easier to widen its use to include all people, although I'm sure that others would have contrary preferences. Certainly it would be easier for me than learning Esperanto, or the more popular Klingon, as a world language.

I'm told that English has rapidly become the language-of-choice for writing international contracts, especially between two non-english speaking cultures. This is not - I am told - because it is intrinsically superior, contains untranslateable concepts, or is the widest known language; but because it, as a hybrid, contains words that can be construed to be as vague or specific as necessary to get a contract signed.

Sometimes, when trying to work past a particularly sticky contractual problem, a certain amount of vagueness can get both to sign the contract and then work out the details of what its provisions mean.

Welcome to the site, and I hope you enjoy it for a long time to come.