/r/AskAnAmerican

12,101 people curious about Americans for 3 years

As a Canadian, I've grown up feeling quite close to my more rowdy neighbours to the south, and yet I've come to find out over the years that there's so I didn't know or understand about the United States. Take this upcoming election for example. This past year when we elected Justin Trudeau as our handsome Prime Minister, the election itself took a total of 11 weeks (about the same length of time as a season of The Apprentice). Now that the primaries have started in the states I can't help but wonder what's taking so long, and have had to ask a few of my American friends about how this whole complicated process works exactly. Luckily for me, /r/AskAnAmerican also exists, and they currently have a stickied thread dedicated to simply explaining the primaries leading up to the election.

Maybe you have a less serious question to ask, like what is meatloaf? or why do Americans seem to hate New Jersey? It's both interesting to read the answers as well as to see what those who are unfamiliar with the States will ask. Going into this sub for the first time, I was honestly expecting more of the patriotism and stereotypical comments you'd see over on /r/Murica, but I was pleasantly surprised by the seriousness of both answers and responses. People are genuinely interested in getting to know what it's like to live in the States, while others are genuinely helpful and take time in crafting their responses. You can see this come across in the most upvoted question How much choice of brand variation do you have? And 1000+ comments later you have a really interesting discussion develop. Other questions like What are some culture shocks you've had within the US? make you think more about your own experiences and show just how different the US can be from State to State. Other posts like "show me photos of mundane America" really get at the heart of day-to-day life in the States, a glimpse that you don't really see through the media and through tv shows or Hollywood films. Places like this hot dog shop or this Iowa State Fair or Florida before a storm were among some of the interesting responses.

So if you're not from the United States and would like to learn more about it, or if you are American and feel like sharing with others what your life is actually like, then I'd suggest heading over to /r/AskAnAmerican for some thoughtful discussion! There's also /r/AskACanadian, /r/AskEurope and /r/AskAnAustralian as well if those are also your cup of Tim Horton's tea.

1. Could you tell us a bit about yourselves?

/u/cardinals5: I'm an engineer who moved to Detroit - after finishing my masters - to join the auto industry. I'm originally from Connecticut, and I lived overseas in Italy for a few months as well. This is probably the most active subreddit I moderate, and I'm only active on ones that are within my interests - cars, Civ, RCT, cooking, that kind of stuff.

/u/EagleEyeInTheSky: I'm also an engineer, working in Southern California, in the Aerospace Industry. I grew up in North County San Diego, in a tiny little town with a weird obsession with avocados. I started Redditing because I was bored in class, and now I can't stop when I should be working. I think that fans of the Cardinals suck.

/u/CoCaptainJack: Howdy I'm a senior at a small private college studying math and economics. I love starting and growing ideas, founder of 4 clubs on campus, and looking to make that hobby into a career as an entrepreneur one day. I really dig E-Sports and truly think it will rival traditional sports in the future, following E-Sports is mostly what I do on reddit. My personal favorite are league of legends and super smash bros melee. (shout out to r/smashbros)

2. Tell us about your subreddit!

/u/cardinals5: /r/AskAnAmerican was started when we had a weird "Americans of Reddit..." trend on /r/AskReddit. It was slow growth at first but we've been trending twice now, and while the first time was a struggle to deal with, we seem to have a better handle on it now. The subreddit itself really is intended to be a place to look at some of the things that don't normally get asked on /r/AskReddit, while getting real answers (example, questions about Detroit get actual answers from Detroit here, where on the defaults you'll get...less of that).

/u/EagleEyeInTheSky: /r/AskAnAmerican is a subreddit that primarily has two userbases. Curious foreigners who see a lot of American culture and are confused or curious about our strange little land where fat people can take the prom queen on a date to the gun range. (This is a joke, by the way.) Then we also have actual Americans who are willing to clear up misconceptions about our culture, our politics, our lifestyle. Being a smaller subreddit compared to something like /r/AskReddit has really affected the quality of the posts here, and you get a lot more genuine responses to questions. We don't need a serious tag on our posts. Not that our userbase is perfect, but the regulars really do try to make an honest effort to provide an honest look at our country.

/u/CoCaptainJack: Others have said the main ideas of what I will say but AskAnAmerican is a unique play even though from the description it might not seem so. The sub is a place to ask questions to Americans and get answers with wide ranging backgrounds. Which encapsulates a lot of America, many different people, many different cultures in one big place. I also don't like the stigmas, stereotypes, and misunderstandings associated with the US (no we don't eat hot dogs and burgers for each meal, well at least most of us). I thought this place would be a decent way to combat that.

3. What do you like most about your subreddit?

/u/cardinals5: Our userbase is great. What's nice is, really, it doesn't lean heavily conservative or liberal (in American terms, anyway); there's a good balance and people are generally respectful of each other. The users definitely don't put up with people being assholes either, which is nice. We're also aware of and try to account for bias when we're answering things, which is always a plus.

/u/EagleEyeInTheSky: I like the questions. You'd think that a subreddit like this would get overloaded by the same questions over and over again, but there's a lot of misconceptions about America or interesting things that I as an American would never ever think about. We just had an /r/bestof post the other day where a guy was interested in the varieties of pizza that we had in our supermarket. One of our users recorded a video of a pizza aisle at our stores and blew everyone away with how much pizza we had. That's not something I would ever think about. Questions like those are my favorite, because they help me look at my own country from a unique perspective and appreciate the small details that are absolutely absurd from a foreign perspective, and those kinds of questions usually are fun as hell to read.

/u/CoCaptainJack: I love how there are some true golden answers given in response to questions. A simple question can lead to a HUGE detailed post giving multiple perspectives and intricacies. Check This out for example.

4. What does it mean to you to be an American?

/u/cardinals5: Interesting question. This one is tough, because a lot of what I think of can be applied to many other countries. I think, in essence, its knowing that your ancestors (or your parents, or even yourself) came here seeking a better life, and worked hard to achieve it. To me, being American means being hopeful, industrious, hard-working, and stubborn to the point of near stupidity. I could prattle on about freedom and all that, but really what makes us Americans is our shared background as a nation of immigrants (minus the native Americans...) who came to find something better, and never stopped trying to make a better life.

/u/EagleEyeInTheSky: I think of America as a bizarre, experimental attempt at building a first world country from scratch. We're so weird. Being a part of this subreddit has really opened my eyes to a lot of the weird and wonderful things about this great country. Our history is really short. This country changes fast, and so do the people living within it. Growing up in this country, I was born to a poor family, living day to day with less than a hundred dollars in my parents' joint checking account. As I grew up, my dad got his home business off the ground, my mom got several promotions. We got rich for a while. We owned 7 cars, 10 motorcycles, moved to the rich side of town, and my life changed accordingly growing up. Then the housing market crashed, my dad's business tumbled, my mom's company closed its doors. We kept the house in the nice neighborhood, but we lost half of the cars and went back to worrying about how much clothes were going to cost. Now I've moved out and I'm completely separated from my parents. I'm building my own career. I'm not rich at the moment, but I've got a degree, a stable job at a stable company, and I'm digging myself out of the typical college poverty.

I've been rich, I've been poor, I've lived in nice neighborhoods, and bad neighborhoods. The biggest thing that America has given me is the chance to have that kind of financial mobility, where my future has never really been decided by my past, or by my family's origins. Who I am, what family I'm from, how much money my parent's had, what kind of opportunities I had growing up, and where I used to live, have had very little effect on where I am and who I am today. I'm here where I am today because of what I've worked towards and my own efforts. And no matter where I've been financially, I've been treated the same by every single one of my peers and I've always felt that the world was always being fair to me. Life changes quickly. Where I am today is only because of the choices I've made within the past five years. Where I'll be in a decade has almost nothing to do with where I am today. That, I think, is what the American dream is all about. I've never felt like I was constrained by a destiny.

/u/CoCaptainJack: Hard to say exactly, Hard working is definitely an attribute associated with us sometimes even to a fault. I think Americans have a little bit of everything so it makes it so hard to say. If you are looking for somethings specific in a type of person or people you can find it here in America.

5. Anything you want to potential subscribers to your subreddit?

/u/cardinals5 We always want new perspectives and new people. As long as you're respectful and not here to lecture us on why things suck about America, we are always happy for more people! I think we'll also have an FAQ and some new stuff going on soon, so keep an eye out for it if you subscribe!

/u/EagleEyeInTheSky We have one rule, and one rule only in this subreddit. Everybody Love Everybody. Also, all of our other rules on the sidebar apply. BUT EVERYBODY LOVE EVERYBODY!

/u/CoCaptainJack Even though this subreddit is based around questions for Americans, American subscribers here can learn a LOT about world culture that is hard to get elsewhere. Some of the differences in different cultures are subtle but have interesting details. "Do Americans really not use cursive that much?", "Ao does your country still?", "All the time! almost exclusively!" is a rather mundane example, but you get the point.

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The Q&A portion of this feature was put together by our intern writer /u/monkeyman764 -

I would personally like to thank the Mods of /r/AskAnAmerican for there deep and thoughtful responses to my questions, and my mentor /u/joshguillen for answering my questions. Finally, in honor of this feature of /r/AskAnAmerican I would like to sign off with a quote from Abraham Lincoln, “Whatever you are, be a good one.”

The written portion of the feature was by /r/Respectfullyyours