I've visited America a bunch of times and I really like it as a place, they have amazing scenery pretty much everywhere you look, and just about every individual American I've met has been really nice.
BUT...
I'd never want to live there. Their healthcare system is insane (sorry Americans but it is) and politically as a nation they're pretty bonkers. Guns, religion, general sort of global belligerence etc.
Also as an aside, San Francisco is genuinely one of the strangest places I've ever been to. I dunno if I was just there at a weird time, but it seemed like every single person there was either a millionaire or homeless. Absolutely nothing in between.
Oh nobody likes the healthcare system except the people profiting from it and the people who think billionaires will love them and share if they sing their praises enough.
Work takes me to Houston from time to time, and I wholeheartedly agree. I would never want to live there.
It seems that whenever you find something likeable about the place, it turns out to be a product of a predatory system.
I seriously hope the workers at T.J. Birria Y Mas down in Missouri City are well paid and cared for (I doubt it), because they're doing an awesome job and it's hard not to love that place.
Yes. As a black man, America has produced a long very involved legacy of which I'm proud being my heritage.
Sure, it was absolutely founded on treating people like as sub-human, and there are people today that are trying to return me to that state, but fuck them as they've been fucked for the last century and a half. I'll be damned if I let them represent America.
I'm genuinely glad we live in a country that recognizes the horrors of its past. Even with all of the "whitewashing" that occurs in textbooks in parts of the country, like "states' rights" in the Civil War and praising Columbus, there's still an overwhelming consensus that minorities were wronged for our entire history.
I love America. I'm rather less fond of some of the people in it. The land is beautiful and varied. There is so much space here. And the constitution is really special, I think, though not perfect. The biggest flaw is people haven't been taking politics seriously and have elected unserious people.
I swore to defend it many years ago. At the time I was a kid just paying lip service to a required oath, swearing to a god I never believed in, but the truth is I do love it and I would fight for it, warts and all.
people haven’t been taking politics seriously and have elected unserious people.
This is the inherent flaw. We have a representative government that never intended "people" to take politics seriously. Politics was for the landowners.
It depends on what you mean. America the government courting christofascism? Hell fucking no. I wish all the Republicans and neolibs in power would have a heart attack. I also wish to live long enough to read Trump's and Alito's obituaries. But I do love my local community too much to just abandon them. At best, I would call my relationship with America akin to Stockholm Syndrome.
Yes, I don't think many people realize how good we have it here. I say this having traveled to places and seen some shit (war in Iraq, gang violence in El Salvador, abject poverty in Palestinian refugee camps in Jordan).
Can the U.S. be better? Of course it can. There are horrible things happening here and people are losing their rights at a scary rate. However, these horrible things are not on the same level of horror as that which is occurring/has been occurring in other countries, it's apples to oranges.
Anytime I've been overseas and I come back to America I realize how much I love it here. We have it so good here, really. But as someone else stated, there is huge inequality that needs to be addressed in order for EVERYONE here to have it so good.
Thats the catch 22 of America, its "good" except when its not, and like 60% of Americans are one missed paycheck away from it being "not" - And once you're there this country hates you and does everything it can to make sure you stay fucked.
See: SCOTUS ruling the other day that you can't illegalize homelessness but you CAN illegalize homeless behaviors like sleeping outside or in a tent.
(Because since pot is increasingly legal we have to bolster those legal slavery numbers somehow!)
America, americans, or american politicians? I've got different opinions. The common american may be misguided or misinformed, but they're not hateful. America itself, has done incredible damage to the world, all while claiming they're all for liberty and freedom after being dragged into the most clear-cut good vs. bad war almost a hundred years ago. Ever since, it's has been dragged kicking and screaming towards progress, and fighting very hard to go back to the stone age. American politicians are nearly all wastes of skin.
I’m European and I have mixed feelings about the US.
There are some great sceneries, nice peoples and my accent does wonders there. I like its smaller towns and countryside.
But at the same I hate its cities. You can see the most widen gap between poverty and absurdly rich peoples in the same street. You can have a wonderful avenue and once in the back alley it looks like third world. I’ve never seen that many weird people than in the us. There’s too much violence and capitalism.
And don’t get me on the fucking tipping culture.
I would feel better about america, as a non american, if the country on the whole would accept they aren’t the only country in the world, and didn’t continuously consider themselves the greatest. Actually acknowledge their history and the atrocities committed to get it to where it is today.
America sucks. The government and the "America" it upholds is an institution of evil, a factory for global war and oppression all while insultingly calling itself "land of the free", and anyone who latches onto its historical "achievements" probably sucks too.
The world isn't black and white. I agree with some of the reasons I like the USA in the comments over here - like subculture, universities, research institutes, etc, but I want to discuss about what I don't like.
As a South Asian, I feel grateful that we have governance over our own land by our own people. I can't help but pity and empathize with the aboriginal folks and native Americans, whose right over their own sacred lands were snatched, their lakes polluted, and mountains defiled, their tradition destroyed, and them being treated like third-class citizens in their own land. Long ago, they were nomads, but today, based on what side of the border they ended up in, they're either natives or illegal immigrants.
I hate the tone-deaf white defaultism, I hate it's genocidal campaign and foreign interference, and worst of all, I hate how it still enables exploitation and wage-theft.
And what I hate even more is shoving down everyone's throat like a clockwork about how groups opposing them were bad. Obviously, for example, the Nazis were bad, no doubt about it, but addressing so in a way so as to ignore your own terrible past absolves the crimes of the collective West, which is quite convenient for the imperialist empire.
Now, let me break it down - the amount of crimes under the Old Glory or the Union Jack exceeds far more than that under the Nazi flag. But someone decided that the Old Glory or the Union Jack aren't hate symbols, but singled out on the Nazi flag. Being a PoC in America must suck so much, imagine having to see that disgusting hate symbol that enslaved your ancestors, bombed houses and dropped chemical agents on farms.
As a non American who used to live there, I can say some things are amazing and some things are awful.
I love the nature. The national parks are so beautiful. I like many of the people. And there are good job options there in tech.
But the awful things were a deal-breaker for me, and why I'd never want to live there again. The wealth inequality, the guns, the crime, the homelessness, the healthcare system, the partisan politics, etc.
So ultimately I probably fall on the side of not liking it.
Meh. I’m an American and I don’t hate it here. But I’m from (and moved back to) a culturally distinct place (New Orleans) so I don’t really identify with the dominant culture. I loathe the politics/corruption and how our government is structured. (The amendments are the best part of our constitution and maybe we should think about that for a bit.) I’m deeply ashamed that we’re the world’s biggest arms dealer and oil/gas producer.
That being said, we have beautiful landscapes and individual American people are usually kind, decent people, at least on an interpersonal level. The corruption of companies and elected officials doesn’t usually extend to the middle class. (Like, you don’t have to bribe someone to get a driver’s license or permits or whatever.) There’s obviously loads of advantages to being an American citizen, just as there are to being an EU citizen. I love our national parks. Just the western half of the United States contains enough varied forms of amazing landscapes to keep a person occupied for a lifetime.
So, I wouldn’t say I like America as a political entity. It’s definitely in my top 30 or so countries to live. I wouldn’t give up my citizenship for a random place but, having travelled extensively, there’s a lot of countries that have a better form of government and a healthier balance between oligarchs and labor.
I fucking hate this dystopian hellscape of misery and torment and I hope it gets glassed. Land of the fee, home of the slave. If I get drafted in WW3 I'm a turncoat as soon as they hand me a gun.
Not even a little. We are being forced into sickness and poverty. We make just enough to put food on the table and even that's getting harder. An unexpected illness is setting people back on their bills. Every law that's passed goes against what the people want and the only way this will ever change is if we can afford to pay off a politician like all the major companies do. Voting doesn't feel like it makes a difference anymore and the only platform it feels like they use is "at least I'm not them". I've said it before and I'll say it again if someone paid for us to leave the US I'd be packed within a couple of hours.
I have distant extended family in New Brunswick. It's not good enough to get me Canadian citizenship, but it could be worth a try when Civil War 2: Here We Go Again starts.
I've always thought of America as a teenager - we're sophomoric, rebellious, and self- centered. We don't have the history of most other countries. Our settlement and the beginnings of our government are really not long ago and most of us are just a few generations deep. I'm thankful for my life here and appreciate the struggles my family endured to make life better for the next generation.
Careful with the idea that you're a young country with limited history. Your indigenous peoples may view the matter (rightfully) quite differently.
In Australia we actually changed the lyrics to our national anthem a few years back. It did say "...we are young and free". Which is a bit of a 'fuck you' to the people who have lived on and cared for the land for upwards of 50,000 years. So it's now "we are one and free".
I'm not chastising you, just prompting you to think about things differently.
Not sure I share that viewpoint for the US, the history of the indigenous is the story of the people, not the nation.
And the US has many more populations that have great history, from EU and Africa.
But the beginning of its history is founded on the gathering and interaction of all those different cultures.
So for me saying the country is young doesn't quite have the same connotations of erasure from colonialist, it mostly makes me think of how current the melting pot of all those different cultures are.
I still agree we shouldn't diminish the importance of indigenous people in it.
Arguably, many people groups indigenous to what is now the US (and often times into Canada and Mexico as well) were each their own countries and sometimes joined into confederacies (for example the Iroquois Confederacy and some others). I do think indigenous voices frequently get lost (and that does need fixing), but I don't know if there's value in representing them as a single unit as though they were a single nation before. Many groups came over at different times, migrated around, etc. They're not even all in the same macro language families (and may have come from separate peopling events, but that's a whole other can of worms).
You're past your teenage years; Australia and New Zealand are younger. America is more like someone in their 20s fucking up their life with party drugs. You might make it, you might not. Either way it seems right now you need a hard reset.
I don’t dislike America. I was a teenager in the ‘90s, when the culture was peaking in influence here in the UK, so I have great nostalgia for American things (which really helps when playing the daily NYT games). I’ve visited a few times, and always enjoyed my time there.
But I am real fucking tired of the American influence on the internet, on politics, and on attitudes around the world.
I’m tired of the American view being the default on social media, because the majority of social media sites are American, populated by Americans.
I’m tired of saying something that would completely uncontroversial outside the US that attracts a rash of people bitching at you because it’s not normal over there. Like letting our cats outside. I once said something on Reddit about my cat getting killed by a car, and got a bunch of replies from people telling me how irresponsible I am for letting her go outside.
I don’t use TikTok, but my wife does, and part of her kinda wants the US ban to go ahead, so that her feed is a bit more balanced towards Europe. And I get that.
:edit: I accept that this isn’t the fault of individual Americans, and hold no ill-will towards them. It’s down to the vast majority of global tech wealth being held in the US, giving the illusion that the whole internet is an American thing.
I also accept that this is rank hypocrisy coming from a Brit. If we’d had the internet 250 years ago, the whole world would be speaking English now, as opposed to most of it.
The country was founded in large part as a nation for those escaping oppression and persecution for their beliefs. It was designed to provide everyone certain freedoms the founders claimed to be inalienable.
While this is still an immensely powerful idea, it can not function without guidelines and government involvement.
Two hundred fifty years ago, it made sense for sparsely populated states to operate mostly independent of the federal government. In time, land became more dense and borders dividing populations and cultures and commerce blurred. Now, the entire world is instantly connected.
Somehow, generation after generation, it was not self-evident that all people should be treated equally. The police force and prison system still largely resemble what they were initially intended to do - serve the wealthy and enslave people for profit.
The United States affords everyone the same freedoms and opportunities by way of doing nothing at all. Everyone has the opportunity to work hard and make a fair living for themselves. But some people win the genetic lottery and inherit extra opportunities and extra freedoms.
We all have the freedom to be complete idiots and that's considered a win.
Our constitution needs to be re-written. In my opinion, it needs to be explicit about what all the citizens of the United States should be afforded: education, health care, clean air and water, shelter, the right to not be lied to by the people who draft and pass legislation impacting our lives, the right to a source of information that's not subject to special interests.
No. I can't say I like it. I don't like how our government is intent on making our lives worse by their inaction. They take more and more of our money while we get less and less in benefits.
We have no leadership. We have influencers and celebrities. Some people complain about globalism because they know we can't compete on a global scale. People are prejudice of foreigners who take their jobs because they're complacent with doing as little as possible. Our most successful form of entertainment is ragebait. Who's helping us progress as a country? Who's helping to make us smarter and healthier and happier? Who exactly is promoting general welfare and domestic tranquility?
It's the land of the me and home of maybe. And our constitution supports your freedom to be this way. Some people love that and claim the freedom to do nothing is what makes America great.
A great America, to me, is one built for everyone to prosper, that promotes self-worth and civil respect, that strictly enforces the idea that my freedoms can not be infringed upon by you freedoms or beliefs. A great America is one that doesn't have elections where you have to vote for the person you dislike the least. Politics should be positively engaging. We should give a damn about our leaders and they should have to deal with consequences of their actions, like anyone else.
Though it's not perfect, the one thing I really love about America is our immigration policy. It's the best place on the planet for people to escape for a better life. Our country is built by and thrives because of immigrants. It's the one thing that has held true for hundreds of years. How we treat immigrants is a sin. How our government fails to properly fund our immigration system is appalling. I believe most people are in support of legal immigration yet they fail to support proper funding of our immigration department. It wreaks of racism and bigotry.
America is, by design, the land of the self-righteous. The only people in favor of that are the self-righteous.
If you say “I’m going to America” pretty much everyone on the planet knows you mean “I’m going to the United States of America”. No one cares if someone uses the short hand of “I’m going to America”.
I hate it despite realizing what a good life I have because I was born here with a lucky set of circumstances (cis white male). But I love parts of it, like the Bay Area and Oakland and all the surrounding hiking spots. If we didn’t share it with lunatics I’d feel a lot better about it from a policy perspective.
Non-American here. You all keep making up the vilest "jokes" about French people. The sheer level of ignorance and disrespect deserves nothing but contempt and derision. And that's what you'll get from me and most of Europe.
America is addicted to money however, and has a warped idea that working hard is somehow what life is about. But it's still not close to fascism and there is some accountability still.
America is the center of the world, hate all you want. This is the cutting edge today. Hollywood is the dominant music/media power. Silicon valley is the dominant technology power. NY is the dominant financial hub. The hippie cultural revolution was largely here, and the civil rights revolutions that inform modern morals. America spends more on military than the rest of the world combined, and therefore has massive influence
So that's my context for being here. I was born pretty far away in Europe, which is great in its own ways. But if you really want to play the game at the highest level, America is the place to do it. Everyone else is just trying to catch up. Or they are enjoying a happy low stress life of wine and women with a high standard of living and low inequality — which are definitely unamerican ideals XD