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

well you have one thing right spacecadet... the usa can definitely be represented by one vote.... as has been prooven in our last two unelections or is it three?

so i reiterate you cannot rename us we are known as Americans... i dont care if you are the president of the united states... you cannot rename us.....

and also, this is the internet.... anyone can say anything they want about who they are. it doesnt make it true. and if you are an american it doesnt necessarily follow that you are a patriot.... surely noone here can expect a citizen of the united states to behave better than its titlar head right now??

if the president of the united states can be found to be unpatriotic than so can the citizens of that country....
and do not go saying that he is patriotic... he has done not one thing since he took power for the welfare of the united states and its citizens

"
"Lasch posited that social developments in the 20th century (e.g., World War II and the rise of consumer culture in the years following) gave rise to a narcissistic personality structure, in which individuals’ fragile self-concepts leads, among other things, to a fear of commitment and lasting relationships (including religion), a dread of aging (i.e., the 1960s and 1970s "youth culture") and a boundless admiration for fame and celebrity (nurtured initially by the motion picture industry and furthered principally by television)."

I'd say the wariness of commitments is a good thing (thank goodness we don't live in the days when people were pressured into loveless marriages by 25 because "it's time you were married and X seems a nice boy/girl" that inevitably descended into domestic misery) and the wariness of religion is more to do with the inevitable march of Reason that's been going on for centuries as well as the wittling-away of hypocritical "identity" religions (ie people who don't believe a word of it but call themselves "christians" etc because it's the family/national tradition).

The dread of aging thing I agree with but that's always been with us. I think what is the case now is that people age "slower" - not physically more mentally. The days of people being "grown-up" by their early twenties and "settled-down" by their thirties are long behind us now. I think that's largely to do with the fact that society is a lot less rigid and ordered than it used to be.

I'm not sure about the "boundless admiration for fame and celebrity". Certainly in the UK, there's as much contempt for it as anything else because celebrity has become so debased these days. What I think *is* true is that many people see celebrity as a genuine career-path that anyone can embark on and fame is seen as a goal in and of itself.

'this is the internet.... anyone can say anything they want . . .'

but

' you cannot rename us '



But seriously:

'It's a solution to a "problem" that doesn't even exist.'

Well, no. Perhaps the problem doesn't exist for you, but then, if you go to Europe and every person you meet says 'Oh, you're from America', you don't have to reply, 'well, yes, I'm from the American continent, but I'm not from the U.S.'

There is an ambiguity which *can be* a problem for citizens of the Western Hemisphere who are not citizens of the U.S.

It is unpleasant to have one's problems, however minor, dismissed as non-existent.

Furthermore, imagine if, after the Civil War, the King had decided to name his country The United States of Europe. And imagine if there were also a strong current in European (i.e. British) political philosophy that saw the Manifest Destiny of the U.S.E to be the rule of all of the European continent. Do you suppose the French, for example, would feel uncomfortable with the ambiguity of the term 'European' which would mean both 'British subject' and 'Somebody who lives between the Urals and the Atlantic north of the Mediterranean'?

The U.S. long ago co-opted the name of the continent for itself. Italians and Germans can sit down together and say 'we're all Europeans'. I can't sit down with my Chilean friends and say 'we're all Americans' without feeling a little treasonous.

Apparently someone *can* rename *us*.

Just been on this thread on the mainstream BBC boards:- http://www.bbc.co.uk/dna/h2g2/brunel/F1951566?thread=4243300 It's about a woman, a newspaper columnist and Internet pundit who is, I suppose, the British equivalent of Ann Coulter, albeit with less of a functioning brain: she was on the BBC's premier politics discussion show the other week, and people have been posting questioning the appropriateness of the choice. Sorry if I might have offended space cadette, but the fact remains that people like Melanie Phillips are better received in the USA than GB. Their sort of foaming-at-the-brain right-wing ranting finds fertile ground over there, far more so than it does here. Phillips also writes regularly for the Israel Insider site (when searching, no gap between the "Israel" and the "Insider", writing it this way makes it easier to read) This is, as you might expect, an apologist forum for the Israeli Government's actions in recent years, and anyone posting who says it's just conceivable that the Palestinians might have a few valid grievances is usually flamed and acid-bombed out of existance. Compared to here, the talkboards are not moderated at all, and when you look at the sort of ill-educated redneck, diehard Bush loyalist, neocons, and religious nut-jobs who post there from the USA demanding anything up to and including genocide of the Palestinians, you might be forgiven for thinking that's the only shade of thought coming out of the USA. (You also thank God for sensible moderation that stops a board like this descending into flaming and acid-bombs) Check it out. The first thought I had after reading some of the more hair-raising opinion pieces and reader feedback was "There is one enormous gulf of thought developing between Europe and the USA - thank the Gods we are more liberal still!"

In Spanish there is a word which corresponds to "Unitedstatians" (summat like Estadounidenses). Then there's "Yanks" which is a popular term, but a bit derogatory.

"yanks" only properly applies to the old Northern states though... just try calling somebody from Texas or Alabama a "Yank" and then count the number of teeth you're left with. So what DO you call somebody from the Confederacy? Redneck? Klansman? Good Ol'boy?

"The United States of Europe. And imagine if there were also a strong current in European (i.e. British) political philosophy that saw the Manifest Destiny of the U.S.E to be the rule of all of the European continent."

There already is this, it's called the European Union and it is often called "Europe" for short even though it doesn't cover the whole of the European continent.

"The U.S. long ago co-opted the name of the continent for itself."

You're insinuating an agressive acquisition. The Americans called their country "United States of America" because it was a union of (originally) thirteen states on the American continent. The label "American" came to essentially mean them. There was an attempt (within the US) to come to a better short-name for the country ("Columbia") but this faultered when a South American country gained independence and called itself "Colombia". It still exists in the names of some companies (eg Columbia Pictures) but the Americans have settled on "America" as has the rest of the world.

Generally, when speaking of the American continents, I use the term "Americas" (ie all the Americas), when talking about the US in shortened terms I call it "America" and everyone knows perfectly well that I'm not talking about Canada or Mexico. The same as when I refer to a South African people know I mean someone from the Republic of South Africa and not someone from Zimbabwe or Namibia.

"So what DO you call somebody from the Confederacy? Redneck? Klansman? Good Ol'boy? "

Why not take a trip to the Southern States and call them "Klansmen". Be interesting to see what happens to you.

I purchased a set of maps for my GPS. I bought the North American set. I also bought a microSD chip that will hold then entire set.

I live in Texas and am much more likely to visit Mexico than Canada.

Mexico is NOT included in this set.

WTF?

Ok... so the Central America set would be relatively small. But don't move a country to another continent just because it's convenient.

People always seem to forget that Mexico is part of the North American continent. I think it's because the US and Canada are Anglophone countries and Spanish-speaking nations are associated with South America.

Still completely wrong, though, obviously. Have you considered pointing this out to them?

"are Anglophone"

are *mostly* Anglophone, I should have said. Obviously, a considerable number of Canadians speak French (and quite a few Americans speak Spanish).

Do you think I need to?... They're cartographers.

I did notice a small red "Note: Mexico coverage is not included" on they're web page.
http://www8.garmin.com/cartography/mapSource/citynav.jsp

The English were originally at least two tribes: Angles and Saxons, hence Anglo-Saxons. So how about Yanko-Rednecks?

Zagreb -

Good points all.

I agree that miserable marriages should be ended, but the concept of "serial monogamy" seems to have problems also (children, health care, etc.). And yes, the dread of aging has always been with us, but the trend to breast lifts, plastic surgery, hair coloring (why is it always pitch black or distress orange?) can be pathetic. The term "aging gracefully" seems to have dropped out of the language. And I certainly agree religion has largely gone astray (and IMHO become a growth industry for tax evaders). But we seem to have trouble finding replacement social structures.

"What I think *is* true is that many people see celebrity as a genuine career-path that anyone can embark on and fame is seen as a goal in and of itself."

Really the key point, I think. From the NSF (I am an engineer, BTW):

"Undergraduate engineering enrollment decreased sharply during the 1980s, followed by slower declines in the 1990s ..."

So when Bill Gates says he cannot hire American graduates due to a lack of science education, the answer is to go for talk show host, or perky news anchor, or salesman for a pharmaceutical company (ex-cheerleaders are recruited), or ...

OK, I'll stop.

"I purchased a set of maps for my GPS. ... I live in Texas and am much more likely to visit Mexico than Canada. Mexico is NOT included in this set."

Cormac McCarthy's novel "All the Pretty Horses" has two young Texas cowboys in the late 1940's realize that the ranch lifestyle is over. Looking at a map of the US, they see that everything south of the Rio Grande is just white - no map at all. So that's where they go, to the "frontier". Adventure ensues.

As far as fear of ageing goes, I believe that mainly comes from the fact that we no longer properly care for and revere our elders. Gettin old IS scary if your experience of age is that you get isolated, ignored, left to rot... Many older people have a lot to offer in terms of experience, ideas, help, information... Not to mention insight. My nan was fascinating to talk to. I loved her so much, me and my mum still chat about her ideas, the things she taught us (her mum, my nan)... she died when I was about five I think. We treat our parents appallingly. No wonder we're scared.

Oddly they seem to have lost the Yukon, Northwest Territories and Nunavut as well....

Nice of them to include their northernmost state, though. Odd that they would miss a lot of what's between 124°46'W and 24°31?15?N, 81°57?49?W

Oops, darn cut and paste.

Make that second one (the Southernmost point of the US- Ballast Key, Florida) 24°31'15"N, 81°57'49"W

I'm sure they (like most companies) are going after their demographic and need not include maps of places most citizens of the United States of America will never visit or care about.