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 #17 (permalink) Thu Nov 24, 2011 14:11 pm The French government must have lost its mind... |
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| Jamie (K) wrote: |
| Claudia, the Germans who come here do not succeed in showing us that the United States is "not free", because all they're doing is pointing out that the US is not an anarchy. We already know that, because we're taught in 9th-grade civics about the difference between freedom and license. Apparently these Germans were out sick the day that lesson was taught at their school. They expect that "freedom" in the US means the ability to do absolutely anything you want with impunity, which is ridiculous. |
It is not about succeeding in convincing Americans that the United States isn't free. It is about pointing out that the United States isn't the only free country in the world and that it, too, has restrictions that compromise true freedom. Of course there need to be laws so a country won't slip into complete anarchism. Also, I don't consider anarchism to be synonymous with freedom. The thought of freedom as in doing whatever you want is, of course, naive, but not only typical and unique of Germans. I'm not even sure if there is such a thing as true freedom, as even nature has laws, mathematics has laws, and the universe has laws. It really is more about bringing Americans back down to Earth whenever they flaunt their oh-so-free country. And they DO flaunt their "freedom".
| Jamie (K) wrote: |
| I think the people here who asked you what it feels like to be free must have been the same ones who (quite seriously) asked a Ghanaian student of mine if she wore clothes in her country. |
I was asked how long on average I had to wait in line to get a loaf of bread. If I've ever been in an elevator before. If I was able to use swear words in the street. If Germans put up Christmas trees on Christmas. Hello? The tradition of the Christmas tree IS German!
As awkward and hurtful as these questions were, in hindsight I realize that I shouldn't have taken offense. They were questions, after all, which is a sign of showing interest and wanting to know more about my culture. I shouldn't have gotten defensive about them, but rather shown photographs and talked more about my heritage, and introduced them to my homeland that way. This is what I regret. But now, it is what I admire most about many Americans: they ask. They do not claim to know everything about anything.
| Jamie (K) wrote: |
| Most states actually did lower the drinking age to 18 around 1970, but the huge increase in drunk driving fatalities convinced them to raise it again. |
I don't think we can compare the 1970s with 2011. Back then, Flower Power was in "full bloom", the sense of rebellion in youths was much greater, and the need to expand one's mind with the help of drugs (including alcohol) was rampant. Also, education on health and environment was close to zero. It was a different kind of mentality. Awareness and education has improved since then. There is a different kind of sense of responsibility. Not that I'd want to change America's legal age for drinking; I think it's fine. Every country can handle this matter as it sees fit.
| Jamie (K) wrote: |
| And I won't even get into foreigners' ideas of what the US is like or what they think we do in the world. I know that Germans typically think that the entire US is California, that approximately 50% of the population is black, and that our banks will give you a rifle as a gift for opening an account (thank you, Michael Moore). The Spanish think we lie around on nude beaches. To see the distorted conception foreigners have of American life and behavior, you just need to watch what they do when they think they're imitating us. |
I concur with Torsten. Most Germans identify Americans with Texans. Just as Americans identify Germans with Bavarians. Germans don't think America is 50% Black. No, they think that Blacks are a minority who is still struggling for equal rights and in some areas still kept as slaves. They think that every American carries a gun at their hip. That the death sentence is legal in all of the states. And that all Americans eat are hamburgers. I hear you when you know go "Ooph". :-)
But I don't think it is only the uneducated German who harvests these misconceptions. I encounter them in all kinds of social classes. I knew an engineer who had a totally warped picture of the US. We've had the longest, most passionate conversations about America, and no matter what I said, he refused to believe me. I lost touch with him before he went to the US with his boss on business. I met him again by chance about a year later. He said, "You know, you are right. It was completely different from what I thought. And the people there are fantastic. I had such a great time!"
That's the thing: almost every German who visited America says he had a great time. Here are even so-called "America-fans" (lovers of America). They go there on vacation every year because they enjoy the country so much.
There are also a lot of Americans who are German-fans. They studied in Heidelberg or who knows where, or were stationed somewhere in Germany. When they hear that I am from Germany, they beam with joy and say "I had such a great time!"
In my opinion, it isn't school education that makes the difference, but setting one's foot in the other country.
And even then it takes time to fully comprehend and understand that the misconceptions are just that: misconceptions.
Claudia
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 Cgk
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| #18 (permalink) Thu Nov 24, 2011 21:29 pm The French government must have lost its mind... |
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| Torsten wrote: |
This is so ridiculous, it isn't even funny! I suggest we remove countries who have medieval governments like France from the EU. I had to re-read this article several times until I came to understand that this was not an April Fool's joke:
In a controversial move the French government has said that it will enforce a law so that the words 'Facebook' and 'Twitter' will not be allowed to be spoken on the television or on the radio.
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| Torsten wrote: |
Crazy French. Downright scary...
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I don't understand why you are so terribly shocked about this, Torsten! Being glued to the computer screen all day long is not such a good thing after all! ;-)
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Cristina.ro
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| #19 (permalink) Fri Nov 25, 2011 0:03 am The French government must have lost its mind... |
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| Jamie (K) wrote: |
| Beyond that, we get blamed for a lot of things we don't even do, because dictators and others in some countries use us as a scapegoat for preposterous things, much as past generations blamed "The Jews". A Greek or Swiss Internet service provider that hasn't invested in enough technology to handle its peak traffic times will tell customers they're being bumped off line because "the Americans" are all online during those hours. People in North Africa are told by their potentates that their unemployment is caused by the US, and not by all the corruption and poor law enforcement that drains their economy. Nigerian Muslims are told by imams that the polio vaccine was developed by the US to make black men sterile. There's more fantasy than fact abroad about what the US is and does. |
There is propaganda everywhere around the globe. The media is known for warping information to achieve a certain sentiment among their viewers. Also, even though reporters and journalists are supposed to be neutral and objective, they are human and their stories will always reflect their feelings. Some countries propagate misinformation more than others, and dictatorships are the worst of these, but its being done everywhere. The media may not lie to you straight out, but it leaves out important tidbits of info, so the whole thing comes across differently than it actually is. They need headlines to meet their quotes, which is another reason why they dramatize rather than inform.
| Jamie (K) wrote: |
| The reason there are no German towns in American cities now is not merely that Germans integrate here, but that life is pretty good in Germany, so we don't get consecutive waves and waves of German immigrants. The Italian town and the Irish town, or in my city, Greek town, largely consist of ethnic restaurants and bars, but the Italians, Irish and Greeks who own them are scattered out in the suburbs with everybody else. The people in the China towns aren't the same ones who lived there 20 years ago, because those people moved out to the suburbs and sold their places to newly arrived people. It's the same with the Mexican towns. And everybody intermarries. I know this, because in my neighborhood the kids with the Arabic, Greek and Asian names familiar to me from childhood do not look even remotely Arabic, Greek or Chinese a generation later. A white family owns the Chinese restaurant, but it has never changed hands. It's the same family that ran it when I was in high school, but they don't look Chinese anymore. |
The last "wave" of European immigrants was in the 1920s. After that, the conditions in European countries improved enough for many to stay in their homeland. Around a quarter (or perhaps a bit less) of the American immigrants even went back to Europe. So, there were no consecutive waves and waves of immigrants after that.
Even if these "towns" are only restaurants and businesses, and the owners are living scattered in the suburbs, it is still nice to see that they are retaining their heritage. Germans generally integrate to such an extent, that their children, the second generation German-American, doesn't even speak German while immigrants of other nations continue to speak their own language at home while learning and speaking English outside.
Claudia
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Cgk
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| #20 (permalink) Fri Nov 25, 2011 2:24 am The French government must have lost its mind... |
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Speaking of the media leaving out tidbits of info, I was reading a French book on the US subprime crisis that crashed the world economy, and it fully blames it on the banks and completely leaves out the role of the US Congress and regulatory agencies that forced banks to lend to unqualified borrowers in the first place. It's trying to explain the situation while leaving out 50 percent of the information.
The last wave of European immigrants to the US didn't happen in the 1920s. It's happening now. This time they're coming from Albania, Ukraine, Poland and countries out that way. German families don't lose their language any faster than any other immigrants here. Generally the second generation from any nation can't speak the parents' language well, if at all.
As far as groups "preserving their heritage" after assimilating in the US, they don't actually preserve their heritage, but just what they imagine is their heritage. This is why it's embarrassing, for example, for an Irishman to go to an American Irish festival, or a Pole to go to an American Polish festival. The "heritage" on display is always a grotesque exaggeration of the old country's traditions mixed with strange things that the Americans of that heritage have simply made up from their imaginations. One crazy example is that Polish-Americans hold "polka masses" at their parishes. They're regular Catholic masses, but the music is polka music with religious lyrics. People who are really from Poland find these masses horrifying, because they don't think drunken pub music should be played at mass. We have a Czech and Slovak ethnic organization in my area, and they believe they're preserving those nations' traditions, but they don't know anything about them. Last year I told some people there how St. Nicholas Day is celebrated in the Czech Republic, and the president of the club got angry at me because he thought what I described was horrible, and he didn't believe me. |
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Jamie (K)
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| #21 (permalink) Fri Nov 25, 2011 3:21 am The French government must have lost its mind... |
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| Jamie (K) wrote: |
| Speaking of the media leaving out tidbits of info, I was reading a French book on the US subprime crisis that crashed the world economy, and it fully blames it on the banks and completely leaves out the role of the US Congress and regulatory agencies that forced banks to lend to unqualified borrowers in the first place. It's trying to explain the situation while leaving out 50 percent of the information. |
There you go. As sad as it is, but that's how it's done everywhere.
| Jamie (K) wrote: |
| The last wave of European immigrants to the US didn't happen in the 1920s. It's happening now. This time they're coming from Albania, Ukraine, Poland and countries out that way. German families don't lose their language any faster than any other immigrants here. Generally the second generation from any nation can't speak the parents' language well, if at all. |
So, then you can look forward to Albanian towns, Ukrainian towns and Polish towns. I've made a different experience from what you are describing. While I heard many a mother speak her tongue with her children, it was never a German one. Whenever I met a fellow German immigrant, she always said (with an embarrassed smile) that her children don't speak German, except for a few words.
| Jamie (K) wrote: |
| As far as groups "preserving their heritage" after assimilating in the US, they don't actually preserve their heritage, but just what they imagine is their heritage. This is why it's embarrassing, for example, for an Irishman to go to an American Irish festival, or a Pole to go to an American Polish festival. The "heritage" on display is always a grotesque exaggeration of the old country's traditions mixed with strange things that the Americans of that heritage have simply made up from their imaginations. One crazy example is that Polish-Americans hold "polka masses" at their parishes. They're regular Catholic masses, but the music is polka music with religious lyrics. People who are really from Poland find these masses horrifying, because they don't think drunken pub music should be played at mass. We have a Czech and Slovak ethnic organization in my area, and they believe they're preserving those nations' traditions, but they don't know anything about them. Last year I told some people there how St. Nicholas Day is celebrated in the Czech Republic, and the president of the club got angry at me because he thought what I described was horrible, and he didn't believe me. |
What I meant with "preserving their heritage" was that you can find things and foods from home in those "towns" and neighborhoods. At a German delicatessen store, I was able to buy imported goods from Germany that I couldn't find at my local grocery store. But there is no big cluster of German stores and restaurants as there is of other nations in any American city I've ever been to.
As you said yourself, the people who are preserving their heritage as they imagine it are those who have been in the USA for many generations already. That has nothing to do with the "towns", though.
Speaking of grotesque exaggeration: I would like to tell you about an incident, which was rather typical, by the way. Americans very dear to me constantly boasted of being Italians. Their great great great grandparents were from Italy. Once I dared to tell them in my "German arrogance" that they are Americans. They've never been to Italy, they don't speak Italian, and they have no knowledge of Italian culture other than from watching "Godfather". I spared them the "Godfather" part, but they got upset nonetheless. ;-)
We're still real good friends.
Claudia
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Cgk
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| #22 (permalink) Fri Nov 25, 2011 8:54 am The French government must have lost its mind... |
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These people who have never seen their ancestors' home country, can't speak the language, and have only a quarter of that nation's blood in them, are particularly sensitive to being told they're not Italian, Irish, Polish, or whatever.
A few years ago I made a woman at the Czech and Slovak society angry because I said that the Czech Republic has the same percentage of idiots that any other country does. Gosh, she was furious! |
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Jamie (K)
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| #23 (permalink) Fri Nov 25, 2011 10:14 am The French government must have lost its mind... |
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| Jamie (K) wrote: |
These people who have never seen their ancestors' home country, can't speak the language, and have only a quarter of that nation's blood in them, are particularly sensitive to being told they're not Italian, Irish, Polish, or whatever.
A few years ago I made a woman at the Czech and Slovak society angry because I said that the Czech Republic has the same percentage of idiots that any other country does. Gosh, she was furious! |
:-)
Sometimes I wonder if people even know what they are actually getting angry about.
Claudia
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Cgk
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