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118 points

Americans assuming everyone else is from America and knows everything about America.

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60 points

The American mind cannot comprehend this.

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21 points
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Americans can’t see this comment chain.

Edit: or should I say “Ameri-can’t see this comment chain

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4 points

But if Americans can’t see this comment chain, how USA-ful is it to the discussion?

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32 points

Idk I’ve had the impression that this is not as bad here as it was on the place that shall not be named.

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26 points
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It is. I still wish it “Politics” would default to WorldPolitics" and USPolitics was it’s own thing, instead of the other version where Politics and News is US stuff and the general topics need the “World” prefix.

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13 points

Lemmy.ml has US Politics as a comm, and World News as a comm.

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7 points

Fair point.

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3 points
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You should ask your instance about that, bc right now it’s just mirroring the US-centric reddit trend where the politics community is all just US-specific politics. Same for news, etc.

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9 points

It’s better than on Reddit, which was usually justified by “it’s an American site”, but it’s definitely still here and annoying on Lemmy.world.

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10 points

Well, I also have the feeling that most people here are from the U.S. or Germany. And I only identify the latter as such, because of their usernames. Not sure if I’m right, but I surely feel isolated on Lemmy at times.

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11 points

Here in Europe there are a lot of country-specific instances (e.g. feddit.de or feddit.nl). I can confirm the German one has quite a lot of members and some large German subreddits moved to Lemmy when the blackout happened. Germans are quite privacy focused in general with a generally higher Firefox market share and a lot of shops only accepting cash (not proud of the latter haha)

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2 points
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Oh, die Bargeldsache geht mir auch auf den Sack. Fühle mich nach jedem Auslandsaufenthalt als wäre ich 20 Jahre in die Vergangenheit gereist * g *

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2 points

feddit.de is dead, long live feddit.org!

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2 points

or Germany. And I only identify the latter as such, because of…

…ich_iel?

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10 points

Reverse for me.

Talking about an American politician.

In a thread about American politics.

In a community about American politics.

On an American instance.

Cue 200 “UGH WHY IS EVERYTHING SO AMERICA CENTRIC WHY AREN’T YOU TALKING ABOUT EEEEUUUUUURRRRROOOOOPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPPE” butthurt comments.

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7 points

Or just the random snarky shit they think is so clever.

“America, are you okay?” for the 500th time is not clever, just like it wasn’t the first couple hundred times it’s been posted.

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4 points

Why did you name your instance .world?! 😭

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4 points

Yeah, it’s contextually appropriate most of the time. I doubt there are many American users posting American politically specific ideas on posts about non-american politics.

The only real validity to this complaint would be an overabundance of posts regarding American politics; to which I would say, down vote those and post your own. I, for one, promise not to be upset.

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9 points

I’ve done my best to include °C conversions of all my °F. What more do you people want.


Since we’re here, I had covid one time and had to shop online for stuff that came in ounces, quarts, pints, and liters, and even without brain fog, I can tell you that comparing prices and sizes against apples, oranges, and furlongs (⅛ miles (≈⅕ km (but this is an argumentum ad absurdum))) is the most unsatisfying garbage that has ever been.

In conclusion, what if God did bless America ?

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2 points

Wait we still don’t have a bot for that?

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8 points

Honestly imo lemmites are better at this than any other social media site.

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8 points

Same but with being fluent in english.

Like nobody is “dumb” for not being an expert at speaking English, let alone just speaking 😭

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3 points

I make sure to list any weights and measures in both US and metric.

I also try to include a fair amount of content focused on other parts of the world.

Lemmy is small enough that even though I’m guessing it is majority US, that it is likely less US-centric than most social media. It’s just good to have some stuff for everyone, and I know I like to learn about things outside my country, so I want non-US focused content myself on a regular basis.

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6 points

Regarding weights and measures:

I don’t think in metric, and there’s a strong possibility that I never will. I came of age in an educational system that taught metric units alongside imperial, but also in a day-to-day world that heavily skews towards imperial units.

If I see metric units that I can’t immediately interpret in my head, it’s absolutely trivial for me to get the conversion by other means. It’s equally as trivial for someone who uses metric to make the opposite conversion.

Anyone losing their shit about it is acting performatively.

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7 points

The triviality is what makes me just do it myself. If I’m the one sharing something to a global audience, it makes more sense for me to do it once than to have everyone else go do it if they need to.

I was talking in another thread today, possibly one in response to this one, or at least one similar, and I basically said I want Lemmy to succeed, and my content is easy to source, but getting regular visitors and commenters is the hard part, so I’m willing to do a little pampering to positively reinforce my “guests,” especially at this stage of the game. It’s just some extra consideration, to show people I’m being thoughtful of them, and to make it feel like a place they can come to get facts without having to google them all the time.

My big issue with Lemmy at the moment is I think we’re testing what level of civility we’re willing to give to and to tolerate from others, and I don’t see as many commenters being helpful to each other and I feel mods are scared to steer conversations back to more polite conduct due to the overbearing rep of Reddit mods. So I’m just trying to be the example of what I want to see. That’s the real thing I’m looking to provide. The unit conversion is just a slice of that you could say.

I still have people downvote over nothing or make smartass comments occasionally, but I can’t prevent it all. I’ll do what I can though to make things pleasant and positive for who I can.

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2 points

I don’t put the conversions in my comments, usually because I don’t even post measurements in my comments, but if I did and got a reply asking for it, I’d tell them to go ask Google.

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-11 points

Americans assuming ‘America’ means ‘U.S.’

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25 points
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Canadian here. “American” means from the US. People from the rest of the continent don’t care. They’re the ones with the dumb country name that doesn’t have a more obvious demonym. But we’ve all collectively agreed that that’s what it’s called.

If you want to refer to someone from South America you say South American. If you want to refer to someone from North America you say North American.

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1 point
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Most americans (IE the americas, which include central and south america, and the carribbean), really dislike the usonians usurpation of the term “america” to refer solely to the United States, which really only started in the early 1900s as the US got really forward about its imperialist interests. You’re only hearing “americans mean only US citizens” from the nation that excludes most americans.

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12 points

Non-American here: In English it typically does. The collected landmass of North and South America (or just the continent, if you consider them to be a single one) is usually called “the Americas”

This isn’t a hard-and-fast rule of course, and with all the different dialects of English out there I’m sure there are some that work differently. I assume you prefer “US” or “USA” as a short name for the country?

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6 points

I, as an American, write “The US” the refer to the country specifically to avoid confusion. But there’s not really another good demonym that’s not an slur. “Estadosunidenses” is too much of a mouthful and “Statesman” has another meaning.

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6 points

If you use it differently you are in conflict with the entire anglosphere. You can make that complaint if you’re not speaking English, but in English, the primary meaning of “America” is the United States.

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4 points

Also Italian.

… Not that there’s much of an Italosphere but “Americano” vuol dire “Person from the United States”

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4 points

Hey, I love calling my Canadian friends “my fellow Americans” or saying “hey, we are all Americans here!”

And I think they really like it too! 🤣

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3 points

I’ll say it again, if you don’t like the demonym of “American,” feel free to refer to us by our state and territorial demonyms instead.

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