Americanism: 9 Things Americans Do That Piss Off Non-Americans

1. “If America Cared About This Sport, We’d Totally Dominate It”

It’s such a lazy and dismissive way to talk about sports that America doesn’t traditionally participate in. If Americans were able to dominate the sport, they would.

2. American-Sized Portions

The way Americans go abroad and say “Is that all we get? This is so small!” No, American portion sizes are too big.

3. All-Or-Nothing Politics

It’s either Republican or Democrat. If you’re anti-choice, then it’s automatically assumed you’re a gun nut. If you support government subsidized healthcare, it also means you want everybody to give all their earnings away to the poor. Why can’t there be a middle-ground?

4. Taking Credit For Winning The War

You guys joined World War Two a year before the end and take the credit for everything. By taking all the credit for winning the war, you’re ignoring all the hard work all the other countries put in over the previous five years.

5. Guns

The United Kingdom has had ONE school shooting in its history. Dunblane, 1996. After this, private gun ownership was banned. Since then, the U.K has had one mass shooting. Do you know how many the United States have had since 1996? 52.

6. Greatest Country In The World

This is a phrase that has been repeated over the years, and I just can’t get my brain around it. What makes the United States of America the greatest country in the world? Was there a “Greatest Country In The World” competition that I missed? How do you even measure whether a country is the greatest in the world?

7. Saying ‘In America You Can’t Do That’ When You’re Abroad

Well thank God we’re not in America then!

8. Chanting ‘USA USA USA!’

It’s genuinely the most bizarre thing. Not necessarily because it’s weird to spontaneously chant your country’s name, but it’s the random timing of it all. This chanting can suddenly start up at a sports event, in a bar or after an American movie has finished showing in a cinema.

9. Categorizing All Other Areas As ‘Europe,’ ‘Africa,’ or ‘Asia’

How hard is it to learn the names of the countries you’re traveling to? Europe and Africa are huge places: at least be specific when recounting the stories of where you’ve been to.

 

Featured image by Kevin Dooley, available under a Creative Commonns 2.0 Attribution-Sharealike license.

After graduating from City University London with a degree in law, Craig is now a freelance blogger and writer. He works on his own blog that speaks on social and cultural millennial issues.