Arrogant europeans

I've been a member of these boards for a while now and one thing I have noticed is the overwhelming arrogance of thier mindset. This has surprised me greatly as I live and work in europe and would characterise most of them as Average Guys. For some reason however the ones posting here are different. I don't know if its due to the anonyminity of these boards or just that this website only attracts these types but it is annoying.
Whether they are critisizing U.S. defense spending or policy, Or U.S. policy, they all seem to think they know it all. My favorite is when those who have never visited the U.S. try to "educate us" on all the failings of Amercan culture, and of the American system. So what is it about the Europeans on this board that makes them so smug, so arrogant, and so self righteous?
I for one am sick of hearing how the U.S. is a nation of undereducated, overfed, lazy, closeminded idiots. Aren't you?

So once and for all lets clear the air.

What makes you think the european system is better?

Originally posted by mwm1331
What makes you think the european system is better?

To quote your statement in the "Arrogant Americans"-thread:

Originally posted by mwm1331
Ignorance as it beles an uninformed attempt to judge a complex structure based on a nonrepresentative sample.

Aren't you in fact repeating the very mistake you were criticizing earlier? Having visited Europe; is it your opinon that Europe is one country with one "european system"?

Well durden while there are a number of systems they do share a number of basic approaches to government. However I would also be more than willng to do it country by country.

Originally posted by mwm1331
Well durden while there are a number of systems they do share a number of basic approaches to government.

Well since you chose to start this thread and considering what I quoted you saying earlier, I feel it to be quite important to understand your actual knowledge here. What "basic approaches" are you referring to? Which countries are you referring to when you say Europe? All? Those within the European Union?

Originally posted by mwm1331
What makes you think the european system is better?

You can't talk about THE european system because there are more than a dozen european systems. They are better because we have made the terrific experience of war the US did never make and are therefore a peaceful people. The best example is that you have a war criminal schizophrenic president at the moment. That would never be possible in peace and freedom loving nations such as France or Germany. The american culture lacks the basic common sense to rule out megalomaniacs from important positions, it encourages them. That is why american right-wingers need to be reeducated by european/UN psychiatrists, and the sooner the better. The first step toward a normalisation of the United States would be that John Kerry, as president signs on the ICC agreement and George W. Bush gets his trial as a war criminal.



[edit on 3-9-2004 by Mokuhadzushi]

Durden I am primarily referencng the E.U. and western europe. They all have socialistic government programs, Lack of weaon rights, (at least as compred to the U.S.) much higher taxation.
Mokuhadzushi - Thank you you just proved my point.

mwm1331 my old china plate (rhyming slang for mate)

Firstly have you read anything by Noam Chomsky? Especially the stuff on history and the US adventures abroad (Phillipines, Vietnam, Nicaragua etc), I think you would be joining in on our rant if you had...

Secondly in defence of our "european arrogance" (the french have audacity -l'audace, encore l'audace, toujours l'audace- Danton):


The US of A invaded europe 50 years ago (under the pretense of liberateting us from the nazis, OK but..), now instead of eating sauerkraut and listning to marching music, we eat Mcdonalds and listen to Britney Spears.
The US is still here, we dont need to go to the US to see what its like coz you are all over us here! You took over our culture and are on the way to take over the rest of the world, we have the right to tell the US where to go with its self-serving policies.

Then tell me corinthas, why , when George W. Bush announced that we were pulling our troops out of Germany, did everyone get upset?

Originally posted by Corinthas



The US of A invaded europe 50 years ago (under the pretense of liberateting us from the nazis, OK but..),

Are you friggin kidding me?...Invaded?...how did we not liberate you?...France gave up in 8 days...We lost a sh*tload of soldiers saving Europes ass....dont even begin with that junk....

As you probably realize, I'm questioning the fact that you chose to start this thread as I feel it reeks of hypocrisy.

Originally posted by mwm1331
Mokuhadzushi - Thank you you just proved my point.

How can you say that one post proved your point? Wouldn't you agree that this could be seen as an example of

an uninformed attempt to judge a complex structure based on a nonrepresentative sample.

Please help me understand your reasoning here..?

Relax basementaddix, Coritnthas hates the U.S. and everythng it stands for. Don't expect any ratoanl posts from that one.

Originally posted by Corinthas
mwm1331 my old china plate (rhyming slang for mate)

Firstly have you read anything by Noam Chomsky? Especially the stuff on history and the US adventures abroad (Phillipines, Vietnam, Nicaragua etc), I think you would be joining in on our rant if you had...

Secondly in defence of our "european arrogance" (the french have audacity -l'audace, encore l'audace, toujours l'audace- Danton):


The US of A invaded europe 50 years ago (under the pretense of liberateting us from the nazis, OK but..), now instead of eating sauerkraut and listning to marching music, we eat Mcdonalds and listen to Britney Spears.
The US is still here, we dont need to go to the US to see what its like coz you are all over us here! You took over our culture and are on the way to take over the rest of the world, we have the right to tell the US where to go with its self-serving policies.

You're a retard. You have a choice to listen to stupid pop music and eat junk food. If you're dumb enough to give money to those types, then suffer. Let me see a law saying you have to. As far as Chomsky proving America's evil, guess what every superpower goes through that stage. When Napoleon was running all over Europe I'm sure his soldiers were fighting with flowers. France helped out the US a lot in the Revolution against King George, thank you very much. I honestly don't give a crap how you feel about the US but to say we invaded Europe and made it ours is a load of #e.

Originally posted by Durden
As you probably realize, I'm questioning the fact that you chose to start this thread as I feel it reeks of hypocrisy.

Originally posted by mwm1331
Mokuhadzushi - Thank you you just proved my point.

How can you say that one post proved your point? Wouldn't you agree that this could be seen as an example of

an uninformed attempt to judge a complex structure based on a nonrepresentative sample.

Please help me understand your reasoning here..?

It proved my point that the many of the europeans posting on this forum are arrogant.

Originally posted by mwm1331
It proved my point that the many of the europeans posting on this forum are arrogant.

You're contradicting your previous argument. Suddenly you find it acceptable to base one's opinion on one example? You really need to explain yourself here. Because your current reasoning is IMO seriously damaging your credibility.

by taibunsuu
You're a retard. You have a choice to listen to stupid pop music and eat junk food. If you're dumb enough to give money to those types, then suffer. Let me see a law saying you have to. As far as Chomsky proving America's evil, guess what every superpower goes through that stage. When Napoleon was running all over Europe I'm sure his soldiers were fighting with flowers. France helped out the US a lot in the Revolution against King George, thank you very much. I honestly don't give a crap how you feel about the US but to say we invaded Europe and made it ours is a load of #e.

Don't insult me!
I am not talking about myself here but when I look around my self I see these little robots who tune in to empty-vee to get their 15 minute dose of culture. THATS WHO IM TALKING ABOUT!
What do you think? I have just quoted danton, you will probably have to google that name and you call me retard. Cute!

Also can you please referr to what was actually said?
Words like "evil" never appeared and I was merely poiting out that the US still has a military presence in europe 50 years on and has had a CONSIDERABLE influence on European culture!

About Chomsky "proving the us is evil" he does nothing of the sort. He merely shows how History is re-written by the winners to make all land/resource grabbing look like a act of charity!

Edit : oops ths @$# quoting thing went all pearshaped again ][ *grumble

[edit on 3/9/2004 by Corinthas]

[edit on 3/9/2004 by Corinthas]

Simple durden. The post in question is a perfect example of the type of post I was referring to. Is it in and of itself proof of my hypothesis? No. However it is the first bit of evidence. More will follow.

Oh man, this is topic is going to turn ugly....

Anyways, mwm1331, this is a very broad topic.
I'll try to cover a few points here.
War: since WWII ended, european countries generaly don't start wars or invade other countries based on dubious inteligence or a desire to rule the world (minus a few exceptions, we know who they are). Those times are gone, they have taken another course of action, you could say it is pacifism, more or less expressed, depends on a country.

Taxes: higher taxes for rich and lower for poor have resulted in a list which has 10 european cities on top: the cities with higest life standards, like cities in nordic countries, then Vienna, Zurich, etc, etc. More money for the state has resulted in VERY GOOD health care systems and EXCELENT education (refering to primary and high schools mostly), because the state has more then enough money to fund these. So, ALL poor kids are also given a chance to make something out of their lifes. Not to mention various state benefits like child care, or here in austria the so called Studienbeihilfe: ALL students whos parents don't have enough money to finance university, get that money from the state.
THAT is democratic socialism, which has nothing to do with communism, socialism, totalitaristic regimes and Marx.

Enviroment: I don't think I have to elaborate much on this one. Europe is THE leading continent in all enviromental issues: recycling, alternative enegry sources, water purification, renewable energy, Kyoto agreement, Vienna (where I live) is one of the cleanest most enviroment friendly cities in the world. Germany puts at least one product daily on the market connected somehow to protecting the enviroment.

Gun laws: I am not familiar with gun laws of specific countries, but as far as I know, nobody is objecting much the current tougher laws. We are all ok with it, no need to cary guns with us all the time. I personaly despise any kind of violence and do not intend to ever own a gun. In my 27 years of living in Europe, I haven't been in a situation where I needed one.

You said it yourself that most europeans you know are ok, so we must be doing something right on this continent.
The arogance you noticed on this board might be provoked by words like "AMerica!! the ONLY free country in the world", "america, the greatest country in the world, # the rest" or something like that. Even in such cases the arogance and comments are directed to goverment of USA, not to all americans. Such higher level of criticism has its roots in political system in Europe, where there are more then two leading parties. So, it is very much natural to support one of 5-6 parties, and criticize all others. That is a part of life here. People are not in any way connected with president or goverment, so criticism directed at HOW a country is ruled, its goverment, laws and issues have nothing to do with how people are in that country.
If a european says that education system in USA is #ed, that means the laws governing thar system and those in goverment supporting it are #ed, and not the people.
What you perceive as a criticism directed to you personaly is actually criticism directed at goverment, and in most cases it IS justified.

Anyways, statistics clearly show that the best of the best is in Europe, mostly in Sweden, Norway, Finland, Austria, Switzerland and Germany.

Originally posted by mwm1331
Simple durden. The post in question is a perfect example of the type of post I was referring to. Is it in and of itself proof of my hypothesis? No. However it is the first bit of evidence. More will follow.

Fair enough, mwm1331. You're obviously free to adjust your reasoning to fit your previous argument (which is what you just did).

Europeans think they are better than Americans and Americans think they are better than Europeans. This will never change, because reigning ideologies and beliefs are different in each bloc.

The US believes in rampant capitalism while Europe believes in Democratic Socialism with a socially-oriented free market economy. IMO the europeans have a much better system that makes sure it works for the people and not for the few. Capitalism is a beast that needs to be controlled because it is full of many fishes trying to eat eachother and as time progresses there become a few really big fish and many really small fish. The big fish don't give a damn about the small fish and they get most of the resources.

The reason I would think that the Europeans don't appreciate the US is because the US is still a baby and hasn't learnt the lessons Europe has and acts in an awful manner. It still acts dangerously and as someone said earlier the politicians in the US (many of the right-wing politicians) are absolutely mad,are megolamaniacs and political bullies, including the illegitimate Bush regime.

i'll add more once the rebuttals come in ,

drfunk

Originally posted by Corinthas

You're a retard. You have a choice to listen to stupid pop music and eat junk food. If you're dumb enough to give money to those types, then suffer. Let me see a law saying you have to. As far as Chomsky proving America's evil, guess what every superpower goes through that stage. When Napoleon was running all over Europe I'm sure his soldiers were fighting with flowers. France helped out the US a lot in the Revolution against King George, thank you very much. I honestly don't give a crap how you feel about the US but to say we invaded Europe and made it ours is a load of #e.

Well guess what, empty-heads are always going to watch TV if they're in the US or wherever else. The US does not have a monopoly on pop culture even in the US. Quite often European bands that are every bit as trivial and silly as Britney Spears make a big hit in the US. Hmmm lemme see the Beatles and British Invasion come to mind, unless you consider Black Sabbath and the Beatles and Abba and Nitzer Ebb to be points of high culture. We have a Russian band of two teenage lesbians who are a big hit with young kids. Gee, thanks Europe for your awesome cultural influence on youth! We have British and French movies that make big splashes over here each year and if Europe had as big a movie industry as the US we would be watching as many European movies as Europe watches US movies. It's natural economics and ebb-and-flo of culture. Yes the US was in Europe for 50 years after WW2 on the invite of almost every free European country ever heard of NATO? Look at Germany, people from the East were crossing minefields to get to the West, East German kid lost a leg getting to the West and 20 years later he said both legs would have been worth the cost. This country was discovered, colonized, and invented by Europeans and European culture IS the culture that founded this country! Of course once this country became economic and cultural powerhouse the cultural tide switches from Europe - America to America - Europe. It's not a big scheme. Oh yes domestic American cars are considered pretty cheap, the rich cars here are BMW, Saab, Rolls Royce, and creme de le creme sports auto non-pareil is Lamborginni or Ferrari.

Oh yeah, and thanks for Mr. Bean, Inspector Cleasau, but you can keep those guys, I don't find them too funny. Send more French noir and Polish directors' films please. Kubrick was great, too.

Don't insult me!

Sorry.