Americans of Reddit, what's something that America gets shit for that is actually completely reasonable in context?

jpow33 · 5時間前

Our restaurant food portion sizes. A lot of people in other countries don't take home their leftovers. That $12.00 Fiesta Platter is three meals right there.

darthatheos · 4時間前

Our obsession with the car comes from the vastness of our country.

jessie_k_grey · 4時間前

American beers sucks.

Not any more bitches. We fixed that shit.

6thFairway · 6時間前

Speaking English only. Do you know how far we have to go to find some place that doesn't have English as a primary language? You travel across Europe and hear many languages. I leave Georgia and go 2000 miles to California without leaving a primarily English-speaking area. I learned Spanish in high school, but never got to practice it and now I don't speak it anymore.

su5 · 8時間前

We have very different laws in different states. Hell, some of our states have legalized marijuana, while others had sodomy laws on the books after the year 2000. What people need to keep in mind is how incredibly large the US is. Texas is bigger than France, and the distance between Maine and California is 3,300 miles (5,400 km), almost the same distance as England from Russia.

Edit: I was a little off on the distances. From the UK to Russia is nearly HALF the distance from Portland Maine to LA

-eDgAR- · 6時間前

Hollywood. As much as people complain about the industry, the stars, etc. America is a powerhouse for entertainment, not just for ourselves, but for the rest of the world.

dick-nipples · 8時間前

Pretty much every American enjoys some greasy, salty fast food every once in a while.

overdramaticteen · 4時間前

I'm not even American, but those little square packaged cheese things you guys have are fucking delicious. I'm Dutch and my family is a bit of a cheese snob, but if I'm in the States, I will proudly order a grilled cheese sandwich just for the processed cheese.

pumpinpat · 4時間前

Maybe this is more of being from a big city, but when being asked where you're from saying the city or the state instead The United States.

I travel a lot and constantly introduce myself to people from all over. When asked where I'm from I just say Chicago...everyone knows Chicago.

If I say "the states", then it's "where?" "Illinois." "Where in Illinois" "Cook Country" "Oh, and where in Cook County" "Chicago"..."why didn't you just say Chicago?"

A lot of people give me shit for it. Particularity Aussies.

I know people from Paris will Say Paris...I feel like Londoners do as well.

Unknownentity7 · 7時間前

That a lot of Americans haven't traveled to another country. It's considerably more difficult and expensive for us to do it, especially if you live in the middle of the country. Plus there's so much to see here (for the record, I have traveled).

EDIT: OK Australians, I get it, your flights are expensive too, and your location relative to other countries isn't great either. But you guys get 20 days paid time off plus 10 public holidays, a lot of Americans are lucky to get any paid time off at all. My first job out of college I had 5 paid days off, you can't really plan a lot of travel with that. Thankfully it's different now though, I'm actually going to Toronto this weekend.

Justice_Man · 1時間前

Everyone gets so pissed when we call ourselves "Americans."

"What Jerks! There's South America, Middle America, we're all 'Americans'

Yea, except Brazilians have the luxury of calling themselves Brazilians ... You know what sounds stupid as fuck? United Statesian. That's what.

That's why we call ourselves Americans guys, it was the easiest shit to say.

No doubt this is going to get buried, but dude am I passionate about that one.

Nulono · 7時間前

It irritates me when people make fun of America for having bizarre laws like "it's illegal to whistle underwater" or "it's illegal to carry ice cream in your back pocket". These tend to be laws in specific cities, not all of America, and they're usually instituted because some specific incident made them necessary. The latter one, for example, is an attempt to deter cattle theft; if any animal who wanders onto your land becomes your property, all you have to do to steal an animal is lure it onto your property with a tasty treat, and if it's in your pocket you can claim that you didn't do so intentionally.

compleo · 2時間前

I'm not American but the US seems to get a lot of shit for being racist. It actually seems more like Americans are just very vocal about racism when it happens when other countries don't care or keep it quiet.

HarveySpecs · 7時間前

Lawsuits. For example, accidents happen, but so do the medical bills that often follow, and not everyone has adequate/any insurance to pay those bills.

dqsg22 · 7時間前

Beer. I was so excited to try beer in England. To my dismay they mostly drink a beverage that is identical to bud/Miller/Coors only they call it carlsberg/carsling/ or 1554 (is it 1664?).
Edit it's 1664. 1554 is an American brew I had it mixed up with.

I admit that the cask ales were amazing.

As for craft beers the average pub had less than a dozen choices. In America it's easy to find places with over a hundred to choose from. The US is a beer mecca right now

lukepa · 8時間前

Not having a passport or speaking a second language. This place is fucking YUGE (and classy) and everyone more or less speaks English. You couldn't explore everything there is here in one lifetime much less the world.

scottevil110 · 8時間前

The fact that we don't have mass public transportation everywhere. Our country is simply too large and spread out to have the kind of rail or bus network that European countries have. Outside of the northeast, our major cities are hundreds of miles apart, with very little in between. It just isn't feasible to connect all of our cities with a nice, frequent train service that's going to be anywhere near affordable.

_ShutThatBabyUp · 7時間前

We have all these big trucks, but its not our fault that we have so much farmland and nothing runs like a Chevy Silverado

Edit: and cabins in Gatlinburg

Whisper · 3時間前

"American cars have huge engines and lousy cornering."

Allow me to introduce you to the typical American road.

"America has a lousy public transportation system."

Let me explain the scope of the problem.

"America spends ludicrous amounts of money on weapons and fighting wars."

Yes, defense is cheaper when you have someone else do it for you.

"Americans are fat."

Nations have obesity epidemics in direct proportion to availability of refined sugar. This problem started in the US, but now other developed nations have it too. The more soda you drink, the fatter you are.

JosephND · 1時間前

That you can't go see Texas, California, the Grand Canyon, etc all in one day. I meet too many Europeans who think traveling the US will be fast because it's all one country, and they completely fail to recognize it takes 10-12 hours to drive through Florida or California.

copycat · 5時間前

Raw milk being banned. Apparently we don't care because we're not all anti-gmo with no proof of harm, but pasterization has been proven to say lives.

bodymanccc · 3時間前

As being a veteran of the us. It always surprises people that we disagree with alot of what goes on with the politics of the u.s. and that we don't totally support the political leaders of our country, we are just people who signed up, and protecting one another in a combat enviroment.

roninjedi · 3時間前

That we spy on other countries. What do you think your own country isn't spying?

SirThomasYorkeshire · 8時間前

If we didn't have our guns, the king of England could just walk into our homes and start bossing us around.

TooBuyFor · 8時間前

Having a military the size of our military.

MooneySuzuki36 · 8時間前

Intervening all the time in foreign countries. It's a gray area really. We don't do something and we are being greedy and neglecting and the entire UN looks to the US to do something about it. We do something and now we are intervening on everyone's business and being the "world police".

We give more humanitarian aid than any other nation but we are seen as this huge aggressor/death machine.

gridster2 · 6時間前

Kinder eggs are illegal because of an FDA ruling against non-edible items inside food products. It's a sensible law, and it would be dumb to make an exception for a single candy.

iowaboy · 4時間前

That Americans don't know much about other countries (political systems, cultures, languages etc.).

Here's the deal: America is the cultural hegemon of the world. Everyone watches American movies and TV shows and listens to American music. If you turn on a radio in France, Saudi Arabia, Kenya, or Japan, you'll be able to find at least one American Pop station, that might play some local music too. They also talk about American politics (generally at least) in most countries (e.g., I listened to Obama's first inaugural speech with a cabbie Amman).

The fact is, citizens of most countries only know a lot about two cultures: (1) their regional/national culture and (2) American culture. Europeans are just as ignorant about Chinese culture/politics as Americans. It's not our fault that Brazilian TV shows haven't gotten the international "star power" to make it on American TV stations, so we can't learn about their culture that way.

This also leads to the language thing. Most people learn English (or want to learn English) by watching US TV/movies. If China made 90% of the global blockbuster movies and music, I would probably have picked up quite a bit of Mandarin over the years.

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