America vs Europe



  • I recently got a flyer that told me how people were actively helping fight terrorism.

    It didn't look propagandistic, but I suppose propaganda always subtle in the context of the then-present day.

    I ripped it apart and tossed it.



  • @dhromed said:

    I recently got a flyer that told me how people were actively helping fight terrorism.

    It didn't look propagandistic, but I suppose propaganda always subtle in the context of the then-present day.

    I ripped it apart and tossed it.


    It may look totally innocent and well-meant, but the pure existence of such a flyer is propagandistic. The message is "Terror is here. Worry."



  • PH33R!!ONE



  • sounds like you guys got the best solution.  let the dumb foreigners do drugs, tax them, rob them and send them home.

    Then you guys get to use the money for whatever you need. 

    [:D]  Just kidding about the rob them part, you do want them to come back & spend more, no?

      [I]



  • One thing I have never understood about Europeans is the way they say certain English words and phrases.

    Take the phrase "compact disc". They pronounce it "kompakt deesk". There's heavy emphasis on the k's in the word "kompakt" and the long e sound in the word "deesk".

    That, my friends, is very annoying.

    On top of that, they use expressions like "pizza super supreme". The word "super" is greatly exaggerated so it ends up sounding like "sooper".

    Why oh why do Europeans butcher our language so?



  • @CPound said:

    One thing I have never understood about Europeans is the way they say certain English words and phrases.

    Take the phrase "compact disc". They pronounce it "kompakt deesk". There's heavy emphasis on the k's in the word "kompakt" and the long e sound in the word "deesk".

    That, my friends, is very annoying.

    On top of that, they use expressions like "pizza super supreme". The word "super" is greatly exaggerated so it ends up sounding like "sooper".

    Why oh why do Europeans butcher our language so?


    Quitcher whining.

    The reason is the same as why 'you people' butcher just about all other European languages, including, but not limited to:

    - Dutch (mine)
    - German
    - French
    - Italian
    - Spanish
    - Hungarian
    - Polish
    - Russian
    - Norwegian
    - Finnish
    - Swedish
    - Danish

    And it's not a bad reason at all. It's just a fact that learning a language proper takes years. I'll forgive all issues you have speaking a foreign language -- unless you've lived in the respective country for years and are younger than 30. (after 30, I can understand that your mother tongue is so ingrained in your system, the accent will never leave).

    Also, try not to lump all European languages together, willya. The diversity is far, far greater than North-America will ever be able to achieve.



  • @dhromed said:

    The diversity is far, far greater than North-America will ever be able to achieve.


    I don't know why, but when I read your last sentence this came to mind:



  • @dhromed said:



    The reason is the same as why 'you people' butcher just about all other European languages, including, but not limited to:





    Come on, it's not their fault that our people use so many English
    words. My personal favourite German-English word is "Saalvoting",
    "Saal" means "Hall" (in that case, it means the audience in the studio
    of a TV casting show).



  • Europeans "butcher" the language of the Americans? What language are we
    talking about, here? I would consider English a European language. In
    my opinion American languages are native Amerian languages, like Sioux
    and the like. But, on the other hand, native Americans have been
    butchered themselves.



    It came to my ears that the English are annoyed by what the Americans have made out of their language.



    And the phrase "Compact Disc" was invented by Philips and Sony, both
    not American, while "pizza" is Italian and "super" is Latin, which
    means that it is part of most European languages.



  • Just for the record, I don't pronounce it 'deesk'.

    I can imagine the French and Spanish doing that.

    "C'est le disque qui fait la musique."



  • CPound, I took you serious for the first 3 pages, but now you are just spitting inflamatory nonesense. It is a shame, I thought you would contribute to a great thread. Please get back on track and lets have a discussion.

    Here is a few facts about Denmark.

    Yes we do use Hiz-ouze in our language, we call each other niggers and bitches... And "fuck" is also one helluva word to use for everything.

    Water is cleaner from the tap than the bottles in Denmark.

    Dial up modem is long dead.

    We have "all you can eat", but it is common knwoledge that obesity isn't healthy.

    We don't have a secret police. Our country is way to small to keep shit like that undercover.

    We definatly like breasts!

    Everybody in Denmark has social security.

    Everybody gets free schooling. Universities aswell.

    Everybody has a chance of becoming a millionare (sp?) if they put their mind to it.

    We don't think gay is evil, wrong or whatever. People are people, let them be as long as they don't hurt others.

    We made beastial sex legal as the first country in the world, and intend to keep it that way. Fish are sexy! ;^)

    We have freedom of speech aswell. Just think back to the Muhammed scandel.

     

    I have family in the US and is therefore not surprised by the ignorance that exists there. I have freinds that visit there often and tell stories about how freaking absurd things are over there. My roomate has recently gotten home from LA, she said food was so full of fat that it was borderline uneatable. People didn't walk in LA, you have cars "duh". [ironic]All in all, great for the populace and even greater for the enviroment.[/ironic]

    The coffee lawsuit isn't a hoax, a good friend of mine who studies law has recently gotten home from Washington after half a year of study there.  None from her firm denied anything, infact they only gave more examples. Also it was Mc Donalds if I remember correctly, and the coffee was unreasonably hot. Still fucking histerical that you would make such a big deal about it.

    How about the burglar that broke into some house, slipped on the stairs and broke his arm or his leg, or whatever, sued the inhabitants and won! Can you believe that? "How dare you have slippery floors when I intend to rob the place!"

    We now know that TV series, no matter how absurd, from the US resembles reality almost in perfect detail.

    Respect became fear, and fear has been substituted with laughter. TheDauthi (loved your post) hit the nail right on the head. 98% of the US are fucking nutcases. Since Denmark has no power to change that, what so ever, we can only sit back and enjoy our endless source of laughter.

    Two humble pleads though (For all sides)...

    Think of the enviroment and no more wars please...



  • Oh yeah and uhm, here is an example of Danish beauty when it reaches its peak.

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tT8JJXoVNRs

    No no no, not Chris Isaack! Helena Christensen ofcourse :)

    Also check this... http://www.beautifulpeople.dk/frontpage.asp



  • Dear Xeraph, 

    THIS THREAD IS MORE THAN 1 YEAR OLD.
     



  • So it seems.

    I thought to myself while posting the last reply "I wonder how old this thread is?" ...hmm

    Guess I got carried away with my oppinions.



  • It's okay.

     

    I still love you. 



  • > 98% of the US are fucking nutcases.


    No; 98% of CPound's postings make the US look like nutcases.  In my experience, only 26% of the population actually are.

    -cw


  • @CodeWhisperer said:

    > 98% of the US are fucking nutcases. 


    No; 98% of CPound's postings make the US look like nutcases.  In my experience, only 26% of the population actually are.

    -cw

     Except for the fact that we have a right to voice our opinions, why do we have to be so judgemental ?  I know a lot of us probably seem like nutcases. We probably all have our "Well, Duh!"  moments. But that doesn't give us a right to say that the majority of people in a country are nutcases. Besides, we are programmers, and only a small portion of the entire workforce. You never know... maybe most of the smarter people just don't have the time to post on this site, they work too many hours a day and then have to take care of a family.  Everybody has a purpose here, even the people who flip burgers, deliver pizza, drive a truck, etc. Our economy depends on some of these people, and sometimes it takes a nutcase to even put up with some jobs.

     



  • @pitchingchris said:

    @CodeWhisperer said:
    > 98% of the US are fucking nutcases. 


    No; 98% of CPound's postings make the US look like nutcases.  In my experience, only 26% of the population actually are.

    I'd say it's closer to 50% (that's roughly the illiteracy rate in the US, to the nearest 10%).

     Except for the fact that we have a right to voice our opinions, why do we have to be so judgemental ?  I know a lot of us probably seem like nutcases. We probably all have our "Well, Duh!"  moments. But that doesn't give us a right to say that the majority of people in a country are nutcases. Besides, we are programmers, and only a small portion of the entire workforce. You never know...

    Go and meet some of them. You'll learn.
     

     

    Our economy depends on some of these people, and sometimes it takes a nutcase to even put up with some jobs.

    Your government is structured so that those people determine what rules you live by, and you don't really get a say in the matter.

    Besides, the rest of us manage okay without such a stunningly large proportion of insane morons. You must be doing something wrong.





  • I know that its a long time since this post but I had to comment... 

    "You talk of propaganda, then turn around and call Americans terrorists. (Well, we do have a few, but we don't hold benefits and telethons for them.) Maybe your opinion is the product of propaganda?"

    Did you know that for years the IRA was funded and armed with cash and weapons from the US? You did indeed hold benefits to help with "the struggles" and you did help to fund terrorism.

    Infact.... Didnt the CIA train and fund al'queda in the early 90's so that they could overthrow the current (in the 90s) leadership? I think you will find that they did.



  • @wonkoTheSane said:

    I know that its a long time since this post but I had to comment... 

    "You talk of propaganda, then turn around and call Americans terrorists. (Well, we do have a few, but we don't hold benefits and telethons for them.) Maybe your opinion is the product of propaganda?"

    Did you know that for years the IRA was funded and armed with cash and weapons from the US? You did indeed hold benefits to help with "the struggles" and you did help to fund terrorism.

    Infact.... Didnt the CIA train and fund al'queda in the early 90's so that they could overthrow the current (in the 90s) leadership? I think you will find that they did.



  • @asuffield said:

    Besides, the rest of us manage okay without such a stunningly large proportion of insane morons. You must be doing something wrong.

    The issue is that our morons are concentrated into their own areas and are not equally distributed in our country (it is in some respects, simply too large). But because each region gets disproportionate support from government at the state and federal levels, these morons have more influence on our society than we would like.

    It would be easy to just ignore them. But these morons are vocal (which plays into the hands of the meda), and they are easily parted with their disposable income for charitable causes and election funding in exchange for sound bytes and appearences at church services. This provides a support base for special interest groups and politicians who speak to this vocal voting block. 

    You can't just write everybody off... no one likes it. It seems we're moving backwards. But we need guidance and support for the little victories, not ridicule.


  • @wonkoTheSane said:

    Infact.... Didnt the CIA train and fund al'queda in the early 90's so that they could overthrow the current (in the 90s) leadership? I think you will find that they did.

    This is true. But it doesn't mean "Americans" are terrorists. Just the CIA. See, the CIA is full of unaccountable cowboys and (surprise, surprise) they didn't bother asking me if I thought it was a good idea before they went ahead and did it. I don't like it anymore than anyone else does.  

    Furthermore, the thing is if they did their jobs better no one would have been the wiser and we wouldn't be having this conversation.

    What, your country doesn't have a secret spy agency that carries out clandestine activities? I doubt it!
     



  • For years, I always thought that government was supposed to represent the people. Obviously I was wrong.

    Britain is turning more and more into a police state. I read 'nineteen eighty-four' (Orwell) and I gave it some thought and realised just how close this was to reality. In Orwell's Oceania, the Party use the constant fear of the war and the bombs to keep the people terrified and ignorant. They continually waste resources to prevent the people (other than the inner party) from becoming too well educated and questioning the Party's actions. And anyone who starts asking questions suddenly never existed.

    The British government is using the 'war on terror'*  as an excuse to push through legislation to 'protect us from the terorist threat'. If you look back through history you will see that Hitler did roughly the same thing. He had the Reichstag approve the 'enabling law' that made them all redundant, as the enabling law allowed him [Hitler] to pass any law he wanted. I wonder how close our respective 'leaders' are to doing that? And, of course, anyone who tries to see through these laws is either ignored or, if they are making too much of a fuss, escorted away. (For example, the 80-year old (I think) Jewish man who complained about something the New Labour party said, so they threw him out of the conference.) Our freedoms are being trampled on, and we're letting them do it.

    "You want to see a vision of the future? Picture a boot heel grinding the face of humanity into the dust for all eternity." 

    * War on terror my ass. The government and people in power are saying that they do not want to let the 'terrorists' disrupt our lives. Well, what are the governments doing? You can't take a bottle of water on a plane because you'll blow up the plane with the magic liquid explosive in the bottle. etcetera.
    The act of terrorism is to spread fear and panic. Which is what the governments are doing. This makes the governments the terrorists. <sarcasm_level='very high'>But of course, the governments can't be terrorists, they're protecting us from the nasty {communists|hippies|muslims|iracqies|FILE_NOT_FOUND}</sarcasm>

    Ah, I think I'm going to go now, I can hear someone knocking at the door.

    "This is the thought police, give yourself up. We have your head surrounded"
     



  • @wonkoTheSane said:

    I know that its a long time since this post but I had to comment... 

    "You talk of propaganda, then turn around and call Americans terrorists. (Well, we do have a few, but we don't hold benefits and telethons for them.) Maybe your opinion is the product of propaganda?"

    Did you know that for years the IRA was funded and armed with cash and weapons from the US? You did indeed hold benefits to help with "the struggles" and you did help to fund terrorism.

    Infact.... Didnt the CIA train and fund al'queda in the early 90's so that they could overthrow the current (in the 90s) leadership? I think you will find that they did.

     

    IIRC, the CIA trained and funded the Taliban, not al'queda. Actually, when it came to fighting commies, the U.S. were not too picky when choosing their allies.



  • @Control_Alt_Kaboom said:

    "This is the thought police, give yourself up. We have your head surrounded"
     

    They're not watching me.  The speck of dust I put on the corner of the monitor is still there.

     



  • @Control_Alt_Kaboom said:

    For years, I always thought that government was supposed to represent the people. Obviously I was wrong.

    Britain is turning more and more into a police state. I read 'nineteen eighty-four' (Orwell) and I gave it some thought and realised just how close this was to reality. In Orwell's Oceania, the Party use the constant fear of the war and the bombs to keep the people terrified and ignorant. They continually waste resources to prevent the people (other than the inner party) from becoming too well educated and questioning the Party's actions. And anyone who starts asking questions suddenly never existed.

    The British government is using the 'war on terror'*  as an excuse to push through legislation to 'protect us from the terorist threat'. If you look back through history you will see that Hitler did roughly the same thing. He had the Reichstag approve the 'enabling law' that made them all redundant, as the enabling law allowed him [Hitler] to pass any law he wanted. I wonder how close our respective 'leaders' are to doing that? And, of course, anyone who tries to see through these laws is either ignored or, if they are making too much of a fuss, escorted away. (For example, the 80-year old (I think) Jewish man who complained about something the New Labour party said, so they threw him out of the conference.) Our freedoms are being trampled on, and we're letting them do it.

    "You want to see a vision of the future? Picture a boot heel grinding the face of humanity into the dust for all eternity." 

    * War on terror my ass. The government and people in power are saying that they do not want to let the 'terrorists' disrupt our lives. Well, what are the governments doing? You can't take a bottle of water on a plane because you'll blow up the plane with the magic liquid explosive in the bottle. etcetera.
    The act of terrorism is to spread fear and panic. Which is what the governments are doing. This makes the governments the terrorists. <sarcasm_level='very high'>But of course, the governments can't be terrorists, they're protecting us from the nasty {communists|hippies|muslims|iracqies|FILE_NOT_FOUND}</sarcasm>

    Ah, I think I'm going to go now, I can hear someone knocking at the door.

    "This is the thought police, give yourself up. We have your head surrounded"
     

    And in 1800 everybody lived in fear of colonial opressors.

    In 1915 millions got slaughtered in WW1

    In 1942 everybody lived in fear of the germans.

    In 1960's till 1990 everybody thought they would be nuked.

    And now we have lunatics yelling "police state!!!!" in the streets. So another reason we should live in fear.

    It is not the government, it is these lunatic conspiracy people that make things far more worse than they really are.



  • @Control_Alt_Kaboom said:

    Britain is turning more and more into a police state.

    In the context of "War on Terror", I find it interesting that they recently awarded knighthood to Salman Rushdie. This is simply "asking for trouble". As if the government was looking for a reason to do those things you cannot easily do in a well working democracy.
     



  • @ammoQ said:

    @Control_Alt_Kaboom said:

    Britain is turning more and more into a police state.

    In the context of "War on Terror", I find it interesting that they recently awarded knighthood to Salman Rushdie. This is simply "asking for trouble". As if the government was looking for a reason to do those things you cannot easily do in a well working democracy.
     

    The British government has no real direction or ability to pursue any goal to a successful conclusion. This is by design (over the centuries we've found that governments who can get things done are more trouble than they're worth, as you have to round up a lynch mob for them on a regular basis). As such their actions are frequently contradictory or nonsensical, and the only reason is that left arm #243 does not care what left arm #45 is doing, much less know about it.

    Why am I not concerned about the large numbers of cameras they're putting in all over the place? Because the plan to use those cameras involves a large, complex computer system. The British government has tried to build many large, complex computer systems over the past few decades, and every single one of them never worked. Most of them were worse than the manual system that they replaced. They do not have the ability to get something like that working - the system funnels money to contractors who use it to go on long junkets and do no work.

    "Never attribute to malice that which can be adequately explained by incompetence"
     



  • Let me first say how this thread has turned into a carbon copy of soooo many other threads all over the net: on the one hand we have a bunch of Europeans calling the US out, and on the other we have a bunch of Americans lecturing everyone else about Democracy and Freedom. The funniest thing is that neither side really has much of a clue about their subject matter. You all remind me of some of the tales we hear about villagers hundreds of years ago believing that their own village is best because they don't have the Giants/Wolves/Dragons etc. that (as everybody knows) plague the villages on the Other Side of the Hill.

    Fact 1 : Most euros have never lived/worked in the US - so how do they know what it's like?

    Fact 2:  Even more Americans (and by percentage a great deal more) have never lived/worked in Europe.

    ... and yet so many people on this thread seem to know All There Is To Know about the other side. 

    I guess I am in a somewhat unique position here as I have spent the last 24 years living and working in the US (5 years in California, 2 in Florida), Europe (5 years in the UK, 4 in Switzerland) and Asia (for the last 6 years). So why did I leave the US? America is stagnating, the dollar is weakening while the federal deficit is getting ever larger and xenophobia is getting worse by the day. Euro-land is in exactly the same position, with less personal freedom but a slightly better financial position. So where do I think is best?  - no doubt about it, Asia is the future. More freedom (and not just the paper kind so beloved of US neocons). High spending power, low taxes and an ever expanding economy.

    So be careful CPound, there be Dragons over here too!!!! 



  • Another one for CPound little hitler pic.

    Here is a nice litle quote I found:

    <FONT face="Times New Roman" size=3>"We have no interest in oppressing other people. We are not moved by hatred against any other nation. We bear no grudge. I know how grave a thing war is. I wanted to spare our people such an evil. It is not so much the country of Czechoslovakia; it is rather its leader, Edward Benes. He has led a reign of terror. He has hurled countless people into the profoundest misery. Through his continuous terrorism, he has succeeded in reducing millions of his people to silence. The Czech maintenance of a tremendous military arsenal can only be regarded as a focus of danger. We have displayed a truly unexampled patience, but I am no longer willing to remain inactive while this madman ill-treats millions of human beings." --Adolph Hitler, April 14th, 1939.</FONT>

    <FONT face="Times New Roman" size=3></FONT> 

    <FONT face="Times New Roman" size=3>sounds kinda familiar... </FONT>

    <FONT face="Times New Roman" size=3></FONT> 

    <FONT face="Times New Roman" size=3>George!!???? helloooooooo....</FONT>


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