I often enjoy these articles, but they never really resonate with me. I see almost nothing of my day to day life in these narratives.<p>Would this article describe San Francisco? New York? Seattle? Portland? Austin? New Orleans? Memphis?<p>I assure you that people buying a house in SF aren't surprised to find grout in the tiles or drafty windows. We're actually kind of hoping to find those things, because this means we're not paying for someone to stage and flip (even in this economy).<p>I think international borders are very over rated where it comes to culture shock. Not saying there's no difference, of course, I just suspect there's the opportunity for every bit as much culture shock within the US than between the US, Canada, or Australia, maybe more... try moving from central Manhattan to central London, then move from Manhattan to the outskirts of Toledo. Hell, you don't have to go that far, just go to the New York exurbs.
This article was strong because it balanced critique with commendation. It's an interesting observation that America's "bigness" in many things is simultaneously it's largest advantage and disadvantage.<p>I've often felt that Americans tend to have a kind of naive optimism compared to folks from other countries. In fact, while living abroad I've felt judged by Western Europeans in particular for that quality in myself (some of my best friends are German and French, FWIW). But I think that attribute is what has contributed to much of the success in America, particularly in the entrepreneurial crowd.
That piece resonated with me. In the spirit of Alexis de Tocqueville (Democracy in America), sometimes it takes a fascinated outsider to draw a properly nuanced picture of what it really means to be an American.
This sums up pretty much exactly how I feel about America having lived here for 6 years. I both love it and hate it here. This bit was particularly good:<p><i>A nation which will one day mass produce a cure for type one diabetes, could not, would not, save little Kara Neumann from the bovine idiocy of her religious parents.</i>
<i>"It was an entirely preventable death caused, let's be frank, by some of the Stone Age superstition that stalks the richest and most technologically advanced nation on earth."</i><p>That's patently unfair. Much of that superstition is Bronze Age. Credit where credit's due.
Why is it that so few Europeans believe that diabetes can be cured via prayer? Is it that state-run religions aren't as market-savvy as the "free-market" churches in the US? Are Europeans better educated? I presume the author probably is also referring to an embrace of creationism as well. What is it that went right in Europe (or just didn't go awry)?
I'm a bit thrown by the mention of Kara Neumann. It's as if he's trying to suggest it was some major trend that wacky American law allows, as opposed to a freakish event that lead to her fanatical parents being convicted of reckless homicide.
In Europe, lower classes* are obsessed with upper classes, and vice versa. In America, neither cares about the other. The upper classes are free to live in their own world (much as the great artists of the Renaissance), while the lower classes, left to their own devices, become grotesque. America is really two separate nations.<p>Am I delusional? This seems so clear to me, and yet I haven't heard it anywhere.<p>*I'm not talking about "class", exactly. This is not about social standing or money, but the ability to influence the world, and not necessarily in a highly visible way.
<i>...there must be something creating the drive, and part of that something is the poverty of the alternative, the discomfort of the ordinary lives that most Americans endure and the freedom that Americans have to go to hell if that is the decision they take.</i><p>Both of my grandfathers sacrificed everything to come here so that <i>I</i> could have a better life. They knew 100 years ago what many, sadly, still don't understand. The "poverty of alternative" transcends time as well as space.<p><i>They</i> created the drive. It's my job to make sure it continues.
"But America speaks to the whole of humanity because the whole of humanity is represented here; our possibilities and our propensities."<p>Sounds a bit Nazi, a nation over all others ...<p>God bless America, we, the people of the Earth are proud of seeing it, understanding it and learning from. And (now as the world order is changing) we are inviting Americans to see us, understand us and learn from us.<p>And God bless we are living fast times. Our grandchilds won't ever think in terms of nations, borders and states
Alain de Botton's Status Anxiety( <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0403538/" rel="nofollow">http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0403538/</a> ) is an excellent look at this and the US in general.
What a terrific article! I know a comment like that doesn't add much to the discussion, but as a native American, I'm not sure I have much to add to it anyway. :)
"I am increasingly convinced that these elements of the nation are not the flip side of the greatness of America, they are part of that greatness."<p>Too bad we can't ask the girl.