Comments on: The Ugly American and other stereotypes

By: Jon Anderson

Jon Anderson — Sat, 08 Aug 2009 23:10:13 +0000

I always laugh at the French when they complain about the number of English words creeping into their language. They forget that 25% of our vocabulary has a French derivation. (Anyone remember 1066?)

Trying to keep your language “pure” is a joke.

By: Carole Fite

Carole Fite — Thu, 23 Jul 2009 20:35:13 +0000

I assume the “Ugly American” is too obese to travel nowadays?
Nasty, huh?

By: Horst Engels

Horst Engels — Thu, 23 Jul 2009 20:10:40 +0000

Americans, despite what we would like to believe, are hardly ever singled out or disliked anywhere. You would have to go to a hard-core country (Iraq/Afghanistan) AND find a truly hard-core hater. If Americans are ever singled out, it is because the person is a weiner. Having been to umpteen countries, and lived in a number, I can attest that Americans are better liked, and better behaved than the majority of the British and German tourists. And don’t believe the press. The French like Americans. They are just cool-ish toward everybody. So they aren’t looking to make best friends in 5 minutes. They are an awesome people, and they typically really like Americans.

By: Robert

Robert — Thu, 23 Jul 2009 18:23:44 +0000

I am an American and have never traveled to Europe.
My wife wants to go to France and personally I would rather skip visiting a country where Americans are not liked. While on vacation in the British Virgin Islands I brought this same subject of visiting France with one of the local Brits and he assured me that it is not true that the French dislike Americans.. he said they dislike everyone. I feel much better now that we werent being singled out.

By: Expat American

Expat American — Thu, 23 Jul 2009 11:41:35 +0000

As a traveller and expat who is also an American, my philosphy is to channel the standard of behavior set by Rudyard Kipling’s “If” (though I do not always measure up) and look for the good in people and situations. While, strangely enough, certain stereostypes hold true for a sufficiently large percentage of time to continue being stereotypes (i.e. loud Americans, rude French, melencholy Danes, etc), I have met a good cross-section of nationalities and find that stereotypes are generalities that seem to “generally” apply to certain nationalities but are by no means a way to define individual people. I have met the good, the bad, the beautiful, and the ugly from many nations and find that in the end, you are dealing with individuals and your own paricular bias which is also influenced by your culture and nationality.

By: Lisa

Lisa — Wed, 22 Jul 2009 22:20:30 +0000

I’m pretty much resigned to people wanting to dislike Americans wherever I go. (Except in Kosovo; there, we can do no wrong. Last fall, I actually got out of a ticket I totally deserved “out of respect for your being an American”.)

So I try to make a habit out of tipping outrageously and thanking everyone as profusely as possible for everything in sight (hopefully in some reasonable facsimile of the local language).

I like to hope that my own little personal foreign policy campaign might change a few minds, just a little.

By: Mr Holiday

Mr Holiday — Wed, 22 Jul 2009 19:56:51 +0000

As an assistant hotel manager and booking supervisor I’d say Canadians would be a close second to the French in both rudeness and being stingy -
but I’m just speaking from personal experience. A guest is a guest no matter what.

By: Nahnook

Nahnook — Wed, 22 Jul 2009 19:49:46 +0000

Racial profiling is like Astrology, it has to be right at some point. Only the ignorant and lazy employ it.

I can be the loudest person in the room, or the mouse in the corner; neither occurrence is because I’m American.

By: Derek D

Derek D — Wed, 22 Jul 2009 16:14:42 +0000

OK, so little bit of a typo. America is just OVER 200 years old. Can’t let that one go unchecked. Anyway, please continue to the next post with this in mind…

By: Derek D

Derek D — Wed, 22 Jul 2009 16:13:16 +0000

America is less that 200 years old. It is being compared to countries that are thousands of years old. So the fact is “American” traits are really just the collective traits of the many people of many cultures that felt they would rather live here than in thier own land. So that any person from any nation should exclude their own culture’s misgivings from those of Americans is pure hypocracy. How many French, Italian, Englisn, Canadian, and German-Americans are there? Uh, 60+%, or more. eople who live in glass houses shouldn’t throw stones.

I’ve traveled all over the world. I’ve found almost without exception, that most people are kind, welcoming and interested, and only a few live out the stereotypes we all know so well. And I’ve seen people in this country do good deeds without a second thought that made me re-evaluate my own personal standards of goodness. Complaining about other people’s differences is just complaining. The details of the discontent of malcontents is really of no interest to me…