Service Dog wrote: ↑
Brive1987 wrote: ↑
America is a land of extremes. A land of BLM and this ⤵️
I hesitate to embrace advice flowing from such a fountainhead.
I see a video clip of the US Army academy's football team entering the field carrying American flags on the 20th Anniversary of 9/11.
I don't think it serves as a potent example of the point you are trying to make.
I think highly of you, Brive. You're always the first pitter who Parody Accountant asks-me about... "Does Brive still post? How's he doing?" I tell him you're fighting the good fight on nutrition & going-strong in-general.
But ever-since Australia's lockdown caught everyone's attention-- it seems like you'd rather whine about Americans & American-ism/ than let me agree with you.
It seems to me-- that a group of people could
~~Either: organize itself around "Democracy"-- elect leaders then defer to those leaders' decisons: swift & efficient.
~~Or: organize around Rights Of The Minority... blunting Majority Rule/ but preserving Individual Autonomy.
Australia leans toward the former culturally & politically, & the U.S. leans toward the latter. Australia's way has undeniable advantages... but also disadvantages. And the US emphasis is on avoiding those disadvantages (at the cost of losing the advantages.)
What part of that summary bothers you? Surely it's better than just namecalling you pussies, weak, cucks, bootlickers, etc.
I like the US way better.
But I don't think a monoculture of the US-way is a good fit... for people who'd rather live the Australia way.
So... enjoy your own house & don't worry about whether I like the color you painted it.
Thank you for your kind words. And pass my best onto PA.
To be honest, I’m not trying to win an argument here. And I’m not bagging America as a whole (though I think the concept and metaphor of 🇺🇸 is more powerful than its RL expression).
The USA is larger than life, endlessly interesting and the world would be less colourful without it. Further, the USA forms an intriguing chunk of the essential “West”. There’s the UK. There’s the flavours of Western continental Europe. There’s the civilised Commonwealth. And there’s the States. After that its “the rest” of the planet. IMHO.
And each of these Western cultures is (or was 😐) unique and wonderfully weird. Clearly I’m no fan of global and woke-liberal forces which reduce National character to an oxymoronic homogeneous rainbow mix.
No. Speaking in cultural generalisations, the French are passionately insane. The Italians are chaotic but good natured manics. The Scandinavians are coldly autistic but blonde, so they are forgiven. The British are resignedly repressed, Australians are convinced they are larrikin products of the ‘lucky country’, here defined without black irony.
And as with the expanding universe, our frame of reference is fixed, everyone else seems to be flying off in their own odd direction, away from our “normal” baseline.
The Americans,
in this context, appear bipolar, with a tendency to drift to the extremes. Their country exudes the unconscious arrogance of collective manifest destiny - "
a sense of mission to redeem the Old World by high example … generated by the potentialities of a new earth for building a new heaven". They wear their patriotic heart on their sleeves, they unironically run around with flags and view the rest of the world, when it’s noticed at all, as a mirror which confirms an essential national superiority. But they also paradoxically venerate the stoic individual. Everyone hopes they would be a “Shane” wielding their six shooter to enact necessary justice against the “big something” threatening the lone homesteader. They love their country but fear their government and institutions. Go figure. It’s wonderfully complex and enigmatic. It very un-Australian, but for the States – I wouldn’t have it any other way. Ie it has no resonance or impact outside your cultural context where it quite rightly reigns supreme.
But I believe Americans (in common with many of us) use this prism to judge / understand the rest of the world. And this is when there’s a risk of appearing ignorant / uneducated. It’s the lack of qualifiers, the apparent belief that an objective standard is applicable - and from this an understanding of other cultures can be gained, and worse yet, a judgement made.
I’ve always said that the States looks odd “by the standards of other countries”. Apparently such nuance is not always reciprocated. Not so much by yourself, but by others in the forum (Matt et al).
COVID could have been an interesting cultural teachable moment for us all. the virus has revealed different cultural responses which deserve considered appreciations. It has also highlighted blinkered thinking ingrained by national parochialism.
I’m disappointed my limited efforts to show the more complicated currents driving decision making here has merely resulted in a conclusion Australians are “pussies”, or ‘inmates and gaolers’. Simple ignorance is never pretty.
But if the starting premise is that the vaccine is a poison wielded as a club by ZOG-lite to enslave the population … then I guess nuance will always be elusive. It’s a heartbeat away from the thought processes that underpin past conspiracy theories. It also rejects the truism that in history incompetence/tactical opportunism always trumps cunning planning. And that in democratic politics nothing is done without an eye fixed on the next election.
But my complaint (such as it is) isn’t directed specifically at you, even if I might disagree with some of your explanations. You at least appear to be considering the differing frameworks in play.
Meanwhile, I’ve managed to maintain my low 24 BMI, I’ve kept my weight to the 68-69kg range (about a 25% drop), I also get my 14K steps in a day and continue to eat steak rejecting all vegetables. Oddly, I’ve enticed 1100 Twitter hanger-ons (to date) while I berate vegans and those who reject the obvious low-fat conspiracy enacted by Ancel Keys. 😉