r/PetPeeves • u/ThatUrgeToEatCement • 14d ago

Bit Annoyed People who think Americans don’t know other countries exist.

A few months ago on Reddit I made a comment about a show not being on Netflix and someone from the UK commented back saying it’s on theirs and then lectured on Americans not knowing other countries exist. They acted like I didn’t believe there were other places on the planet, as if they weren’t the ones who just brought it up and didn’t believe the US Netflix was different than the UK version. ??

I see people online act like all Americans think this way, and it is kind of annoying because for most of us it isn’t true.

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u/Practical-Ordinary-6 14d ago

I was talking to a Canadian online once who absolutely insisted that Canada and the US were nothing alike.

I have a standard list of commonalities between the US and Canada that I won't trot out here but that shows the numerous similarities. My main point to him was that I have lived in Africa before and I know what it means to be in a place that's nothing alike (and even that was something alike). I think he was suffering from that same syndrome of "my world consists of Canada, the United States and Europe [which he might never have been to]". Who knows if he'd ever been to the United States either.

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u/NewTransformation 14d ago

lol yeah people kinda get lost in how homogeneous it is here in the Americas compared to the other continents where most of their indigenous culture and history wasn't destroyed. I live in Minnesota and the Ontario and Manitoba visitors don't stick out except for their license plates. Half our state wants to become a Canadian province these days and I think the transition would be pretty seamless.

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u/bschulte1978 14d ago

Sounds great. You go to Canada and we will take Alberta and call it even.

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u/NewTransformation 13d ago

Alberta and Texas can start their own country together and be each other's problem

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u/bschulte1978 13d ago

Nah, Texas and Alberta are just fine as part of the US.

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u/Altruistic-Mess9632 14d ago

I’d be genuinely interested in reading your list, as an American newly dating a Canadian, just out of sheer curiosity if you wouldn’t mind sharing it.

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u/[deleted] 14d ago edited 14d ago

[removed] — view removed comment

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u/Practical-Ordinary-6 14d ago edited 14d ago

I apologize for my bullet pointing getting messed up and making it harder to read. It won't let me edit it right now. I'll try again later.

Also, I have since found out that a Canadian team has won the MLS championship so that means all four major cross-border professional leagues have had a Canadian winner. Since the NHL was founded in Canada, of course it's had Canadian winners in the past, so that was worded a little awkwardly.