2. Sure, America gets dumped on in media all over the world. And blamed for economic disparity across the world. But the general populace, as the OP states, really doesn't think about America. It's true. Unless they have a relative or a friend in America they think about, or there's some global news going around, they really couldn't care less, which = not hating. Which is why they give you a break -- they don't care (although whether they should care is a different question)
3. Foreign language is not the only thing. Almost all of us can speak English, believe it or not. Just talk to us in English to get to know about us. And I'm amazed you can call American immigration "open" in the midst of all the conversation going on about it right now. I'm strongly led to believe you don't know very many non-Americans entangled in immigration in the last 5 years. Myself, I'm getting the boot by the end of this year (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5708206). I'll leave it at that, always a separate discussion.
Agreed, there are countries worse than America for immigration. But really, for all the immigrants, how many do you think nationals really interact with closely? How many of those are just outliers to the typical citizen of their respective countries? Large parts of the country that aren't Atlanta, Seattle, Boston or California have very little cultural intermingling and really, Americans know little to nothing about the rest of the world there. Of course, there are world-aware Americans and those who interact with others. This is a terrible terrible minority. And I suspect you have a selection bias here, where you probably interact with (and are one of) those kinds of people more than your average bumpkin who only cares about a 50 mile radius of his existence.
4. I completely agree with you here, countries like South Korea and many parts of India are far more ridiculously poor at self-expression than America. The author's expression is compared to the most open cultures in the world.
5. Of us immigrants, I imagine a large number do it because of proximity (Mexicans/South Americans), and relatively better, yes. Immigrants from other developed countries are here not for the standard of living, but for the innovative economy and career opportunities, fun products to work on, etc. The American Dream, in practice, is a thing of the past, and to people still groping for it, it's a delusion. People in those countries just aren't advertised to by any other country (like Sweden or Finland) as much as by the US via popular media. For the record, my quality of life here is certainly below where it would be if I worked a job commensurate to my qualifications back in India or the Middle East, but I love my work here more than anything I could see myself doing back home, as the markets exist today.
6. Yes, the US is a developed country. So it would be unfair to really compare it to most of the world. A lot of places really are slum-ridden shitholes (inside the US too, but moreso outside), but a LOT of places aren't. I don't see why you really disagree with the author here.
7. I'm sure you aren't paranoid, and I'm glad you aren't raising your kids to be. Again, I call selection bias on you calling baloney on this. If you pick any article that talks about international anything on the internet, and read a couple comments, you'll hear how paranoid they are about foreigners, about crime, about the government, about bomb threats, terrorists, etc. A lot of it is grounded, a lot of it plain stupid. The media, law-enforcement and public reactions to events in general all depict this paranoia, and a lot of it is grounded in Americans believing the rest of the world is out to get them and ruin their pretty lives (goes back to point 2).
8. This is probably true over the entire world. Maybe you don't seek status, but my parents, my friends, my cousins, and I'm sure to a great extent, myself, all are pretty status-obsessed and seek attention. Americans have eaten up social media tools more aggressively than most of the world (not surprising given most of it started here) and so seem more explicitly attention-seeking, but really, the whole world does this. That's being human in a society.
9. Long lifespans and being "healthy" are correlated, but not equivalent. However, there are definitely worse health problems over most of the world. In fact, I think more Americans think the country is unhealthier than it actually is. However, healthcare is definitely cheaper in the rest of the world. If I had to do serious surgery, it would cost me far less to buy a two-way plane ticket to India and pay for the best hospital and doctors the country can provide there than try to go to a default hospital here in California to get it fixed. If only I didn't have such visa issues if I tried to do that...
10. Do you really feel you are representative of Americans choosing to not pick a penis-car and go for homeschooling and encourage multiculturism and human relationships? People I know who I never thought would mistake comfort for happiness when they were in college, have rapidly turned into those looking for "nicer" suburban houses, routine expensive getaways and big televisions, and, believe it or not, penis cars. However, this is true in a lot of the world wherever people have significantly more than the baseline required money, and I don't think is an exclusively American thing either.
I'm not impressed by the author's use of "we." Speak for yourself. Calling out the points in the blog post kindly submitted here one by one,
1. FEW PEOPLE ARE IMPRESSED BY US
I beg to differ. I know just one non-American part of the world well, and I am well aware that opinions about the United States and Americans are varied and complicated everywhere, but I have met quite a few people who are impressed by Americans as Americans. In particular, I have met quite a large number of people from other countries who are impressed by Americans who learn a non-English language (hmmm, that would only be a minority of Americans) and who make an honest effort to understand and appreciate the history and culture of another country while living in that country. Perhaps the author mostly knows unimpressive Americans.
2. FEW PEOPLE HATE US
In general, people I've encountered from all over the world wherever I've been overseas have seemed friendly to Americans. (I should note that I have been inside the borders of the United States since a couple months before 11 September 2001, so I acknowledge this may have changed.) Even when my government misbehaves on the world scene, which means my country is misbehaving and I am im part blameworthy as one American voter among millions, I still feel most people from other countries give me a break and assume that I have as little control over my government as they may have over theirs. (Because I feel I have more control over my government than people in many other countries, I feel more responsible for its misdeeds than some foreign friends blame me for being.)
3. WE KNOW NOTHING ABOUT THE REST OF THE WORLD
I call baloney on this. There is a level of ignorance that Americans have about the rest of the world particularly because of the systematic lack of foreign language learning in K-12 schooling in the U.S., but there is also an exposure to people from all over the world here because of openness to immigration and mass media from everywhere that largely counterbalances that. I know a LOT of Americans who have traveled to multiple countries for fun or business or both. The most knowledgeable Americans are the Americans who learn languages other than English, but some other Americans know about other countries too. Because many Americans are first-generation immigrants, a lot of Americans are personally acquainted with friends and relatives who know about other countries.
4. WE ARE POOR AT EXPRESSING GRATITUDE AND AFFECTION
Here, the author far too much emphasizes his particular ethnic subculture in the United States (and contrasts it with particular example countries that are not representative of the whole world) and doesn't accurately represent America. In contrast to the author, I have encountered a lot of people who think of Americans as very warm and passionate and straightforward people. "Compared to what?" is the question to ask here.
5. THE QUALITY OF LIFE FOR THE AVERAGE AMERICAN IS NOT THAT GREAT
This is put to the lie by the continued strong net immigration rate the United States enjoys compared to almost all other countries in the world. Tens of millions of people all over the world want to live here.
http://www.gallup.com/poll/161435/100-million-worldwide-drea...
The United States has to adjust its immigration and border regulations to keep people from coming in in even greater numbers, not to hold people here and keep them from moving to other countries. (Many countries of the world have "exit visas" or onerous regulations for obtaining passports, while it is ridiculously easy to leave the United States.)
6. THE REST OF THE WORLD IS NOT A SLUM-RIDDEN SHITHOLE COMPARED TO US
The rest of the world is catching up, true. Taiwan is quite a pleasant place to live now, and may become one of the five wealthiest countries in the world in my lifetime.
http://globalpublicsquare.blogs.cnn.com/2012/08/15/singapore...
But the United States is still improving year on year too. Much of what I enjoy about life in the United States in 2013 was unimaginable in 1969, when my elementary school class prepared a time capsule with predictions of the year 2001--which was opened that year so that I can check my predictions.
7. WE’RE PARANOID
Again I call baloney on this. My four children have all roamed our neighborhood freely and walked or biked to the public library (one mile away in one direction) or to shopping (one mile away in another direction) by themselves since early childhood. We don't worry about anything here.
8. WE’RE STATUS-OBSESSED AND SEEK ATTENTION
Speak for yourself, bub. I notice how you are weaving in an advertising message in your blog post, but I have ways of reality-checking anyone's reputation, and I'm not buying what you're selling until I hear more about you from my friends.
9. WE ARE VERY UNHEALTHY
廢話. This is just flatly contradicted by all available data.
http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=longevity-w...
Health is improving at all ages for Americans. Life expectancy at all ages is rising. Girls born since 2000 in the developed world are more likely than not to reach the age of 100, with boys likely to enjoy lifespans almost as long. The article "The Biodemography of Human Ageing" by James Vaupel,
http://www.demographic-challenge.com/files/downloads/2eb51e2...
originally published in the journal Nature in 2010, is a good current reference on the subject. Vaupel is one of the leading scholars on the demography of aging and how to adjust for time trends in life expectancy. His striking finding is "Humans are living longer than ever before. In fact, newborn children in high-income countries can expect to live to more than 100 years. Starting in the mid-1800s, human longevity has increased dramatically and life expectancy is increasing by an average of six hours a day."
http://www.prb.org/Journalists/Webcasts/2010/humanlongevity....
10. WE MISTAKE COMFORT FOR HAPPINESS
Again, speak for yourself. The lifestyle trade-offs I am allowed to choose with my family in my free country include lots of family togetherness (we are a homeschooling family) and "multiculturalism" in the best sense (we know and cherish as friends people from all over the world). For us, happiness is all about human relationships, not about owning the latest "penis car" or other status symbol.
One of the great things about America is that any doofus with an opinion can express it on a blog, and anyone who chances to read the blog by following a link posted to Hacker News can discuss it here. Isn't life in America great?