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It’s a low hanging fruit, but I mean… The tree doesn’t have a lot of higher fruits, and they’re not as tasty anyway.
Sure we have plenty of high-hanging fruit:
- antiquated voting laws
- asymmetrical representation
- oligarchy via political funding
- military industrial complex
But we didn’t start a world war that killed millions of people, that we’re still digging up unexploded munitions from, and that gave us the ability to fix some of our governmental systems and implement social and societal change (at least for white European folks).
Yet, but you can still elect Trump again.
The first 3 I listed are why, yes. And it sucks that the Supreme Court and some dudes 250 years ago put us in this situation.
But school shootings, obesity, healthcare, and oil, though.
Source: Am American.
Same tbh
Don’t forget police murdering people and doing highway robbery.
And shit trains, and pointless poverty, and ridiculous town planning, and an absurd prison system, and shit voting and representation, and unlimited money in politics, and weak-sauce unions…
I prefer bringing up that in US “democracy” some votes count more than others. When trump won, more people voted for Clinton and for some reason yanks seem to be totally ok with this.
We are not ok with this, but changing the way it works is a herculean task. The people that it currently works for are very invested in keeping it that way.
But why is nobody even protesting it? Seems kind of a cornerstone of democracy, no? How could anything coming out of this system have any legitimacy?
Because it’s easier for people to pretend already being busy (focusing on and protesting nonsensical and completely irrelevant shit) vs actually focusing on the primary and relevant things that are actually impacting their lives.
This is the most honest reply so far.
The media has done a pretty good job convincing the vast majority of Americans that we are the pinnacle of democracy and any change to that is either fascism or communism. Wanting a better system is intentionally painted as un-American.
“The media” sounds like a convenient scapegoat. Who gives a fuck about how things are painted? Do you really just go “well, I guess I better waive my right to having my vote count equally, don’t want the neighbours to think I’m un-american” or is that just an excuse for lethargy? I don’t mean to antagonise you but I think you should ask yourself some tough questions once in a while.
You have a great points, though your scenario is a bit too simple.
It’s not that we’re so fat and lethargic that we can’t be bothered to get off the sofa long enough to effect meaningful change. It’s that “the media” is gargantuan and goes far beyond the synthesized news cycles and reports. The OG social media outlets like churches, work culture, family structure, regional Identities, and every other socialized structure you can think of manifests itself into these ideals that have been pummeled into our head since the first time we stood up in preschool and recited the pledge of allegiance.
Making it more complicated is that our real concerns like, paying our bills, feeding our families, getting Timmy to soccer practice, protecting our kids, being a good employee so we don’t lose our job, being a good dad, being a good son, keeping our relationships healthy, etc., etc. is condensed into an infantesimally small amount of time. When you finally get to stop you’ve only got the bandwidth for bullet points. It’s not laziness, it’s exhaustion. It’s not lack of self-reflection, it’s overclocking. We have an entire backbone population that’s absolutely exhausted and still feeling like failures because somehow the American dream is feeling like a greasy, over-hustled nightmare that we’re constantly struggling to live up to.
This cycle does lend itself to your headlines of gun violence, gladiator arena us v. them politics, and on, and on. The system with which we now live is a constant grinder that no longer leaves time for, nor praises individualism and ideas. It’s a finely tuned revenue machine built on an overhauled slavery model that instead praises corporatism, classism, ruling parties, and residual monthly income… with a smiley face of nationalistic exceptionalism posted on the packaging.
Apologies for being so long winded, but some sympathy for the devil might be in order. We’re largely not a bad people. Most of us are kind, optimistic, and try very hard to change the things we see out of place. The problem is we’re becoming more and more just white noise in the background. A sort of spectre of idealisms past.
You make it sound like you’re just a cog in a machine with no agency and I do believe that’s what it feels like (other countries are in late capitalism, too) but you’re not if enough of you band together. You’re not forced to watch your life pass before your eyes, you choose to play along with the machine’s game. Hell, you even got the guns to take what should be yours and you just use them to shoot at little paper targets.
I don’t think of you as fat and lazy or the devil. It’s just frustrating to see your potential go to waste like that.
I concur with all of your statements, to include the one concerning the realization of being a cog in the machine.
I have several errands to run, and would love to continue the discussion when I return, if you’re amenable, of course.
Great argument. Now instead of preaching to the choir, which is to say someone who already understands and agrees with you, why don’t you elevate your message to all 400 million of us? You know, really get to the ones who don’t understand they’re being manipulated?
No? You won’t do that? Don’t you care about our right to vote and this democracy? Maybe you feel like it’s just not your job. I don’t know, sounds like another way to say you’re just too lazy.
I don’t mean to antagonize you, but you’re the one insinuating that it just takes one person being unhappy about the system to change it. So you should ask yourself the same questions about why you can’t do it yourself. Even if you don’t live in the US, you have about the same resources as I do.
You took a comment that addressed noone in particular a bit personal and now pretend it was meant to start a revolution on a very niche corner of the internet. Not quite what I consider worth my time.
I don’t mean to antagonise you but I think you should ask yourself some tough questions once in a while.
You wouldn’t consider this addressing me in particular? Looks a little like you’re avoiding a response because you don’t have a good answer.
In any case, have fun preaching to people who live in a complex system about changes you don’t really understand. For what it’s worth, entertaining the naive notion of
well why don’t you just ask yourself some hard questions and it’ll all be better
Isn’t really worth my time either.
In America politicians choose their voters
Are those voters people with agency or just cattle? You realize your group is a lot bigger than the group that you watch exploiting you, right?
Isn’t that true for any representative democracy especially when gerrymandering is allowed? In Aus you can easily have a party win more than 50% of the vote but not get in because the votes were concentrated in vast-majority seats.
It absolutely isn’t. There is no inherent reason why votes can’t be added up and tallied in a straight forward way in a representative democracy.
It’s not inherent to representative democracy but let’s be honest most systems we use have flaws like that, including Europe.
(An exemple in Europe would be choosing only one individual to vote. Which divide voters of two close candidates and lower both of their score.)
And that’s probably why we feel like most representatives democracy can’t escape some of thoses problems.
Mathematically though there is some systems that have been proven to not have those same flaws.
Problem is, of course how hard it is to fix a system that can only be changed by the people that it favors.
No, that’s not an example of votes not counting equally…? Am I misunderstanding your example?
You don’t need some mathematical proof to just count all the votes and see which candidate got more votes. It’s how most elections throughout the world work.
In Europe, the countries i know of at least, count each vote equally.
What i meant was that it doesn’t mean it’s a perfect system if your goal is democracy.
Other factors can totally break the purpose of counting votes equally altogether and end up with a unsatisfying result. And my exemple is as such.
(I live in France, we have equally counted vote but with this issue, and some other neighboring countries have it too. If you’re interested i can explain more what the issue is…)
(I guess Australia, for the user you were replying to originally, have it’s own issues too, not that i’m familiar with them.)
Mathematicians worked on how different suffrage creates different results.
There are plenty like the majority judgement but one that i particularly like is Condorcet’s method to solve the problem.
It happens in Spain too. Huge difference in the number of votes needed in Barcelona to get a representative, compared to rural provinces.
Why Americans are suddenly so touchy about their school shootings, obesity and healthcare?
Accepting it is a low hanging fruit is the saddest thing I’ve read today. It’s so obvious our society is fucked! Don’t you have something more creative to say, dumbass?
7% of residential properties in the US are owned by a single corporation, America accounts for 20% of the world’s prison population. The average salary of a college football coach in the US is $3,500,000, almost 60 times the average salary of a school teacher. Americas upcoming election will be fought between a barely coherent octogenarian and a proto-fascist serial fraudster & con artist.
Okay okay you can stop now 😭😭 /j (while it is upsetting to me as an American, I also think it’s very important to talk about this stuff. carry on lol)
and a proto-fascist serial fraudster & con artist.
Also barely coherent. But in a different, funnier way
Imagine justifiably criticising a bad trait that someone has in the hopes of having them improve
Most people are going to take that as a threat because they hold that trait deer to them and / or view it as a part of a themselves
americans are likely viewing the criticism as a threat to themselves and their country and are responding with emotionally fueled responses instead of logic based responses
americans should learn to meditate because it can help with the issue of wanting to respond to percived threats emotionally
You’re speaking pretty large for an American for not being a school shooter yourself
But as an American who meditates, that is not the answer lol.
We have a bigger issue with the media trying to make us feel like everything outside is scary first. A lot of fear mongering to keep the scared gun owners to buy and advocate for more until a mentally deranged one goes too far and ruins it for everyone else. The media can now sensationalize that shooting and you get either people buying more guns or people advocating for no guns and neither side wants to hear each other anymore. It’s one big crazy chain reaction loop we’re stuck in and the politicians got the crazies advocating for things that would just make the politicians more money. Sigh.
Yes saying we can do something about it and do better is stupid. Same here in Europe btw, no one has the power to do anything about media and capitalism fucking us over.
However i still think we can joke about it as a way to communicate our problems and relieve ourselves from the tragic.
(Of course that requires some empathy and a shared humour to overcome our cultural differences.)
Cause they just realized that they do have a problem, its not normal and they internally feel like there is nothing to do to change it.
It’s the Anger stage
Sadly only the tiny part actually interacting with foreigners online realize this and even they react with anger.
Because – and this might be a hot take – I don’t think it should be socially acceptable to bring up a recent national tragedy as a fucking punchline
We’ve been voting. We’re trying to get the rules changed and we’re getting stonewalled by people who only listen to media that makes up reasons for them to hate things that would be good for the masses because it would be bad for a few people at the top and I’m sick to fucking death of people making fun of us for it and treating actual dying children as some sort of own. For Christ’s sake, have some fucking empathy. None of us, not even the furthest-right conservatives, think this is okay, and we’re trying to do something about it, and it doesn’t help when you’re like “haha look at all the dead children, isn’t it funny how stupid Americans are”
None of us, not even the furthest-right conservatives, think this is okay
Aguably, conservatives may not think it’s ok but they’re so scared of losing their guns (because their politicians say dems will take them so they can get elected) that conservatives consider dead kids an acceptable loss. If they didn’t, more of them would vote for the party that wants to control who can obtain them.
Or, arguably even more importantly, conservatives argue that this is actually about ‘mental health issues’ but then subsequently refuse to do anything to improve mental health. So they don’t even bother trying their own proposed solution.
You would think at this point that the US would have the most robust mental-healthcare system on the planet!
I wish I could say people were trying to stop school shootings in my area. I live in PERRY FUCKING IOWA, about a mile from the very school that was shot up, and all I fucking see from anyone around here is thoughts and prayers, wear a blue shirt, Perry Strong!!
It’s embarrassing.
I do agree that we need more empathy. But that empathy can and should be used to have a better humour.
Because i can’t stress enough how humour is important in dealing with tragedy. It’s one of the greatest tool to overcome it.
That’s why you also see American joking about it. Only their jokes might be funnier than European’s because they know and emphasize better with the tragedy.
On the other hand, one thing we do share is trying to change without any or not enough results. That’s something most countries know about in this day and age. Media and corrupt system is something European’s deals with too.
So i get your anger, it’s also good, it’s a driving force for us to continue trying to change, however helpless we feel.
Americans: USA is the greatest country in the world. Behold our God given rights and freedoms! We’re number 1! We’re exceptional! U! S! A! U! S! A!
Europeans: Actually it’s pretty arrogant to think your country is so much better than all the other. All countries have flaws and strengths. For example USA have problems with gun violence and healthcare.
Americans: How dare you make fun of our national tragedies! Can’t you see we’re suffering here? You’re making fun of dead children! You MONSTERS!!
Not that’s a meme. Which template should I use?
Americans: USA is the greatest country in the world. Behold our God given rights and freedoms! We’re number 1! We’re exceptional! U! S! A! U! S! A!
that’s a nice strawman you’ve got there
“I have a Wikipedia article about people who do this. I therefore conclude that all Americans do this.”
Oh, I see where you got confused. When people say ‘Americans do something’ they mean ‘most Americans do it’ or ‘significant portion of American population do it’, not ‘all Americans do it’. You see, countries are big and there are a lot of people in them and it very rare for everyone in a country to think exactly the same. That’s why we usually focus on the prevailing attitudes that shape the country over the years instead of looking for believes shared by ALL citizens (because they don’t exists). Currently over 40% of Americans believe that “God has granted America a special role in human history” and it was way higher in the not so distant past, that’s why someone could say that “Americans believe it”. Hope this helps.
No American I’ve ever met, online or off, believes this. Hope this helps.
Idk wtf is wrong with all of my countrymen, those are three things we NEED to change.
It’s so fucking funny to me because they’re probably the same type of Americans that are like “oH aMeRiCa iS sO tOuGh nOt lIkE tHoSe SiSsY cOuNtRiEs iN tHe EU” but here they are all butt hurt when other countries make VERY VALID CRITICISMS about us
Imagine every time you see a person, he tells you you stink; but every time, also mildly suggests you take a shower.
What can you possibly do to make him happy?…………….
Well ya, it’s absolutely pathetic for Americans to strut around acting like they’re an authority on how society should operate when theirs is an absolute dumpster fire unless you’re making 500k/yr+.
Does it hurt when this is pointed out or something? If you’re tired of it, maybe stop trying to swing your tiny little dick around and people won’t have to constantly tell you to put it back in your pants.
Says the continent that can’t go more than a few generations without degenerating into authoritarian states and widespread war.
You mean like the US installed puppet regimes all over the world 24/7 since ww2? Or the constant wars you are involved in? Or do you just mean the civil war n? Or perhaps it’s easier to controll the land after the genocide perhaps? Really? USAian talking about authoritan States and widespread war… Not like Europe got a good track record but it’s kind of lacking on the imperialism front compared.
Not to mention the current degradation of American Freedoms™, and the constant abuse of the American Election System™ by certain actors.
The degradation of American freedoms and the abuse of our election system is definitely a both sides, where many things aren’t. Neither party wants to lose power by opening up ranked choice or modern election systems and both parties prefer the power of the state over the power of the people.
The US hasn’t had a domestic war since the civil war. How many wars has Europe had domestically since then? Hmmm.
US citizens are powerless to the machine that was built generations ago. We vote between corporate funded warhawks or more liberal corporate funded warhawks. Personally I like the idea of not helping Europe much in future wars, we have more than enough problems of our own. But as much as Europeans hate America for their military prowess, I hate us for it too because we’re all paying for it in human suffering.
We’re policing the world and neglecting our people and it isn’t sustainable. If you need to fight for freedom, start your own military dominance. But fuck war. Americans mostly just want to live peaceful lives but bring a land war here and it’ll get lit.
The US hasn’t had a domestic war since the civil war. How many wars has Europe had domestically since then? Hmmm.
The US is a country, Europe is not, so “domestic” is a misnomer and the comparison doesn’t hold up. The issues Europe had with wars are a result of complex regional and historical issues, those things don’t really exist in the US because it is too homogenous on one side and too much of a military might to challenge on the other, not to mention geographically isolated.
You really need to reach to make Europe look like the bad guy when it comes to wars, not in the least because the US takes other countries to war all the time to throw it’s weight around and establish dominance.
Don’t you feel that’s a bit rich coming from the country who started or been at the centre of most of the wars for the last 80?
Oh forgot to mention the utterly retarded arrogance of Americans. You don’t have a clue where I live, or whether I’m on the same continent as you.
When they stop being huge fucking problems, we’ll stop making fun of you for them :P
Americans when European leaders start making the same choices that got America to this point.
Happening in Canada too. For the last decade, virtually every province has been led by Conservative governments (except BC and that was just half a decade ago). Healthcare and housing has been slowly falling apart.
Looking at the polls, what’s amazing is that most Canadian voters seem to think the problem is insufficient conservatism!
It’s the worst thing about being an American expatriate is watching shit happen again.
It’s bewildering to me that, after decades of getting (deservedly) dunked on by Europeans for our shitty systems, not only are American leaders still giving the whole flaming garbage heap the five finger salute, but European leaders are now saying “well, yes, the American system is awful, but we swear it’ll work for us.” And people are believing them. Unreal. I can’t even imagine the frustration you must feel.
We’ve talked about moving to Denmark or NL, but we’re just not there yet, and with NL getting their own dollar store (there’s a Dutch joke in there somewhere) Trump, I’m not so sure if we ever will be.
It’s the result of a thousand minor decisions that seem like a good tradeoff at the time all added together
What’s the difference between an expat and an immigrant?
Often enough little more than conceit, but you technically can’t immigrate to a place you’re already a citizen in. Brought my immigrant family with me though, so I’m happy enough to be called an immigrant along with them.
Expats are white.
don’t forget the lack of the metric system!
Which ruined looking for recipes online and using Google search operators to filter put american recipes is irritating because you have to fine tune and repeat based on the google results until all american recipes are filtered out
My tip is to search for it in another language.
I only know English and am currently learning japanese but I can only form & read simple scentences in japanese and haven’t learned how to do complex ones yet
And what if I don’t know a language other than X and English?
Let your browser translate the webpage for you. Or maybe you have luck with YouTube auto captions.
More than than it’s worth.
I did it. It’s troublesome.
That one is fun because you concede most of it but then win an argument that fahrenheit is better (Celsius and fahrenheit are both arbitrary but at least fahrenheit scales itself so the range most people use daily, weather, is 0-100)
while you’re correct they’re both arbitrary scales and I’ve heard this argument before but still think it’s a dumb argument.
Water freezes 0 water boils 100, i guess it fits the base 10 thing.
I think you feel the human 0 to 100 idea works because it’s what you’re used to. 0 to 40 works fine for me to intuitively know how hot or cold it is becuase it’s what i grew up with too. Neither can be argued that one is more right.
although it really makes sense for the USA to just finally switch because it’s long been decided by the rest of the planet this is the better way to measure things. https://media.tenor.com/SD-5sdtUX8QAAAAM/simpsons-homer.gif
Yes I know that water does certain things at the “nice” numbers in Celsius. Who cares though? What’s so special about water? I’m not boiling water that often, and in my life I’ve never checked the temperature of water when doing so or have had to care about specific numbers then. Of all substances why does water get to be the one we base everything around?
i guess it’s just one of those cool science observations water freezes (and technically melts) at 0 and boils at 100 (at sea level). it fits the base 10 and we just think it’s neat.
i mean probs we should be using degrees Kelvin if we want to be less arbitrary. I’m down for the switch.
0 is very cold, 100 is very hot. So 50 is perfect room temperature, right?
Nope, you still have to adjust to an arbitary selection of numbers within that range, so it’s not really any more helpful than celcius if you don’t have experience with the scale.
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That is not what I mean. I mean in daily life, most temperatures will fall in that range. That does not mean every day you see them all.
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Not at all. I have lived in two different time zones where I’m dealing with subzero Celsius temperatures for several months of the year.
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I think he’s missing the important part of that 0-100 scale… It marks fairly decently what isn’t safe for people without proper precautions. I’ve gone out below freezing and while it isn’t pleasant by any mean, you aren’t super fucked until you get super low. Likewise, get above 100 and it quickly stops becoming safe for humans without frequent breaks and such
Wrong.
A middle eastern dude would tell you a 100 is fine and a northern canadian will probably tell you to stop bothering them because they are turning into a puddle.
It’s low hanging because it’s overweight.
Americans when they don’t shut the fuck up about their politics and everyone starts mocking them(we don’t mock them enough)
Not "America’, USA only 😄
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we do a little racism
In England the lawyers still wear wigs. You’re welcome, Lemmy. It’s just as fucking stupid as you picture in your mind.
The Civil Rights era is so entrenched in American History, I can’t imagine a Black person being forced (by society) to wear one. And yet that’s the header image from this article.
Americans are so soft. You throw shade at the Europeans by making fun of their food or wine or streets or whatever. They take a shot back and you guys whine.
Take a shot back instead of flipping the table.
You say that as if Americans aren’t prepared to take your invitation literally
I wheezed
As an American I don’t know what you’re talking about, aside from the UK most of Europe has amazing food, and the wine there is so much better and cheaper
And the streets are better too?? IDK what OP is on. Like everyone talks about how European streets are more walkable, bikable and whatnot
Fight me and my bad dentistry you overweight, stetson wearing, language butchering, gun touting redneck.
The UK has a Michelin star restaurant for every 360k people, the US has one for every 1.5million people.
It’s probably better to look at the distribution of Michelin stars in major city centers since you guys are only about 20% the size of our population (edit: and about 25% of our land area).
For instance:
Population of London = 8.982 million Amount of Michelin stars in London = 71 Amount of people per star = 126,507
Population of New York City = 8.468 million Amount of Michelin stars in NYC = 72 Amount of people per star = 117,611
I believe this meme qualifies as taking a shot back
Americans: “Your accent is funny and your food is bland.”
Europeans: “Well at least children aren’t dying in our schools. At least we don’t see street memorials on television every other week. Haha, owned.”
Americans: “…”
Europeans: “See it’s funny because people are dying and voters are powerless to stop it”
Americans: “What the hell man”
Europeans: “Wow, you guys should seriously get some thicker skin”You are not powerless to stop it. Who is telling you this and why do you believe it? Your group is much, much bigger than the one who fucks everything up. Go out and show them! Nobody is telling you to get thicker skin, they’re telling you to get off your ass and get angry about it.
Nobody apart from the guy I’m replying to, of course.
And everyone who downvoted my comment.
And for the record we’ve been voting. We’ve been protesting. We’ve been trying to get the rules changed and we’re getting stonewalled by the 50% of the population who only listen to media that makes up reasons for them to hate things that would be good for the masses because it would be bad for a few people at the top and I’m sick to fucking death of people making fun of us for not trying hard enough and treating actual dying children as some sort of own.
You can’t even prove that’s true about a majority of Americans yet you talk about it like it’s fact
Also I like how you equate memes on bad food/wine/infrastructure to the memes of school shootings and mass death. Totally tit for tat right?
I see two memes right next to each other of Americans crying about being meme’d on… This is why you guys are so fun to bully.
