Quote of the Day
French-American here — spent 20 yrs in France, 13 in the US. Let me speak to this.
I think the only reason Europoors tolerate their miserable existence is because they tell themselves lies about what the rest of the world is like. They eat gruel in their AC-less social housing while the most awesome party in history is being thrown just next door.
If you hang out in France, you’ll routinely hear them say things like: “in the US, people die in front of hospitals” (they literally believe this to be the case) or “our social system is the envy of the world.”
Their image of the US is completely delusional, and they are often shocked to discover that when they visit here. Their Marxist media brainwashed them into thinking America is some Dickensian horror, with Monopoly-style fat capitalists running around with their top hats and monocles, exploiting dirt poor workers.
…
Now, how do Americans perceive the French (and Europeans at large)?
Well, the tragic reality is that they really, truly don’t think of them. They may cross their minds once a month, at most. Why would they think of that irrelevant backwater of a continent?
The few times they do come to mind, it is, at best, as a quaint vacation spot. A nice place to sip espresso and spend their American dollars — which go such a long way in these third world countries! The closest comparison is how Europeans think of Thailand or Cambodia.
That’s at best. At worst, they think they’re a lazy, entitled, smug, snobbish, rude people with a bright future behind them, who confuse regulation for progress, don’t realize their economies were left in the dust a very long time ago, simply stopped innovating because they’ve lost the will, ability, or both, and who would rather brag about their 60%(!!) public spending to GDP ratio than fix their communist shit hole of a system.
Nice wine though.
Flo Crivello @Altimor
Posted on X, November 26, 2025
I am reminding of something told to me by a person raised in China:
… the schools in China taught that in the U.S. there was lots of food but only the rich could afford it. And rather than let the poor people have food for an affordable price the rich would dump the excess food in the ocean. The fact that food is so plentiful and cheap that poor people in this country are obese apparently didn’t make it through the censors.
I am also reminded of something the president of a small company (about $25 million a year in the mid 1980s) told a small group of us once. Paraphrasing some, “People in other countries have no idea what it is like to live in the most powerful country in the world. Someone in a country that is number five or seven, might be able to come close to imagining what it is like living in a number two or three country. But even the number two country doesn’t know what it is like living in the number one country. And living in the number one country, we have no idea what it is living like in even the number two country.”
I didn’t really understand that then. I understand a little bit now. I have no reason to believe it is wrong.
Those of us who have been to a lot of those other countries know exactly what it’s like to live in the(still) most powerful country in the world – in spite of the commie-crats in congress and elsewhere doing their damn-ist to destroy it.
(Used up 5 passports in my travels as a field engineer)
When I traveled to Western Europe for work I got lectures. When I travel to Eastern Europe for work I got questions.
Being stationed in the UK by the USAF as my first tour of duty was instructive. Yes, the dollar went far, the history was delightful, and the dating was on easy mode if you steered clear of the other Americans for that purpose.
Being stationed in Boston for my second was horrifying. Beautiful place (whole region, in fact), lots of history, ruined by the people that live there and their Euro-wannabe tendencies.
An example of the arrogant ignorance of continental Europe is their belief that thermal shock, from warming up quickly, is a huge threat.
As a naturalized citizen immigrant from Holland I recognize the points made in that article very clearly.
It’s been pointed out often that many countries use the term “subject” rather than “citizen” for the people in the country.
It’s an interesting exercise to read the constitutions of other countries. Some don’t have one; the UK is an obvious example, silly claims to the contrary notwithstanding. Holland has one but it itself declares itself to be unenforceable (article 120, look it up, there’s an official English language version online). Not to mention that it suggests it protects various human rights, like free speech, but all those “protections” come with weasel words such as “subject to everyone’s responsibility under the law” — which I read as “void where prohibited”.
but all those “protections” come with weasel words such as “subject to everyone’s responsibility under the law” — which I read as “void where prohibited”.
The Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms does that weasel wording right at the start: “1 The Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms guarantees the rights and freedoms set out in it subject only to such reasonable limits prescribed by law as can be demonstrably justified in a free and democratic society.”
That whole “reasonable limits prescribed by law” part turns every right that follows into a government-managed privilege. And yet people in Canada believe they have rights.
There’s a reason I don’t live there anymore. Today, I would take an Idaho winter over an Ontario one. If I’m going to freeze in a hobbit hole, at least I’m going to be armed and be able to practice my stages from a heated garage!
It’s interesting how perceptions from both sides are so shaped by media and stereotypes. The idea that Europeans think of the U.S. as a Dickensian nightmare and Americans mostly ignore Europe entirely speaks to how disconnected people are despite globalization. I wonder if both sides would benefit from just spending a bit more time *listening* to each other.
This is an excellent point. My own experience of this relates to the extensive reach, for many decades, of American TV shows in the British Isles. The vast majority of the residents of the UK and Ireland have spent their lifetimes consuming American television, particularly sitcoms. Many are some of their favorite shows. IMO, American sitcoms, for decades, give you a pretty good flavor of what American life is like, despite literary license in order to entertain. However, despite this, I have for years found it very odd that these British Isles consumers of US TV who have never visited the US have such little comprehension about what American life is like or how Americans think or act with one another. Perfect example of extensive globalism not yielding a good understanding of the “other”.
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I enjoy traveling to Europe. It is good in controlled dosages.
I was there twice this year. Four or five times before that. Plus, three or four times to the U.K.
We enjoyed most of it. The last trip included Auschwitz, Dresden, Omaha, and Utah beaches and associated museums. “Enjoyed” is not the appropriate word to describe it. But we are glad we went.
I am married to a German national and we do spend several months a year in the Fatherland. When Obamacare was first discussed in Congress, the German media told readers (or viewers) that up to now there was no such thing as health insurance in the United States. Now, thanks to the Obama/Messiah this deficiency will be remedied if the mean old Republicans allow it.
The point above that the European media tells lies about the US because it keeps the serfs peaceful and obedient is well taken.
Foreign countries, hell! My gay cousin in California, who grew up here with me, is afraid to come to Tennessee because she’s heard we’re dangerous.
Just because you don’t need a passport doesn’t mean California isn’t very foreign.
I am afraid to go to CA where everything causes cancer.
Tennessee is the only place my septum ring has gotten so much as a second glance.
I wouldn’t call it dangerous, though.
Waking up in Arcachon right now and saw Sarah Hoyt’s link at Instapundit. We are from Mississippi–yes, that Mississippi. We spent Thanksgiving week at the university in Bordeaux and are now on a three day holiday. (Paid for entirely on AmEx points!)
You would think there would have been lots of talk of politics among our university hosts. Not a peep. They were interested in what’s going on in the US academies and that was as close to politics as we got. I found individuals in Bordeaux quite friendly–not Southern friendly, but not New York style jerks.
We did some shopping yesterday in Arcachon–the market, a fish market, a bakery. Interacted with several individuals who were overwhelmingly helpful. Not one had a sense of superiority. As country folk, we do not present ourselves as betters. Just regular people pointing our phones at labels trying to translate the names of local fish.
In the last few years we’ve been in Hungary, Romania, Austria, Finland and Poland. Cannot speak to the entire world, but our experience is that regular people are just that, regular people navigating their little corner of the world as best they can. As are we.
I am blessed–as we say in the South–to have had the fortune to have been born in America.
Your comment re ‘NY jerks’ is ill-advised. My long experience with NYC is that it’s a mirror. Whatever you expect to see, you will see. What you put out, you will get back. My personal experience is that New Yorkers are some of the most warm-hearted people out there. Stand on a street corner with a map, drop gloves in a subway car, roll a stroller or large suitcates near a flight of steps, you will see what I mean. People are blunt, sometimes in a hurry, but NYC is often a very kind place. For more insight, do a google search for ‘O’Henry The Making of a New Yorker’ – full text or read aloud on youtube (there’s even a modern version of it, look for the two minute video of a young blonde woman walking in the city under the same search results) – it’s a short story, written over 100 years ago, still true today.
Years ago I was very active on a WW2 gaming forum that had a ton of Europeans and some Aussies, South Africans, etc. Over a few years I ran an informal “poll” in that, when it was in-context to a conversation I would ask non-Americans what they thought their country “stood for” in their opinion. Almost 100% I got versions of “what a stupid question”. Never an answer. Not even if I redoubled on the question. They were so eager to be post-nationalists. So eager to be upset if I ever couched an answer to a question or challenge in the concept of “When America sneezes, the whole world catches cold.”
They all know we’re #1, and they resent it, but pretend not to.
I also sometimes remember the advice when I started my IT career from a young-but wise junior exec who warned me “the Brits are lazy and will just refuse to work on a task because they know that Americans are impatient and will just do it themselves.” Boy, in MY experience, was she ever right!
Having lived in Germany, France, Italy, and now francophone Switzerland, I can confirm the thought patterns in the post, but the effect is weaker now than 30 years ago, because of the fracturing of media into thousand niches, blogs, tiktok and youtube and instagram sources. A high level in English is common in Europe now, such that they only need me to switch to French for nuanced points. Reminds me of the “You can’t stop the signal” message that character in Serenity insisted on.
The caricatures transmitted by socialists in state media, statist media and state schools don’t work like they used to. France in particular has lost its control of pop culture and language there to the maelstrom of digitally delivered media from everywhere. Listening to French or Italian radio shows the announcers switch to excellent American English accents mid sentence to pop in one word or phrase from American culture.
I think the Europeans’ old caricatures of life in America are being fractured to bits. On the other hand American perceptions of Europe are still a bit like the Don Draper moment in the elevator where he states “I don’t think about you at all”.
Now do evil Russia.
This is so true. In the 80s and 90s I was stationed overseas in Spain, Greece and Italy. Also before that an exchange student for a year in Germany at a Ruhr university. Add to this my flying over a bunch of Sh1tholes for two years. One had a famous civil war going on. Nice, even quaint, place to vacation in spots for the history but don’t miss the butano, rods sticking out of the eternal construction, no ice or A/C, general feeling that your “betters” have their boot on your neck and their hands in your pocket. And since then they have let the third world in Camp of the Saints style. Good luck Europe. I think we are wising up here. Socialism and neu-feudalism suck.
We flew into Nice to catch a cruise departing from Monte Carlo. This was during the second “W’ campaign. We were two couples with an unholy (and uncool) pile of luggage for a 15-day cruise. The French customs officers were pretending to be amazed that Americans could still afford to travel to Europe. My better half grabbed my arm knowing that if I held forth, they’d check every bag. The best part was toasting “W’s” successful campaign in a dining room filled with New Yawkers and Euros. Priceless, indeed.
Just returned from a 2 1/2 week vacation in Germany and Czechia: Random observations:
Not a single train itinerary survived as planned / scheduled, but in every case what the system lacked in reliability, it made up for in redundancy. I always got where I was going.
Hotel affordability is all over the map, and is seldom reflected in the quality of accommodations. I had a fantastic stay in Dresden on the main square for only $100/night, but a similar hotel (same chain – Hilton) in Munich was more than 2x, and in Prague, 4x (hard pass) – found a modest, but spotless, room across the street for 1/4 the cost. Interestingly, I could see the Prague Hilton from my hotel, and judging on the lights: most rooms were empty. They should probably re-think their price structure.
As a proud American, I truly hate to say this, but the food there is better and cheaper. Now, European salaries May mean they spend a higher percentage on food. But in terms of what I pay here: Europe wins hands down. For the price of some microwaved out of a Sysco pouch slop you’d get at a US national ‘casual’ chain, you get a proper meal, cooked by a real person, made of real food (usually local and seasonal), presented artfully with exquisite beer that’s cheaper than a coke. (American brands are pricy in Europe). Beer is typically 1/3 to 1/4 what it is in American cities.
If you go to a street vendor, you get a real sausage (probably made that morning by an actual butcher) grilled in front of you, and served on a roll (almost certainly baked that morning by a local bakery) and slathered in real mustard. And you get that for the same price that you’d pay in a US city for a lips, and @$$e$, and filler hotdog that’s been in warm grey water for a week, on a tasteless bun full of chemicals, and swimming in yellow goo all made in factories hundreds of miles away and frozen months ago.
If you pop into a bar for an afternoon bracer? You get a world class beer with actual flavor, and… instead of some deep fried, batter dipped, well, anything, because once it’s deep fried it all tastes like month old dirty fryer grease… well, some of the snacks I had for typically $8-$12: soft pretzels with Obatzda (beer cheese of the gods – not melted velveeta in a plastic cup), or duck rillets with carmelized onion jam over rustic bread, or pork brawn (head cheese) with shaved red onion, or chicken liver pate with rye bread, or artisanal cheeses and meats, or you get the picture: real gourmet food, for the price of some sh!tty jalapeño poppers served on wax paper to keep it off the red plastic basket that hasn’t been washed in… probably ever.
To eat that well in the US, you’d need to search hard and pay several times the price, and bluntly in a lot of America: you can’t eat that well. That quality isn’t available.
Now that I think about it, it might actually be worth bailing them out of the wars those clueless fools bumble themselves into a couple times a century.
One catch: you get a high quality beef tar tar, but they have no idea how to fry or grill that into a proper burger. Great bun? Easy, fresh toppings, yep! the Patty? Always over-cooked hockey puck. I honestly can’t comprehend how they get it so wrong. Don’t order a burger in Europe.
Beef in general: expensive, and hard to find a good steak. They just don’t have the grazing land. They keep a bull or 2 handy to service the dairy herds, but the male calves become veal, which IS affordable-ish, and much easier to find than in the US.
“how do Americans perceive the French?”
All men have side chicks?
You forgot “surrender monkeys…”
The story of the Dean’s box deserves wider exposure:
http://unremittingverse.blogspot.com/2002/05/?m=1#76815677