There’s some truth in that. A radio correspondent travelling around the world recently reported, “No one hates us as much as we do”.
A magazine interview with somebody who had lived in Canada, which I read the other day, reported that irony, sarcasm, and self-deprecatory humour were quite unknown to them. “If you didn’t speak the literal truth, in an earnest voice, you were looked on as baffling or untruthful”. [I’m paraphrasing slightly]