I mean there are lots of smart Americans but in my experience of living over there for a long time, it’s insane how many people just have no clue what’s going on outside their own state, let alone country. Mrs K is from Vermont and Americans are always telling her Vermont is part of Canada.
The kindest thing you can say about Americans - and American politics - is that it's *really big*. To say America is insular is a bit like saying someone who follows UK politics, has a moderate grasp of politics across much of Western Europe but is weak to ignorant about Asia/Africa.
But I think the issue is not how much Americans don't know but more the ignorance-about-ignorance.
There’s a self-sufficiency about American ignorance because it just makes for a closed system. The ignorance just bounces around unquestioned and uncorrected. I found people liked me less when I put them right about, for instance, the UK being a modern democracy.
And that wasn’t me being all “Akchually, I think you’ll find…” it was about me having to provide information just to keep a conversation going.
Part of the wearying thing about digging other people out of conversational holes is that unless you're unusually skilled/put an enormous effort in/they are unusually self-aware they will blame you rather than themselves for the difficulty they put you both in.
It's why the *low-grade schtick* of "Look at me, I'm putting myself in a conversational hole and blaming myself haha look at what a prick I am!" actually often works just because you're establishing yourself as not the above person ("look, the tiniest quantum of self-awareness, see it glimmer!").
Yeah, I usually put my foot in it by accident because I just generally assumed *everyone* knew that shit. Everyone does not know that shit. And I do, to be honest, suffer from a certain, possibly neurodivergent bluntness when it comes to facts.
I find people to generally be surprisingly forgiving/cooperative *once you make it clear that you're not taking it for granted that they'll be forgiving/cooperative*.
Born British in 1959, moved to Texas in 1995, lived there since (apart from 5 years in Canada). A) The “not British cuisine” post and refusal to acknowledge and apologize is inexcusable. B) British cooking and food is fantastically interesting and varied (so is American food) because of …
… all the different influences and people being ready to try different things, and the availability of ingredients. Houston is a glorious city for restaurants. C) The US is, in my view, more culturally insular now than it was 30 years ago when I moved there. US sports involve negligible…