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LogisticEarth posted:Glad to see some insight into why New Yorkers are annoying dickheads, and confirmation that the cause does in fact seem to be some kind of endemic regional narcissism. calling them "narcissists" here is what really makes this post sing feeling entitled to the attention of every random stranger you meet is not narcissism apparently?
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Feb 28, 2017 16:44
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One thing I've definately noted versus north and south US racism- in the south we've got more of those jackasses that think they can stand up and yell about how much they hate whatever target minority of the day they're after. But all the rest of us just sit next to each other on the bus and work together since its no big deal, its just skin color or a different church or whatever. Yet in the north, nobody would dare out themselves as 'racist' yet for some reason everyone lives and works in different neighborhoods and no one thinks that's weird. Don't believe me? Look up which school systems in the US are the most segregated. Spoiler- Its New York.
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Feb 28, 2017 17:38
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Grandmother of Five posted:I recognize that as largely a rural versus an urban thing here, too. I don't really have a clear preference, personally. It is nice to acknowledge strangers as people, with a smile, nod, or some pleasantry or other, but if you did that every single time you passed someone in an urban area then you'd never get anything done. If you're walking somewhere rural, though, I feel it is odd and borderline rude to not acknowledge people in some basic way, like a nod and a smile, or whatever. It's pretty much this. Most Americans in urban areas aren't going to acknowledge everyone they see on the street, other people waiting for the train, at the grocery store, etc. I think the suburbs are pretty similar to be honest. Now, if someone says "hi" or nods at me or something, I'm not going to stare blankly at them or anything, but it's a pretty uncommon occurrence. Grandmother of Five posted:People are exaggerating when they are talking about in-depth talks with strangers, though, right? Maybe that is part of the Scandinavian standoffishness, but outside of very few contexts, striking up an in-depth conversation with a stranger is just weird. If you're waiting in line or stuck in a common area, like waiting on a train, then it wouldn't be odd, but are people actually expecting, in-depths personal talks with strangers, or is the counter-reaction just the sort of typical goony "i don't see the point of small talk / pleasantries"? It's a mild exaggeration. Sure, there are people who will want to talk your ear off, but they're fairly rare. I'm not sure if it's a rural vs urban or Northern vs Southern thing, but a lot of people just want to mind their own business and do whatever it is they need to do or get wherever it is they're going. It's not really a "I don't see the point of small talk" type of thing. Grandmother of Five posted:Anyway, from the friends and relatives I know who have visited the US, the general impression has been that people from the US are very open and forward in talking with strangers, and that this has been experienced as a positive and welcoming thing, and that includes people visiting in NYC. It is anecdotal, of course, but it is sort of funny to me that there seems to be a internal US stereotype of NY people as being aloof, distant or arrogant, when it has been the opposite perception from the Scandinavian tourists that I know, but again, Scandinavians are probably generally not seen as the most warm, uninhibited and welcoming people around. In the other direction of hyperbole from "strangers all want to have in depth conversations" is this idea that people from the city will refuse to acknowledge or talk to you. Do I want to make small talk with a complete stranger? No. Will I at least respond politely for a bit? Yes. What's aggravating is people who talk too slow or take too long to get to their point. If you need directions, ask me where you're trying to get, I don't need the whole backstory. As for your friends and family, I'm sure they have the impression that Americans are friendly because Americans LOVE meeting foreigners. Well, most foreigners anyway (definitely Euros). This is pretty universal for everywhere I've visited/lived in the US.
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Feb 28, 2017 19:58
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In my experience with Scandinavians (note: mostly Finnish which may-or-may-not count as actually Scandinavian depending on which skull-type chart you are consulting) if we assume that "talkativeness" follows a normal distribution for national populations the tails of the "least talkative Americans" overlaps with "the most talkative Finns". Like 2-sigma for each in opposite directions.
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Mar 1, 2017 00:09
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How is the political climate currently in the state and city that you live in? I grew up in a Massachusetts suburb, went to college in Rhode Island, and now live outside San Francisco, so I've basically spent my entire life in some of the most liberal places in the country, to the point where I generally just don't even run into people who would oppose me politically. San Francisco in particular loving hates the current political situation, with the city government having recently declared that they're straight-up going to ignore Trump if he tries to make them do something they don't want. That said, I also drove up to Oregon last year, and it was stunning how many Trump signs there were on the road in the rural parts of northern California. What kind of food culture does your local area have? if you're into cooking, or simply know of some local delicacy, please share a specific dish, with a recipe if you have one, of something that you enjoy making or buying yourself that would be representative of your local food culture. The area where I live is both heavily Latino and Asian (both of the south and east variety), so there's a shitton of restaurants that cater to those cuisines. I'm not sure if I can really think of anything that would be considered a "local" dish. Maybe in San Francisco proper, but I go there pretty rarely. How is religious life and worship for you in the states? As an outsider, it appears as if religious life might vary pretty wildly from state to state, with some US areas having markedly different religious demographics than others. I'd be especially interested in whether people experience any prejudice or bias against their religious practice, or lack thereof, in their home states, or from US society at large. My family is Jewish and I grew up in a strongly Jewish town and went to a religious primary school, but oddly enough my parents were pretty bad at being devout themselves, and nowadays you'd basically never know I'm a Jew. However, it took me awhile to realize that in most of the country and the world, the Jewish population is too small for their customs to be a factor in public life. My local public school made the high holidays like Yom Kippur official days off (because half the kids would be at synagogue that day anyway), and for awhile I just assumed that was how things were everywhere. I've never really experienced any prejudice though, since I don't have any of the "stereotypical" markers that would identify me as being Jewish. Sharing what you work with or study for, or if you have any specialized knowledge, would imo also be interesting, because it would allow follow-up questions for specific fields, like, imo someone working with law or healthcare would probably have interesting insights on those areas. I'm a software engineer, which you probably know is a booming market in the San Francisco area. There's a stereotype that all the programmers here work 80-hour weeks either because a) they just love the intellectual challenge of their job THAT MUCH or b) they have to due to money or immigration law bullshit (and oh boy is there immigration law bullshit in this market). I have a couple friends that fit into a), and b) is true for way more people than I know about, but in all honesty my own job is pretty much a 9-to-5. There's also a stereotype that software engineers' high salaries are making it impossible for anyone else to live here because rents keep skyrocketing in response, and that one is absolutely 100% true and one of the things I hate the most about this region. If you belong to a minority group, do you experience harassment? If you do and you are willing to share personal anecdotes, and thoughts about how your state or city might differ from other areas in the US, then please do. I am a white straight male, and while I'm Jewish there's no way you could tell through my appearance or name, so I'm as privileged as they come. I've never experienced anything even close to harrassment. How familiar are you with other US states than the one you live in? Like, how many different ones have you lived in, or visited for a shorter or longer period of time. Are some states essentially as foreign to you, or even more, than some foreign countries might be? Do you feel as if there is animosity between your home state and other states? Basically all my time spent elsewhere in the US has been in cities in more liberal states. I have very little concept of what it's like to live in a rural or conservative area of the country, but I'm not sure if I actually want to find out. Seeing the occasional Trump bumper sticker here already makes me want to scream, and being surrounded by them seems like it would be bad for my health. Have you experienced any stereotypes against your nationality or state when travelling? No, but there is the occasional culture shock even in neighboring states. Fun fact: if you go to Oregon, you are prohibited by law to put gasoline into your car yourself; it has to be done by an attendant even though the machines are exactly the same. A bunch of states have weird laws like that that can throw off travelers and instantly mark them as out-of-staters. If someone was to visit the US for the first time, or your state or city in particular, what sights would you recommend? I would say that a visitor to the US should go out and see the nature, rather than spending time in cities. There's very little you could find in US cities that you couldn't find in other cities across the globe. Our landscapes and national parks, on the other hand, are one-of-a-kind, absolutely breathtaking, and should not be missed.
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Mar 1, 2017 00:52
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Grandmother of Five posted:People are exaggerating when they are talking about in-depth talks with strangers, though, right? Maybe that is part of the Scandinavian standoffishness, but outside of very few contexts, striking up an in-depth conversation with a stranger is just weird. If you're waiting in line or stuck in a common area, like waiting on a train, then it wouldn't be odd, but are people actually expecting, in-depths personal talks with strangers, or is the counter-reaction just the sort of typical goony "i don't see the point of small talk / pleasantries"?
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Mar 1, 2017 14:49
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GenericGirlName posted:As a person who grew up in Brooklyn this loving kills me. Hmm people seem to bowl you over in the streets? Perhaps they also seem reluctant to have five minute conversations with you, a stranger, about nothing? I am a goon, I'm not talking about conversating with strangers. Thanks for confirming stereotypes though. Like lol if you think Torontoans have the same social mores as rural southerners. I also wasn't talking about your precious city, there's actually a whole state out there. My main cities have been Dallas, Denver, Toronto, Montréal, Kingston, and Syracuse, plus the town I'm from, and yeah, the NY staters are odd ones out, typically. They're flat-out rude, I'm sure it doesn't seem that way to them but to me and my Canada-born girlfriend it was extremely offputting. If two people are on a crash course they won't move, they'll insult and yell at strangers, they'll judge you from your accent or your plates and tell you about it. There were also a bunch of drunk assholes stumbling around by like late afternoon on weekends. In beloved Dixie and the great white norf everybody tends to confine daydrinking to the porch. FWIW I saw vastly more Trump paraphernalia in upstate NY and nearby states than in my hick hometown, who mostly thought "at least he ain't crooked Hillary". Still dumb but at least not aggressively so. vintagepurple fucked around with this message at 15:45 on Mar 1, 2017 |
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Mar 1, 2017 15:29
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In a big city there are just too many people to make eye contact with or smile and nod, you'd be doing it ALL the time and it would be exhausting. You really don't have much privacy in a city so people seem to naturally create this bubble around themselves when walking down the street or on transit as a defense mechanism.
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Mar 1, 2017 18:06
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Shayl posted:In a big city there are just too many people to make eye contact with or smile and nod, you'd be doing it ALL the time and it would be exhausting. You really don't have much privacy in a city so people seem to naturally create this bubble around themselves when walking down the street or on transit as a defense mechanism. Y'all keep making this about cities, how is Toronto or Montréal or Dallas less urban than Syracuse or goddamn Watertown, NY? I dare you to find a Watertown tinder user that doesn't have either an army uniform or a dead animal in their photo but they are still rude Trump lovers. New York staters and New Englanders are also really fond of hammering their car horns. 95 and related highways are just always traffic jams, knock it off. No one feels the need to honk incessantly as 401 crawls past Toronto or A20 becomes a terrifying Final Destination clusterfuck around Dorval and Montréal. Same for Dallas and Denver but out their everyone finds some traffic zen and just zooms around bumper-to-bumper at 80mph. vintagepurple fucked around with this message at 18:20 on Mar 1, 2017 |
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Mar 1, 2017 18:13
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There seems to be conflation between NYC and upstate, which might as well be different countries.
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Mar 1, 2017 18:17
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Tater Love 
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Upstate NY is a trash place for trash people.
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Mar 2, 2017 19:54
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Thanks again to people who have taken the time to answer questions btw. A new topic of interest have popped up, and I'd be curious to hear about what kind of sex ed people have received. Like, how much time was spent on sex-ed in your school, and were there any areas of omission or bias, thinking back? How strongly was pre-marriage abstinence advocated? Were LGBT issues openly discussed? In the context of sharing experience on what kind of sex ed you may have received, it'd be interesting to know of how long ago it was that you received sex ed, I think, and whether you went to a public school or not. I'd imagine that the content of sex ed might vary drastically depending on it.
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Mar 26, 2017 18:08
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Grandmother of Five posted:Thanks again to people who have taken the time to answer questions btw. Junior high school, public, grade 7 or 8, 2000 or so, Mississippi. In our health and safety class, we had exactly one period, one day, for sex ed. So about an hour out of the whole year, and if you missed that day, you didn't get sex ed. Aside from the brevity, I don't actually have any complaints or ideas about how I'd do it differently. "Hey you guys shouldn't be having sex at your age, but IF YOU DO, here are some pictures of some of the nasty things that can happen to your genitals and face. The best way to avoid that is not having sex at all, but IF YOU DO, the way to avoid those nasty things is by always using a condom. Here's how those work." This may have been an exceptionally frank class for the south since, to hear others tell it, a lot of people just got basically "don't gently caress until you're married or your dick will fall off or no man will ever want you"
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Mar 26, 2017 19:10
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I went to both public school and private, with a switch in middle school. I lived on on the west coast of California: Sex ed to a very strong extent was discussed at the end of elementary school and all through junior high. During the end of junior high, except in science classes, they sort of decreased the amount it was mentioned because people had already clearly learned everything. It was discussed pretty extensively, including the issues of STDs and the multiple different forms of birth control. PS: The same set of companies provide all of the sex education videos pretty much for the entirety of the United States, but creates like 5-6 versions which each school board chooses from. The videos have the exact same actors, who legitimately say totally different things depending on if you choose the abstinence only version. It's pretty amazingly terrible. LGBT issues were not openly discussed in class, but were done through assemblies and other things. Our school had a Gay Straight Alliance which was sponsored by the school administration. Then again, we were also west coast CA, which is completely open to issues of gender. This was at the end of the 1990s, and I believe schools are now way more frank about discussing gender issues at school. ntan1 fucked around with this message at 19:15 on Mar 26, 2017 |
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Mar 26, 2017 19:12
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Pharmaskittle posted:Junior high school, public, grade 7 or 8, 2000 or so, Mississippi. In our health and safety class, we had exactly one period, one day, for sex ed. So about an hour out of the whole year, and if you missed that day, you didn't get sex ed. Aside from the brevity, I don't actually have any complaints or ideas about how I'd do it differently. "Hey you guys shouldn't be having sex at your age, but IF YOU DO, here are some pictures of some of the nasty things that can happen to your genitals and face. The best way to avoid that is not having sex at all, but IF YOU DO, the way to avoid those nasty things is by always using a condom. Here's how those work." I had basically the same experience in Florida, except that health class was a normal class and not some weird yearly one off. Not all of health class was spent covering sex ed, though.
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Mar 26, 2017 19:16
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Grandmother of Five posted:Thanks again to people who have taken the time to answer questions btw. I went to public school in a very wealthy county in a liberal east coast state. I recall sex ed was first at the end of elementary school and then again in middle school, so that'd be the late 1980s/early 1990s in my case. There were opt-out forms for your parents if they objected, but I don't remember anyone taking that option. My hazy memory has it that it was one class period per day for a week. Abstinence was presented as a method that would certainly avoid all of the potential misery of getting an STD or having a baby. But we also learned about a wide variety of other forms of contraception. I don't remember LGBT stuff being discussed outside of the context of HIV, which was a big deal at the time.
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Mar 26, 2017 20:16
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WampaLord posted:I had basically the same experience in Florida, except that health class was a normal class and not some weird yearly one off. Not all of health class was spent covering sex ed, though. I knew I wrote that out kinda awkwardly. The health class was a full length class, but the sex ed stuff only took place on a single day.
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Mar 26, 2017 21:32
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Grandmother of Five posted:Thanks again to people who have taken the time to answer questions btw. Public school, late 90s. Learn basic anatomy, all major forms of birth control + not to do really dumb poo poo like try to use saran wrap or tack your diaphragm to a bulletin board after washing. Nurse offers condoms after class (no takers) The fact that abstinence is of course an option that is encouraged by many conservative religious people and probably our parents was brought up but we were told that if we don't choose that option to please use birth control and use it correctly. This would be from fairly conservative areas of an overall liberal state (OR) I guess?
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Mar 26, 2017 23:35
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Oh lordy, sex ed. Ok, for context, this would've been like, 20 or so years ago here. I went to a public school in North Carolina but I can't recall exactly what grade I was in when they did a sex ed class- somewhere in what we call 'middle school' here though (usually grades 6-8). But I do know before I got to that class, my parents had their own 'sex ed' thing they did, probably because I hit puberty a bit early. It consisted of an educational video tape, that I got to sit down and watch. With my younger brother. I don't remember anything about it except being exceptionally embarrassed to have to be sitting next to him watching this stuff  In school, I had a class that was mostly health, with a few overhead projector diagrams that we had to label, and then another educational video tape. I don't recall anything from that one either except for one scene in it where it demonstrated how a male orgasm worked. By showing a vaguely dick shaped outline on the screen slowly filling up red white and blue, like the American flag. And then when orgasm was achieved, SPARKLES SHOT OUT THE TIP! Needless to say, the ENTIRE CLASS broke down laughing. Fourth of July has always been a bit off ever since for me.
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Mar 27, 2017 00:02
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Grandmother of Five posted:Thanks again to people who have taken the time to answer questions btw. LOL Sorry, I went to a private Christian school in Alabama, so we even skipped the chapter on meiosis. The closest I got from my parents was my mom, when I was 21 and she was driving me to an airport to visit friends, saying "You don't have to do anything you don't want to, you know that, right?" So the real answer is Google. Thanks, Google! EDIT: We didn't even get abstinence, they just acted like sex didn't exist. PS: One of my classmates got pregnant senior year. Good job, guys! Midnight Voyager fucked around with this message at 00:12 on Mar 27, 2017 |
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Mar 27, 2017 00:08
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It was part of "health class" which was just general catch-all nutrition, anatomy, human-bodily things for the most part. For the sex ed part I just remember a lot of nasty pictures of STDs - abstinence preferred, ask a doctor and get tested for STDs if you really insist on boning, something about condoms. Not super in depth. Not much talk about LGBT stuff either. (late 00s, battleground state)
Friar Zucchini fucked around with this message at 00:39 on Mar 27, 2017 |
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Mar 27, 2017 00:36
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Tar_Squid posted:By showing a vaguely dick shaped outline on the screen slowly filling up red white and blue, like the American flag. And then when orgasm was achieved, SPARKLES SHOT OUT THE TIP! Needless to say, the ENTIRE CLASS broke down laughing. Was it this?!?? -  http://i.imgur.com/It5pprg.gif
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Mar 27, 2017 00:58
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Scudworth posted:Was it this?!?? - I.. don't recall the eagle head but otherwise that seems... close? ( oh man my childhood  )
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Mar 27, 2017 01:35
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Tar_Squid posted:I.. don't recall the eagle head but otherwise that seems... close? ( oh man my childhood So I know who needs that as an avatar. (It's you!)
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Mar 27, 2017 01:46
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Grandmother of Five posted:Thanks again to people who have taken the time to answer questions btw. I went to public school and it was usually a unit in your PE (physical education) classes that lasted, I dunno, maybe 3-4 weeks each year? It wasn't a one day lesson. Your parents could opt you out but almost no one ever did. I think sex education started around grade 4 (so age 9 or 10) and mostly covered the basic biology parts, but they touched on the concept of sexuality a bit. Middle school (age 12-14) introduced stuff like sexually transmitted diseases, consent, birth control, etc. We learned a lot about birth control at this age but ultimately they stressed that abstinence was the only way to ensure you don't get pregnant or a STD. In high school we still got sex ed through gym class freshman and sophomore year, and through social studies classes after that since you weren't required to take gym starting your junior year. I don't remember a lot of what we learned in high school beyond reviewing what we'd already learned for over the past few years and building further on those concepts. They still stressed that abstinence was the only guarantee, I think that's technically the state's position that they have to teach, but our teachers weren't stupid and they did explain proper condom/birth control use. I also remember that starting in high school they stressed that people deserve to be treated with respect regardless of identity or orientation. I think they broke it into four groups (heterosexual, homosexual, bisexual, and transgender) which seems a little bit simplistic now, but at the time (maybe 2007 or 2008) it was probably way ahead of the curve in terms of what kids learn nationwide. There were also individual lessons about internet predators, substance abuse and how it can affect decision making in sexual encounters, and I think issues related to sexual abuse and violence like human trafficking. This was late 90s-2008 in Northern Virginia. I'm sure it's changed in the past decade but I think they did a good job overall. Jamwad Hilder fucked around with this message at 16:05 on Mar 27, 2017 |
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Mar 27, 2017 16:00
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Grandmother of Five posted:A new topic of interest have popped up, and I'd be curious to hear about what kind of sex ed people have received. Like, how much time was spent on sex-ed in your school, and were there any areas of omission or bias, thinking back? How strongly was pre-marriage abstinence advocated? Were LGBT issues openly discussed? I went to school in rural Nebraska 20 years ago and sex ed was surprisingly decent, if dry. No hands-on demonstrations of condom use or anything (at one point a condom was passed around for the class to look at, still in an opaque wrapper), just a ton of info thrown at us. But there was no STD gross out slideshow and no real emphasis on abstinence beyond giving us stuff like (accurate) success rate comparisons. Dunno that it really took considering a quarter of the girls in class got knocked up during school, but at least there was an attempt to drill the facts into us. LGBT issues were mostly glossed over, we got told that gays existed and also that STD prevalence was higher among gay males so you super extra needed a condom to do the gay sex even though you don't need them for contraception. I think the existence of lesbians was largely left as an exercise for the student to extrapolate from the reading, I don't remember the text ever addressing gay women at all. We were told transgender people were a thing that exists and that's about it.
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Mar 27, 2017 16:04
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Grandmother of Five posted:Thanks again to people who have taken the time to answer questions btw. i went to public school in semi-rural georgia in the 90's, north of atlanta. the local area actually was pretty proud of its school system and dumped a ton of money into it, think corrupt small town politicians and the same three families maintaining political power for decades but instead of lining their pockets (which they did, but not excessively) they maintained their grip on power by lavishly funding education. it was and still is a very religious area, the kind of place where people don't ask you if you go to church, but which church you go to in the second year of high school at around age 15, everyone had to take one period of health class. half of the year focused on physical education so there was a lot of gym, track, weight lifting, aerobics, etc. basically how to exercise and keep your body physically fit the other half of the year was classroom education on nutrition, anatomy, disease, basic first aid, and other classroom instruction on the human body's functions. we didn't have a specific sex education focus, but when talking about the human reproductive system we also talked about sexual infections and contraceptives. sex itself wasn't specifically discussed, but i think this was because then the school district could avoid having to take an abstinence stance to please the churchgoers. so no explicit sex ed, but we discussed pretty much everything to do with sex and pregnancy in a clinical fashion without ever mentioning that people have sex. this meant there was also no discussion of sexuality or LGBT persons. i dont remember if there was an emphasis on all the different kinds of sexually transmitted diseases to scare us away from sex or if i was just focusing on them because i was nervous about sex and dating at the time
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Mar 28, 2017 04:50
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In 1992 0r so i was in the sixth grade, we all had sex ed this same year, and I Brought a condom in wrapper that I stole from my dad. I wanted to show my friends, and laugh about it. We laughed and someone rated me out for having a sealed condom, had to meet wit the principal and swear that I was not going to use it. He kept it. I was suspended. If I was having sex he would have made it worse. This was in Salem Oregon back in the ninties.
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Apr 2, 2017 04:24
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Sounds like a right witch hunt.
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Apr 2, 2017 07:42
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sounds fair do you think it would have been appropriate for you to bring a sealed dildo to school, even if you just intended to laugh at it and not use it?
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Apr 2, 2017 12:06
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Corrode posted:Sounds like a right witch hunt. Wrong Salem
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Apr 2, 2017 15:25
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Ein cooler Typ posted:sounds fair No.
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Apr 2, 2017 15:25
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Appalachian Goon who grew up and lives in rural Pennsylvania. How is the political climate currently in the state and city that you live in? We have a pretty notoriously corrupt state government that we don't expect much help from. It's pretty damned common to hear about officials getting ousted for crazy reasons or pulling out scummy backwoods moves. A rather large amount of people are on the dole due to a lot of towns crumbling both literally and figuratively. Politically, people are diverse. The majority of people lean right on social issues, but with the presence of lots of labor unions, you'll see even quite a lot of red voters supporting old-school Democratic Progressive ideals. Stuff like that is how Pennsylvania gets its status as a swing state during federal elections. What kind of food culture does your local area have? There are only really two regional cuisines out here: Pennsylvania Dutch, and occasional Polish food. PA Dutch food is famously plain and notoriously bland most of the time, save for the desserts. I'd normally chalk the blandness up as a "who's cooking it" thing and can be improved by a few tablespoons of salt, but a well-seasoned meal is a rather big exception. The sweets are heavenly, though. It's like Stouffer's made the dinner while Escoffier made dessert. The Polish food can get surprisingly authentic and delicious and it's not uncommon to find restaurants that make their own pierogies and kielbasa from scratch. How is religious life and worship for you in the states? There's usually one Catholic church and at least 4 or 5 protestant churches of various sects per average mid-sized town here. Considering how right-leaning this area is, you don't run into a lot of bible-thumpers. It kind of seems like people in general are kind of cold on organized religion, as I see lots of churches closing or combining with each other (like a Presbyterian and Methodist church pushing together to make a "Modern Church of Jesus" or something). The most famous feature of the state is probably the Amish/Mennonites/similar sects. They actually don't really talk shop when it comes to religion, though. If you belong to a minority group, do you experience harassment? This is only touching remotely on your question, but communities tend to be very close-knit here, and not in a charming sense. By the time you hit middle school, odds are you'll have met all of your lifelong friends and spouse. My family moved to the area almost twenty years ago and we still often hear people refer to us as "new" to the area. It's so white that while I haven't seen any real bigotry expressed or exhibited here, possibly only because of how culturally homogenized it is. The only acts of harassment I've seen were kids picking on an Indian girl after 9/11 but we pulled her into our group of friends and her parents loved us for it. How familiar are you with other US states than the one you live in? I was born in a pretty diverse area in northern New Jersey that was about 30% white. We were the only family in the neighborhood that spoke English as a first language, while everyone else was some form of Central or Eastern European immigrant. As a result, I could speak a bit of Russian and Hungarian that I picked up from the neighbors who would babysit me. It was then a bit of a culture shock to go from an experience like that to a very rural town where I'd get stared at weird for asking kids to come out and play because most people in the new town didn't socialize outside of their families much. Have you experienced any stereotypes against your nationality or state when travelling? Not really. I haven't traveled since 2015 so I don't know what kind of reception we get now, but I had a good time when I went to parts of Mexico and France a few years ago. I did talk to other chefs in France who said Americans are being less doofy these days but we're still pretty bad which I guess is high praise from a Parisian chef. If someone was to visit the US for the first time, or your state or city in particular, what sights would you recommend? Do some Appalachian hiking in the spring or autumn. It's cooler, but you don't have to put up with the oppressively hot and humid summers, plus the views in autumn are incredible. You can't go wrong finding places for fishing or hunting. For Philadelphia and Pittsburgh, plan around hitting up food spots and museums. They're not very fun cities to just wander around in. [/quote]
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Apr 2, 2017 15:57
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CaptainViolence posted:Montana has sort of a friendly rivalry with North Dakota that's most just jokes about how dumb and flat their state is, and how the dumb, flat eastern part of our state should be given to them as West Dakota. Nothing serious, though. I heard a lot of these growing up in Montana. Like this one: A helicopter pilot crashed in North Dakota. When the rescue team got to him they asked him what happened. He said "I got up to 8,000 feet and it got cold so I turned off the fan" My experience growing up in Montana was that there isn't a real "North VS South" mentality there, because they weren't involved in the civil war. I didn't hear much about the civil war in school growing up. I also didn't experience very much racism other than sometimes about Native Americans. I learned a lot about Louis and Clark. They love that stuff. Probably the greatest thing to ever happen to the state. I lived in Helena, which is a small city and the capitol. One thing that people probably think of when they think of Montana is a vast Mountain wilderness, but there is a lot of extremely flat land as well. My aunt and uncle are cattle ranchers in Northern Montana and it's all flat and full of gulches. Hardly anyone lives up there, and when you drive past people you wave. They hardly ever see people they don't know anyways, so it's best to be polite. They all have a very neighborly way too because they rely on their neighbors for help. If you need a real hospital you need to get to a bigger city and that can be 100 miles away. If a fire happens on their land, they have to rush out to put it out because the nearest fire department can be that far as well. Even with that being true, I have been in the middle of nowhere in Montana, hunting on my Aunts land, and a random game warden has shown up to check my hunting license. Multiple times. The federal government owns a lot of the land up there and it's all flat so they can see you from a ways away. *edit, just saw this question* Grandmother of Five posted:Thanks again to people who have taken the time to answer questions btw. This may be more interesting to some people. I grew up in rural areas and went to public Middle School (11-13) in Idaho and High School (14-18) in one of the most rural and southern parts of Kansas (population 9,000). In both places, they are extremely Republican, and I received sex education. It was mandatory, once a year they would split up boys and girls during PE (gym class) for a week and teach us about sex. Education Videos and proper use of contraception and birth control and STDs especially. That was the main focus. They would let us ask questions anonymously as well. As for LGBT issues? No, that wasn't covered during my sex ed in the late 1990's- early 2000's in my rural schools really. The main focus was how scary STD's are though so that would help with everyone. Trump.mp4 fucked around with this message at 22:22 on Apr 2, 2017 |
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Apr 2, 2017 21:04
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Grandmother of Five posted:How is the political climate currently in the state and city that you live in? My state is dark red but it's one of those red states where there are a lot of stupid hicks and mountain men who just hate things they don't understand, not one of those red states where it's families of thousand year old draculas trying to feast on the world economy. The city is the one blue speck in the state that most red states have. Lots of subarus, rock climbers, snowboarders, weed smokers, and low grade intellectuals in the actual city, but if you approach the edges of town where the Walmarts lie you start hearing people yelling stuff to their children about "Quit acting like goddamn Obongo gave you the right!" quote:What kind of food culture does your local area have? if you're into cooking, or simply know of some local delicacy, please share a specific dish, with a recipe if you have one, of something that you enjoy making or buying yourself that would be representative of your local food culture. Food here is terrible, worst thing about the area. I lived in Thailand and China and Taiwan and NYC for long time before this and regularly find myself cooking stuff simply because what I want is not available here. It seems like every loving restaurant just has the same list of 12 different lovely sandwiches to choose from. We do, however, have a ridiculous number of fully functional commercial breweries (maybe 1 for every 5,000 people that live here, plus a few distilleries) and the beer is better here than anywhere other than maybe Belgium. However thanks to my recently discovered issues with gout, which was never a problem before, I can no longer drink a drop of it. quote:How is religious life and worship for you in the states? As an outsider, it appears as if religious life might vary pretty wildly from state to state, with some US areas having markedly different religious demographics than others. I'd be especially interested in whether people experience any prejudice or bias against their religious practice, or lack thereof, in their home states, or from US society at large. You average person in this town thinks that religion causes more problems than it solves and doesn't want much to do with it. If you go outside the city a bit though your average person thinks Jesus is an irreplaceable good that everyone should have personal contact with to a respectful degree. There are very few people here, even outside of town, who think an organized church is a good thing. We've got a handful of jews as well and a few Natives who actually try to do some "tobacco offerings" kind of stuff once in a while too. quote:If you belong to a minority group, do you experience harassment? If you do and you are willing to share personal anecdotes, and thoughts about how your state or city might differ from other areas in the US, then please do. quote:How familiar are you with other US states than the one you live in? Like, how many different ones have you lived in, or visited for a shorter or longer period of time. Are some states essentially as foreign to you, or even more, than some foreign countries might be? Do you feel as if there is animosity between your home state and other states? I've never been to the South, which means the southeast. I find their accent to be really grating and think it makes them sound stupid and I have to be careful to contain those kinds of thoughts when I'm talking to some well meaning southerner as they might actually be very intelligent. I have no respect for the hick simpletons that infest much of the center and southern part of the country, vote against their own interest, and refuse to read. If you cut the bottom right corner of the US off and made it its own country and merged the top half and West coast with Canada you'd have a much more rational division of North America. Also all the stats people see about how poo poo the US is would flip overnight. We carry the south and the midwest around like a brick tied around our neck. quote:Have you experienced any stereotypes against your nationality or state when travelling? Yes. Lots of people want to poo poo on the US at me once they find out I'm American. I don't read as terribly American abroad because I don't wear jeans, am literate and am politically liberal and the kind of people that want to tell me how much America is poo poo don't understand that it's people like me that run everything other than the government in the US, so they don't think of me as being very American. Once while waiting in line in Bangkok I was waiting in a line to change some dollars into baht and heard an American accent in the line ahead of me. It was a cute looking girl talking to her friend. I had been in Bangkok for maybe a month at that point and there are actually very few Americans in Bangkok (tons of British) as most of them seem to go up to Chiang Mai for whatever reason. So I said "Hey are you American?" in kind of a hopeful voice and she said "NO! I'M CANADIAN!" I'm sorry to the Canadians reading this but if you take any given Canadian and then go 100 miles south and pick and American out, someone in a state adjacent to the Canadian province, those two people are going to be indistinguishable. Yeah I can tell you apart from a Texan. Big deal. But you're as American as any American. quote:If someone was to visit the US for the first time, or your state or city in particular, what sights would you recommend? The US is a difficult place to visit because a) it's huge, b) there are cities you would want to visit here because of the weight they swing internationally, and c) the stuff you want to see is not all in one place. The biggest mistake visitors make is not seeing at least one of our natural parks which are phenomenal attractions. So you should try to find a way to see 1) New York City, 2) one of Yosemite, Yellowstone, Glacier or Grand Canyon national parks, and 3) whatever else interests you. If you're looking for common level things that are done very well in America that most other countries gently caress up consider searching out a) American style barbecue, b) a good cocktail house, c) a blues performance, or d) some stand up comedy especially if you're in NYC or Chicago. Additionally if you're interested in hunting or fishing some of the best places in the world to do either are in the US.
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Apr 2, 2017 22:51
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Plan Z posted:I did talk to other chefs in France who said Americans are being less doofy these days but we're still pretty bad which I guess is high praise from a Parisian chef. Paris trails after NYC as far as cuisine goes these days and it pisses them off something fierce.
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Apr 2, 2017 22:52
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Plan Z posted:Appalachian Goon who grew up and lives in rural Pennsylvania. Is there a clear Catholic/Protestant divide in Pennsylvania, or if you know, the Northeast in general? In rural northern/Midwest it's non existent in my experience. Trump.mp4 fucked around with this message at 23:22 on Apr 2, 2017 |
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Apr 2, 2017 23:18
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Trump.mp4 posted:Is there a clear Catholic/Protestant divide in Pennsylvania, or if you know, the Northeast in general? If by "clear" you mean people are definitely Catholic or Protestant, then yes. Any kind of animosity is long gone, with the exception of some of the more backwater areas, (specifically where the KKK and the like still has a foothold). Like, my dad is Lutheran and my mom's family is Roman Catholic. It was never really a big deal, but my sister and I were Raised Catholic(tm). We'd do Christmas Eve at my dad's old church but that was about it. You'd notice small stuff, like my dad not going up to receive Communion and such, since he wasn't confirmed. Interesting family anecdote: I found out that when my pretty much secular grandfather got "permission" to marry my grandmother, one of the stipulations from her family was that all children would be raised strict Catholics. Fun times. This was the early 1940s though.
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Apr 2, 2017 23:58
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LogisticEarth posted:If by "clear" you mean people are definitely Catholic or Protestant, then yes. Any kind of animosity is long gone, with the exception of some of the more backwater areas, (specifically where the KKK and the like still has a foothold). That's very interesting. Thanks! It may be a Catholic thing, but both my Uncle (whom was Protestant) and my brother (whom was Methodist) had to convert to Catholicism to marry their spouses. It was never a big deal though. It was in Montana and Kansas. Their views were "it's basically the same thing, Christian is Christian" by them. I wonder if there is a bigger Catholic/Protestant divide in parts of Europe.
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Apr 3, 2017 01:07
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Trump.mp4 posted:I wonder if there is a bigger Catholic/Protestant divide in parts of Europe. Nope, not at all. Not ever.
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Apr 3, 2017 02:30
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