Anti-Americanism

It should be pointed out that these experiences date from the early 1970s, and as such are largely inadmissable as evidence of current UK attitudes...

 

No more soccer hooligans huh?


Well, my one of my uncle's had a shop on Carnaby street, so that was probably it . The other shop was in the Bullring in Birmingham..

But mostly we bought stuff at Marks & Sparks, like everyone else.

 

We still get a few football hooligans, but rarely, and never on the scale we used to.
Unless it is a match in Turkey

 

I was thinking about disavowing everything cheeky said , er, because that was the early eighties....

It should be pointed out that these experiences date from the early 1980s, and as such are largely inadmissable as evidence of current USA attitudes...

yeah dats da ticket...

Well Chelsea came here 2 weeks ago and played our 4+ time USA champs "DC United" and none of the local Brits rioted.

2-1 Chelsea

DC United has a $2.1 million dollar payroll vs $200 million for Chelsea..

Our star player, 17 year old Freddy Adoo, did a nice job, but lost.

We was gonna burn the British Embassy, but with all those flowers left over from 7/7 we decided not to.

Just misplaced respect for Man U. Bobby Mitchell I guess..

?lol

 

I find it very difficult to dislike most of the European countries. With the exception of a few. I'll get to that in a moment...)
The USA is a melting-pot of cultures and peoples. Most of us came from somewhere else to begin with... or at least our ancestors did. I have English, Scotch-Irish and German-bloodlines in my ancestry. My earliest-known ancestor in the family line was English-born.
I would prefer to think of it as friendly rivalry, though it's clear some of ya'll clearly have issues with us.
Theres one country I was taught to hate as a child. Those bloody Russians. Those paranoid SOB's will kill us all. (I'm sure glad the 1950s and 60's didn't see the end of the world as we know it, but the threat seemed real at the time.)
Children are taught to hate... and we were taught to hate the Russians. Apparently some Europeans were taught to hate all things American. Jacque Chirac can sit on a sharp stick.
Do you fellows feel better now? I do.

Tim

 

Occasionally I might get into it with americans about hockey.

 

y'a ll take that stuff fairly seriously... :bang: LOL

 

Taught, no. Not that I know of. However for some reason everyone I know around here who has half a brain has become more and more critical of the US over the years. Almost as if it's a part of being an "independent mind" here in Europe.

 

Yep, it is about the same here, we have plenty of nasty stereotypes about the Europeans. Some of the comments go like this:

Hitler was a European, so was Stalin... did someone seem to forget that?

We are all familiar with your extreme right and left.

oh and the usual bashing of the French & Germans etc on down the list.

I am sure you must know of our informal boycott of certain wines, cheeses and formerly popular vacation spots.

I wont bother to repeat it all, I am sure you are familiar with most of it, we know your Pan-Euro solidarity is not all that strong, you bash each other more than people here from one state bash people from another state.

Some bleeding hearts here talk about the Muslim street being unhappy with the USA- we aint that happy with them either.

So yes, it goes both ways.

 

Nothing independent about it when you are merely following the herd rather than thinking for yourself. Critical thinking skills are in short supply these days

 

What I meant however was that those who are critical of the US are the ones who don't follow the herd. The herd will simply take over the opinion of those closest to them, whatever that may be; those who don't tend to do this are more critical of the US, at least in the cases I've seen so far.

I do believe I made that clear in my previous post?

 

Stonewall wrote:

That was the most ridiculous event leading up to the Iraq war. I mean, does their opinion not matter?

Stonewall wrote:

Ah, but states are much different than countries.

Roel wrote:

This is probably because Europe has, I believe, a clearer view of what is going on in global politics, especially in Iraq due to their "outside" view of the conflict. Canadian and American media washes out alot of these events. Take, for example, the switch from the dollar to the euro as Iraq's oil transaction standard on November 6th, 2000. I only read about this in a German magazine mentioning the switch, but then I found more on the internet.

 

[Self Edit]

 

Oh I dunno, at some level you are right, I hold differing opinions of the various European countries, where in many Europeans don't differentiate betweenthe various states.

Heck, I question most governments and politrixians.

Be it ours, yours or theirs.

So I agree with some good discussion, but I disagree with your analysis of news sources.. I get Novosti Premyat & Ch1 from Moscow, DW, BBC, Telemundo, China National (from both satelitte and local etc) and access to boats loads of web newspapers.

 

The internet seems to be the best place for more detailed and unbiased news, or some extremely radical theories.

Oh, of course, every country is hiding one thing or another. Goebbels once said that truth is the greatest enemy of the state.

 

Roel wrote:

So are you saying that the majority of Europeans are not critical of the US ? I find that rather hard to believe.
In the US, in academia, in Hollywood and the news media one would be just following the herd if one were critical of the US since the majority of those in these elitist institutions are highly critical of the US.
I would be amazed if you were to maintain that in Europe the elite (using the same example of elite, news and entertainment media and academia) are not in lock step with the same opinion...without much independent thinking behind that opinion..at least that is what I find to be the case in the US.

Zhukov2003 wrote:

Does who's opinion not matter? Do not countries involved in free trade have the right to import what products they choose and from where they choose?

Outside? The French and Germans had some lucrative contracts with Saddam that went up in smoke when he was deposed. They certainly had a clearer view of their own self interests IMO.

Perhaps you can explain why that fact is terribly significant to anyone outside the financial world? I'm quite certain all financial publications like the Wall Street Journal reported this item..because only in financial circles would it be big news.

 

True, but to base a boycott because a country chooses not to support a war is in fact low, in my opinion.

I can think of better countries that have done worse things. Clearly the French and Germans had some prime money making opportunities in Iraq, and frankly, it cost a fraction of the trouble than a full blown invasion. By following internationalism they had a much better position to know what Saddam was and was not up to. This is just an example of course.

Um, yes I can. When Iraq, or ex-Iraq, switched to euros it prompted the Venezualan and Iranian gov'ts to consider switching theirs as well. Now this was a time, as it still is, when the Euro was gaining momentum and was close if not at, parity with the US dollar. The US dollar is used by 2/3 of the world as a reserve currency as well as the standard for buying and selling oil as everyone wants American $. A switch by OPEC to euro backed oil transactions would be devestating, causing the US to have to aquire Euros to purchase oil. Think gas prices are bad now, imagine what would happen if the US could no longer build a deficit to buy oil, which is the current Bush plan.

When Iraq converted to the euro, they did it as undoubtably a strike against the US, but ironically it happened to help them out economically. I am surprised much of OPEC had not switched by now for such benefits especially Iran, who is the 2nd biggest oil exporting country and one of the countries under Bush's hit list. OPEC is sitting on a bomb here and thank goodness they have some sense.

Sorry, I have appeared to go a teensie weensie off topic here.

 

Switching to Euros wouldn't increase oil prices per se. The standard for determining the price of oil isn't that terribly important. If a barrel of oil sells for $60 (US) or 55 Euro dollars..there isn't a bif difference. You take your $60 and buy 55 Euros and purchase a barrel of oil. Actually none of that takes place because only electronic debits and credits take place these days. You needn't buy Dollars or Euros.

"build a deficit to buy oil"? What does that mean? Do you mean a budget deficit? a trade deficit? Do you think that the US government buys the oil that is used by American industry and consumers?

 

In fact, I wrote:
The herd will simply take over the opinion of those closest to them, whatever that may be.
This doesn't imply what opinion it is the herd will have. It is often anti-American but unsupportedly so, whereas those who think independently will often have a supported anti-American opinion. A small minority supports the US, mostly within right-wing parties; these parties find their support mostly among the rich and powerful, meaning that "elitist" organizations are indeed often pro-American. I'm speaking only for the Netherlands, before anyone jumps on this!

How free is such a trade then?

 

I'm sure it is like this with most countries. Any elitist group knows that America is a prime source for money/trade and will undoubtably support them.

I imagine these are still different and possibly more unbiased. We already discussed that American media is portraying the war in a negative manner, but they are more focused on what is happening inside Iraq (ie American deaths, the insurgency) rather than what trouble the conflict is causing outside. All in all, this fuels anti-Americanism as well.

By the way, Stonewall, have you heard anything about the Chinese Defense Minister's speech for "lebensraum" on the China National station?