My comment is not about giving the most nuanced picture of the US, but about the caricatures that seem to exist within, sometimes in stark contrast to one another.

"USA USA USA" chants, american flag on the lawn, big pickup trucks, the possession of firearms, monster trucks, american football, people who attend WWE events, "Trump voters" and MAGA hats (let's throw it in there, because it's tied into that), there's a certain stereotype there, and it's not exactly tied to those people being the cultural or intellectual elite of the country.

I would say that "nationalist" is the more accurate term for this behavior. There's nothing patriotic about it.

Orwell said it well: "By 'patriotism' I mean devotion to a particular place and a particular way of life, which one believes to be the best in the world but has no wish to force upon other people. Patriotism is of its nature defensive, both militarily and culturally. Nationalism, on the other hand, is inseparable from the desire for power."

"Conservative" and "backwards" are definitely the same thing though.

Would you please stop posting flamewar comments to HN? Your account has done a lot of that and we're trying for a different sort of site.

If you wouldn't mind reviewing https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html and taking the intended spirit of the site more to heart, we'd be grateful. That would also include not calling names or being snarky in comments here.