no one is innocent

Submitted by ron (United States), Jul 2, 2009 at 08:55

this whole thread is very interesting, me and my girlfriend, who is from europe, i am american, constantly debate this... is america truly a freer nation then europe? it is my opinion, that no one is perfect, and that includes nations as well. there are good and bad things about america, there are good and bad things about europe. america does tend to toot it's own horn rather blindly and we do come across as rather brash, we are extremely patriotic and we get carried away a lot, but forgive us, we are a young nation still learning about the ways of the world. we don't have thousands of years of culture behind us to learn from.

yes, america does tend to get involved in things we may have no business getting involved in like invading iraq for all the wrong reasons, but we also get involved in things we do need to get involved in, like wwll, kosovo and afghanistan. sometimes we get it right, sometimes we get it wrong. but at least we try and do something. i'd rather we tried and got it wrong the to sit around doing nothing. i mean, we'd never let someone like hitler march into our country and not even put up a fight, what was that all about france? shame on you! and yes, american culture may not as grand and as sophisticated as europe's, but it's not as stuffy either! we gave the world rock 'n' roll, jazz, r&b and soul music to name a few. hamburgers and hot dogs and bar-b-que's. hollywood movies and t.v. the bikini and surfing.

europe gave the world a lot of great things, but we gave the world a few fun things to do. both have there merits, let's enjoy them all. and yes, we not not be as free as we may think we are pr any more freer then europe, but i have one question... why are so many europeans, and the rest of the world for that matter, immigrating to to america? some might say it's because we have the most lack immigration laws of any nation and because everyone wants a piece of the money pie... but is that a bad thing? if it's so good in europe and the rest of the world, why aren't you staying there? and yes, we do tend to think america is the center of the universe and a lot of people tend not to make an effort to find out about the rest of the world. but a lot of us do.

can you blame us for thinking we are the center of the universe when the rest of the world sets us up to be just that? and can you blame us for giving up on trying the understand europe when we go ahead and do try and learn and visit europe we are judged, criticized and humiliated for doing so instead of helping us learn? we are young and stupid, but instead of helping us learn, you judge and make generalizations? is it any wonder a lot of americans don't want to bother going to europe? no one's perfect, and that includes america. there are a lot of good things about this country, there are a lot of bad things about this country. just as there are a lot of good things about europe and a lot of bad things about europe. my question is, why can't we just accept each other for who we are and just get along? that's my two cents or pence or euro's!

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