> What culture does a hill billy from the Ozarks share with a Bostonian?

TV.

From east to west to north to south everyone in the States has this common bond, television, and through this medium our "culture" is propagated.

Flip on the TV in Europe and not only will the language very likely vary from country to country, so to will the content, which is based on the cultural norms of that particular country (or language group from which the country evolved).

Also, given how new the country is, the "united" in United States is easily traced to the American Revolution and Civil War. In Europe there is no such common identity given the rich and varied history.

in europe most of the the time if you turn on the tv you _will_ find the same stuff.

Holliwood movies, Game of thrones, Kommissar Rex, the borgias, eurovision song contest, european football championships, local versions of "the billionaire" or "big brother" etc.

Did you grow up in southern europe in the '80s? Then you probaly watched the same dubbed animes like "Captain Tsubasa". In eastern europe? Same, but this time it was Krtek. Are you a kid now? Then you are likely watching Masha & The Bear across the whole continent.

>in europe most of the the time if you turn on the tv you _will_ find the same stuff. Holliwood movies, Game of thrones, Kommissar Rex, the borgias, eurovision song contest, european football championships, local versions of "the billionaire" or "big brother" etc.

That list sounds more of a reason to being done with Europe rather than an argument for its shared culture.

well, you can be done with the EU, but you can't really move a country outside of the european area.

You can avoid TV though, it's really quite simple to do.

>You can avoid TV though, it's really quite simple to do.

Not really. At best you can avoid watching TV yourself -- but you can't easily avoid living in a city/country influenced by tv culture.

by that logic, there should be just one "housewives of.." why do they need to hyper-localize it?

Because they can sell more ads if they have more shows.

People do not only watch the "housewives of..." that's from their own part of the country.

Historically they would likely share a belief in American exceptionalism. Although that widespread cultural belief may be coming to an end.

Bostonians generally don't believe in exceptionalism. Ozarkians tend to, but I know liberal citizen-of-the-world people from, and actually residing in, the Ozarks.

Anyway, exceptionalism isn't really a common bond.

Bostonians generally don't believe in exceptionalism?

1776.