Rob Fox
America: the land of cowboys, fat people, patriots, the loud, the rude, the arrogant, racists, high school parties that put clubs to shame. Of rednecks and absurdly conspicuous gun owners. Of Americans, whatever that means to non-Americans.
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Apparently, American stereotypes — positive stereotypes and negative stereotypes — cover a lot of things, sometimes bad, usually ridiculous. A lot of that, apparently, is thanks to the American media and Hollywood. For example, not everyone in the United States talks like they’re from New York. Or Texas (a common stereotype). Most people don’t realize that the United States is huge, and that there isn’t really one, unifying American culture like American TV portrays.
Of course, some things turn out to be true, too. College students really do party with red solo cups. Gun ownership is common (though we don’t walk around with holsters), and we are, in fact, the greatest country on Earth. (That last one might’ve just been me editorializing, ahem.)
1. Americans are jerks.
Look, just because we think our country is the greatest on Earth and will blow things up, both recreationally and malevolently, to prove it doesn’t mean we don’t want to hang out with you and help you out if we can.
2. Our lives are as comfortable as TV shows.
As far as TV shows go, The X-Files was typically more believable than Friends.
3. Americans are all sexy like on TV.
Yeah, well, you’re not exactly waifu material yourself, Akari!
4. We’re all cowboys.
We all sort of wish we were, though. Nowadays “cowboys” are just the most hated football team in American history.
5. That fast food is fine dining to Americans.
Five dollar meals > five star meals. Fight me.
6. We’re racist and guns are for crazy people.
Guns are fun. Just have to keep them out of the hands of psychos.
7. Our beer is bad.
Yeah yeah yeah we’ve got a ton of great IPAs and what have you, but discount the pleasure of drinking 16 Budweisers.
8. We’re all rich.
Yeah we’re disappointed about that too. Thanks for the reminder.
9. We’re all fat.
Imagine mentally preparing yourself to walk amongst whales for two weeks. That’s a rich assumption coming from the land of sausage and beer.
10. Our accents are cool.
It’s called speaking American.
This story was originally published July 6, 2018.
