and BTW high schools Do have rivalries with other high schools. Even the ones with sucky football terams come up with something. For example, as a graduate of Stuyvesant High School (another entrance-exam based public high school in NYC) I am required by law to glare at McKenna and holler: “our math team could beat your math team any day of the week, sucker!” if we should ever meet.
Sorry Mckenna, it’s true. 
This is quite true. Back in the 19th Century, many gold prospectors used quite colourful HTML. 
ok, gexgex, I’m mostly rehashing what’s already been said, but in the true American spirit, I’m going to throw in my two cents worth. Besides, since I graduated in June(WHOOOO!) I think I’m fairly qualified to answer most of these. sorry if the responses are a little disjointed.
WARNING! INCREDIBLY LONG POST!
ok, American Pie, and Ten Things I Hate About You were fun movies, and Clueless…I suppose it had it’s merits…maybe… but they were as true to real American high schools as Crocodile Dundee probably was to day-to-day life in Australia.
do you have proms? yes, they’re quite common. usually a club or a class takes over the decoration and organization of the dance. Most are held at the end of May when the weather warms up–just the right temperature for us girls to suffocate in our poofy dresses. and yes, many girls wear the typical horribly expensive cotton-candy colored gowns. Personally…yuck. How are you supposed to party when you need an extra chair for your skirt?
are they as exciting as the movies make out? NO. no live bands, or if they are, they usually suck. no disco ball. (ok, maybe a disco ball, but we’ve never had one.) They’re sometimes held in the gym, sometimes the Prom committee rents a hall; it depends on the school, the budget, weird school traditions, etc. Sometimes a Prom King and Prom Queen are “elected”, and it is usually a popularity contest, but (at my school at least) it’s sort of goofy, and the “positions” aren’t nearly as coveted as they are in the movies.
rmariamp covered corsages–they’re ok, but IMHO, a little old fashioned. They’re usually made out of roses or carnations.
does anyone go to the prom if they don’t have a date? sure! all the time. Proms are just a big party, after all. I didn’t go to my prom, because I was in a “Fight The Establishment!” mood, and other reasons–but no, a girl or guy who “goes stag” won’t be ostracized. and to set another record straight: There is a distinct lack of post-prom drunken orgies in the back seats of cars. Want to know what my best friend and her boyfriend did after the prom last year? They went mini-golfing…or at least, that’s what she told me…
do you have cheerleaders? yeah, and they do actually jump up and down in those bright uniforms with short fluffy skirts (the style shown in movies is actually pretty accurate) and cheer on the boys’ football, basketball, and sometimes baseball teams. sadly, there is quite a shortage of hot guy cheerleaders for the girls’ teams.
are they all perky and stupid (brittany from daria)? Most are perky, I guess. But to jump around in a tight purple and yellow uniform, you’d have to be. There are ditzy people everywhere, but few of the cheerleaders that I know are stupid–half of the squad at my high school were honor students.
are said cheerleaders universally hated by all? Not really. The Hollywood cheerleader image is way off. (again, my experience is limited to one urban high school) People who’re self-centered just because they giggle and show their tush at football games wouldn’t be very popular. Most I know are pretty cool, though. They’re genuine athletes, with rigorous practices, and are required to master complex gymnastics.
are footballers idolised? well, we don’t say “footballers”. we just call 'em football players. and they’re not anymore “idolised” than any other high school sports team.
do they all have cheerleader girlfriends? nope. but FYI, we do actually have “varsity” jackets. The name’s probably traditional, because you don’t have to be on the varsity football team (read: be one of the best, most experienced players) to get one–they’re usually a fundraiser for the sports department. If you want to shell out the cash, it’s yours.
do you have a fashion club, and do you watch all your movies from projector reels? A fashion club? Not at my school, but hey, if a bunch of students wanted to start one, the administrators would probably ok it. If they didn’t the principal would probably have a petition on his desk in a few weeks detailing exactly why the club should be allowed to meet on school property, how the students would benefit from the increased interest in extracurricular activities, etc. most American HS students are beatniks and activists at heart
I haven’t seen a projector reel since those lame movies the librarian showed in my elementary school. Some teachers use overhead projectors in their lessons, but if we’re going to watch a movie, educational or otherwise, we use a TV and VCR.
does every school really have a cool popular kid - with a big house and cool parents - who has cool parties? But of course! Hollywood stole the idea from me! 
seriously, no. at least not in most lower-middle class neighborhoods.
are drama students not cool? nope, that’s another myth.
do you have a lunchroom, and how often do you eat there? is it really disgusting? some schools offer breakfast, but most people only eat lunch there, and yes, the food is horrifying. The older you get, the worse the food is. Or maybe your tastebuds aren’t fully developed in elementary school. Whatever the case, I packed my lunch for 4 years straight, except for those dismal mornings I slept late, and had to face the lunch line. Many American schools have vending machines in their cafeterias, which has become the subject of national debates. The kids obviously prefer Pepsi and pretzels to the “goop du jour”. The cafeteria food may be kind of gross, but it’s got more nutritional value than a twinkie.
can you be socially isolated by not sitting with certain people in the lunchroom? The hierarchy usually isn’t that strict. most people just sit with their friends, who may or may not be in the same club, or the same race, or the same…whatever.
are all the teachers weird? Really, sometimes you win, sometimes you lose. For instance, last year, my sociology teacher was very cool, and I learned a lot. My Spanish teacher, however, was a total nutcase.
is gym class scary, and why don’t you call it p.e? Well, I wouldn’t call it scary, unless the mean, tatooed football coach substitutes… and sometimes we do call it P.E., it’s just not as generally used. I suppose it’s called “gym” because it’s in the gymnasium. I never really thought about it.
what’s the deal with school uniforms? why don’t you have them? oooh, school uniforms… a few public schools have them, or are trying them on a trial basis. Private and parochial schools usually do. Most public schools have dress codes: our school forbade shirts showing the navel, sleeveless shirts, flip-flop sandals, nylon jogging pants, and hooded shirts. Believe it or not, this has been a growing political matter in the past…decade or so, I’m guessing. There have even been court cases and lawsuits on this subject. I’d say most high school kids are against uniforms, just because we like having our own stuff. Besides, those blue wool skirts I see on the girls at the little Catholic elementary down the street look like they itch, big time.
do all students have really cool cars? yes, everyone who’s anyone drives a Porsche. The rest of the riff-raff have to settle for BMWs
no, we don’t. one or two kids might, but they’re the exception–and most of the exceptions have worked their butts off to pay for them. I don’t know whether a larger percentage of American teenagers have cars (I’m guessing yes), but most kids get really cheap POS cars (Piece Of Shit, in case you’re wondering) (or “beaters”) that they can pay for with money saved from a part-time job. I know few people whose parents bought them a car. Some don’t bother. I didn’t (and still don’t) have a car, and I haven’t bothered with my license.
me being 18, doing my final year of high school - what would i be doing were i an american? would i be in college, would i be a high school senior, what? one of those. depends on when your birthday falls. I’ll be 18 next month, and I’m starting college, but some of my friends turned 18 at the beginning of their senior year.
is it at all safe to attend an american high school or is it a haven of firearms? school violence isn’t all that common.
the Starbucks thing is sort of a nationwide inside joke, because they are everywhere, they are expensive, they are packed, and yes, they are disgusting.
are all the aussie bands that we get told are ‘making it big in america’ really gaining any decent exposure? for instance, have you heard of silverchair, savage garden, the living end, the avalanches or frenzal rhomb?
Savage Garden is one of my absolute favorites! I’ve heard of Silverchair, but I haven’t heard of any of the others.
and as far as Australian girls, I’m straight, so I couldn’t tell ya. But I have to go along with the crowd: a male Australian accent is incredibly hot.
ok, I think I’ve done enough posting for a few weeks right here. bye!
I just recently moved to Oregon, so I’m going to comment on this one, because it struck me as funny…
There might well be people like that around here, I sure as hell haven’t seen any, though. Oregon is actually very rigidly divided among the conservatives and the liberals… worse than other places, at times.
I had a friend in Los Angeles whose birth name was Sunshine. That can happen anywhere. Thankfully, she went by Taylor…
Our class structure is fluid, but for a really good look at the way America is lately, look at the schools, since kids learn from their parents and society around them… it’s almost depressing. The people you do see, in mass quantities, are usually stupid, obnoxious, loud, opinionated, and they tend to move in herds. The people you don’t see are the introverts, the quiet ones, the people with minds… they’re often in very small groups, all over. Anyhow… I didn’t have any specific place I was going with this, just wanted to break down that stereotype. That’s another thing about America- when people don’t know, they assume the very worst, and take everybody’s word at face value. Bad idea.
TheLoadedDog asked for some idiosyncrasies and here are some that came to mind for me:
Americans tend to like sweets, and there’s no shortage of items in supermarkets and convenience stores to satisfy their cravings. One may notice more obesity in the States than one’s respective country of origin.
The following accents are sexy for lots of Yanks: Australian & New Zealand, British, Irish, French. The rest… well, probably considered less sexy than the ol’ American accent. Funny thing though, BBC British accents are often used by actors/actresses in US movies and TV to portray sinister characters.
I’ve noticed that Aussies have gobs of abbreviations in their everyday language, whereas Americans have gobs of acronyms.
Americans don’t generally hesitate to take sides. Name any issue, they will likely have a position or take a position if they haven’t already. This doesn’t necessarily imply that we’re argumentative, just that we don’t like to be caught position-less.
I’m not sure if this is universal, but Americans like to see justice being done to other people and dislike justice being done to themselves. They will fight speeding tickets and other traffic offenses even if they are caught red-handed.
You want to know about America?
Excellent! Americans are generally nuts, but in a good way because the majority of her people still believe in wonder, good things, honor, and that good deeds bring just rewards down the line.
An American on the average will give until it hurts if you genuinely need help.
An American will fight hard for your rights if he feels yours are being trammeled.
An American will stop traffic on a super highway to rescue a stray animal or escort ducks across and most of the drivers will agree.
An American will unhesitatingly donate his time, valuable equipment and labor to rescue someone in dire need and throw insurance cautions out of the window.
Americans love to laugh.
Americans actually have a strong sense of right and wrong and will drop what they are doing to see to it that your rights are not suppressed.
Americans love the unique, the eccentric, the creative, and the foolish.
An American will try almost anything, not because of pride nor honor, but just because it is there and looks like fun.
Americans will fight to the death one minute against an enemy, then when the war is over, spend just as much energy and determination patching up the previous foe and helping them recover from their wounds.
Americans are not responsible for the political views of their politicians, and will determinedly tell you this no matter who gets into office.
The average American will allow anyone into this country who is seeking a better life from oppression and will give them assistance, but turn against them afterwards and they will just as firmly throw you out of the nation to fend for yourself.
Americans forgive a lot of things.
Americans love both their individuality as a nation and their homogenization as a people.
The average American is not a racist, but is an ‘attitude-ist,’ meaning he isn’t pissed off because of skin color nor nationality, but because of attitude. Color means nothing to him, but attitude means much.
The average American is a combination of heritage’s and, often, races.
The average American is usually curious about anything different. Most Americans are proud of their nation and her flag and what she stands for. At the same time, most Americans will be their nations most determined critic.
Most also seem to believe that the laws of probability don’t apply to them and that they can do dangerously stupid things with out getting hurt and/or they they are destined to win the lottery.
Or will ignore you laying in the gutter because it is your own fault you are there.
Or he will fight even harder to trample your rights if they offend his sense of ethics.
Thus causing a multi-car accident resulting in many thousands of dollars worth of repair and hospital bills, and most of the other drivers will be cursing him for the dangerous idiot he is.
At others.
Or as mentioned above to suppress your rights because they don’t mesh with the American’s strong sense of right and wrong.
And hate the thought provoking, intelligent or the witty.
Most American’s won’t ever try anything that involves more thought or energy than sitting in front of the television.
As Iraq, Vietnam, Serbia and dozens of Latin American countries can attest.
Americans take no resposibility for the actions of their leaders. Even in the case of patent incompetence the refrain is likely to be, “What can I do? I’m just one man.”
As long as you meet our quotas or are from western Europe. Otherwise we will keep you out with a large armed group called the INS and force you to fend for yourself.
Just not those that matter.
And are likely to attack the person next to them as either being divisive or sheep for being too individual or homonized.
The average Amercian denies being a racist but still blames minorities for their problems. Many will use other philosophies such as ‘attitude-ist’ to explain their racist tendencies.
The average American is of a single cultural heritige which they will often use to deride others.
The average American considers going to Taco Bell to be a cultural experience. Most cannot speak annother language and are ingnorant of other cultures. Most Americans are Fascistically proud of their country and a pattern of cloth which is sometimes incorporated into titilating bathing suit designs. At the same time most Americans are revolted by criticism of their country and will respond with such witicisms as “America, love it or leave it.”
Hopefully most will read this with the humor intended. It is dificult to find anything that “most Americans” agree on. And the above post was a bit over the top with the Apple Pie, Mom and the American Way speach.
[QUOTE]
*Originally posted by Beeblebrox *
**
Sez you! My Texas family knows that sauce is not required. (We use a spice rub, which is typical of central Texas.) The keys are meat on the grill, wood under it and slowwwwwww cooking.
Sigh, there are so many good answers already I just hope I won’t duplicate.
I’d say that whatever America you’re looking for you can find, which makes generalities impossible.
(The miracle is that we’ve managed to get by for 200 years with only one civil war.)
I’ve lived in Seattle, Maryland, North Dakota, Minnesota, and here in New York City since I was 23; I have family I see pretty regularly in Texas, California, Virginia, and Tennessee. All I can really do is tally up idiosyncrasies, but that alone is fun…
Outside the West Coast, most of the U.S. has weather, and often quite a bit more of it than Europeans and Australians are used to. Tropical storms reach much of the East and South, hail will strike anywhere (in Texas, I’ve seen golf-ball sized in July - nothing quite like the thunkathunkathunka of those mothers hitting your roof), blizzards hit anywhere from Walla Walla to Alabama. The old saw is usually true: if you don’t like the weather, just wait a spell. It’ll change.
Informality is integral to our perceiving ourselves as a democracy. First-name basis is usual after the first meeting, and it’s even extending to doctors now (or at least to mine).
Our food is much more than the lowest-common-denominator we export. Take a small thing like pie: every chain restaurant on the Interstate has apple and cherry. But find a local place, and you discover that there’s something much more special. Pecan in Texas, chess in North Carolina, shoofly in Pennsylvania, sour cream in Indiana, real-Key-lime in Florida, wild blueberry in Maine, rhubarb custard in North Dakota, blackberry in Washington, sweet potato in Georgia.
I’ll never forget scheduling my grandmother’s funeral at her church in Fargo. Up there it’s inconceivable to have such a thing and not have food afterwards in the social hall. “Now, if you have the service at noon, we’ll have a hot lunch. If you want it after one o’clock, we’ll serve open-faced sandwiches and bars. Which would you prefer?” (With family coming from out of town, I opted for later - ham salad, egg salad, or turkey sandwiches, with homemade brownies and lemon bars.)
We really do try to get along with one another, I think. Even with people whose views are totally antithetical to our own, provided there’s a way of not bringing the issue up.
One such controversy concerns chicken-fried steak (cheap beef that’s pounded half to death, breaded and fried like chicken): white gravy or brown? I usually favor brown, but if the white gravy is made with sausage I can be convinced.
It’s very hard to get chicken fried steak in New York.
And it’s even harder to get good bagels anywhere else. Especially avoid places that claim to be “just like New York.” They aren’t. (Montreal has very good bagels, and happily seems to have the self-confidence to let them stand on their own.)
OH dear, this has all drifted to food. But I do think it’s a good idea to eat your way through a country, and what’s important is that America’s food gets an undeserved bad rep. You just have to find the real places, and behind the McD’s and Denny’s and Pizza Hut there’s always something real.
Lyllan,
Thank you so much for mentioning the Southern Goodbye. I grew up in the south but have been in NYC for around 10 years and had forgotten all about it. Don’t get me wrong, my brothers and I hated waiting for whomever to shut up talking to our parents so we could leave, but it did make me notstalgic for the past. Ditto for the iced tea.
Once when my mom and dad visited, Dad repeatedly ordered a “co’ cola”, meaning of course “Coca Cola”. The waiter stared at him like he was from Mars. Only when I specified “Coke” did he finally lose that bewildered look.
Damn! So kids in mountain towns in Colorado really don’t have oversized heads and foul mouths? And Canadians don’t have flip-top heads? Shock-horror!!
I’d like to poke in here at rebuke all the people who say that California and the West Coast don’t have “weather”. I live in Northern California, and we have what is generally called a Mediterranean climate, in that it is similar to southern Europe and the Middle East. And yet I never hear people making fun of those candy-ass Italians or Lebanese, with their “lack” of weather. FTR, although it doesn’t snow here (on the coast), it gets very chilly in the winter, and usually rains for months in the winter. And it does snow in California, and quite heavily, I might add. I invite you to look up the location of the 1960 Winter Olympics.
Oh, and on proms: I elected not to go to mine. I guess it was a big deal, but I had no desire to go, and have never regretted it for an instant. But my mom was horrified. She wanted to take me shopping and pay for the whole thing and was pretty upset when I refused.
I second the weather on the West Coast thing. Since when wasn’t there weather in Seattle? Sometimes it snows, mostly it rains, and every now and then, you can even see the sun! Woowoo!
LOL! And I was just about to chime in and tell TheLoadedDog to visit Boston instead of NYC, 'cause Boston is so great! The greatest! Whoo hoo! Go Boston! Um… oops, there I go competing again.
(slight hijack)
On the other hand, I grew up in New York state, where it is understood when you say “The City” you mean NYC, because you could mean no other. In the minds of New Yorkers, there IS no other. I still refer to NYC as “The City” to the confusion of my friends here in Boston.
Motorgirl: “So you want to go to The City this weekend?”
Friend: “Um, aren’t we IN the city already?”
Motorgirl: “No, silly, this is Boston, not The City!”
They’re mostly used to it after 7 years.
In Northern CA, we call San Francisco The City. Even though San Jose is the largest city in the Bay Area, SF is, and will always be, The City. You can actually address a letter “The City” and it will get there okay. The SF Examiner used to refer to SF as The City (yes, with capitals) all the time, before they got bought out and turned into a tabloid. I never thought about it much until I went to college and my Angelino dormmates thought it was funny.
99% of what you see on American television and American films is incorrect. Laughably and sadly so.
America is, to put it simply, good and kind.
In other nations I’ve watched accidents happen and people either mill around looking irritated and bored or curious and unconcerned, where 9 out of 10 times in America, most will get involved instantly.
In other nations, I’ve watched small children wander about aimlessly, or stand crying alone where in America, 9 out of 10 times someone will pay attention and help out.
In America I’ve known White people to defend Black and Black to defend White, even if they did not like each other, but the instance required their action.
In America people have gotten involved to help the police catch criminals and then held the crook safely until the cops arrived. In a few cases, where the criminal’s acts merited it, the civilians have ‘roughed’ him up a bit before the cops arrived, knowing that the officers would not be allowed to do so.
In America I’ve known total strangers to pull refugees out of stormy seas, to fight to keep them alive until medical help arrived, to risk their own health and safety to make sure these exhausted ones are safe and to ask nothing in return.
In America I have known people of vastly different races, creeds, education, and languages to get together and help each other make their neighborhoods safe and nice.
In America, people of different views and races have and still do, fought for each others rights.
No other nation that I know of has so many charities designed to help so many people in other nations freely given to by the populace. American charities range from programs to provide tons of basic staples to hungry nations to sophisticated, advanced hospital aircraft and ships that provide free surgical and medical care to thousands.
America is a land so big that it has different climates from one end to the other, something many Americans as well as foreign visitors tend to forget. In America, a visitor from the Middle East may find a climate similar to his own as well as one from Africa. One may not drive across America in a day or two, like one can in many nations.
America is advanced technology, safe, packaged meats, safe, wholesome tinned or packaged foods and laws designed to punish hard those who would attempt to sell us dangerous goods. America is a press so free that nothing, not even the government, may censor its pages, and this press has cost us billions, but still remains free. America shows it’s dirty laundry to all instead of hiding it and pretending it does not exist.
America is a Chinese restaurant selling down home BBQ wings, tacos and chow mien in the same building. America is knowing that the cop on the corner is not going to kill you, to fleece you nor to ticket you because he’s in a bad mood. America is knowing that the military is not going to turn on you, rape your women, torture your brothers nor behead your fathers and burn your homes.
America is knowing that there is a lawyer willing to sue almost anyone if you have a beef with you cannot resolve through other means. America is giving high penalties to major crimes and lessor penalties to minor ones, not giving that guy 2 years for using his cell phone while driving and giving the car thief, who was chased for 4 hours, hit two cars and smashed into a house, 6 months. America is the right to bear reasonable arms and the right to get sued and prosecuted if you use them wrongly.
America is the right to act publically like an ass and the right to be seen by others as an ass.
America is the right to disagree and agree without fearing death from such actions.
Nah.
Easterners tend to be a bit more brusque. The South has an ingrained politeness that it demonstrates better than any other region, but under certain circumstances, the people there are capable of being the most suspicious of strangers, as well. (“Capable” does not equal “are,” it varies by circumstance.) The nicest, most helpful people I have encountered (and I have visited all but two states, most of them several times) have been in NYC. However, there is a general friendly attitude throughout the whole country that is simply demonstrated differently by region.
As to the fear and violence portrayed on TV, I live within 20 miles of a medium-large city (500,000 city, 1.5M metro) and I have not locked my house except when I went on vacation in 18 years. The only “incidents” we’ve had on our street involved neighborhood kids and did not amount to felonies. (I have also lived in a neighborhood where I did not show the key to my building if a stranger was within 100 feet of me, so it is obviously a neighborhood-by-neighborhood situation.)
A hijack about Anal Scurvy’s visit to Oakland. I assume he went to Oakland, CA, and not one of the other, smaller US Oaklands.
Oakland can be a strange place (I was born in SF, went to high school in Oakland, college in Berkeley). It shares a border with Berkeley which may be the universal center for weird/different people, and its elected mayor is Jerry Brown, ex-Governor of California, called “Governor Moonbeam.” I don’t think the people of Oakland are at all put off by people looking or acting ‘different.’
Oakland has always suffered from being the city across the bay from San Francisco, never quite up to par, the poor relative. During most of the past three decades it was called “Cokeland” because of drugs, gangs, murders. It has cleaned up dramatically (most likely because so many young men are in jail, but that’s another post) and there is some spirit of even further revival. I frequently meet people who tell me they’re from the ‘East Bay’ and I know they mean Oakland because they would admit to Berkeley, Alameda, San Leandro, Piedmont, etc. Back in the '60s and '70s it was the home of the Black Panthers, SLA, and a few other militant groups.
It could be that when an outsider appears, the residents are wary that negative comments might be made and they’ve heard it all. It’s a sore spot with lots of my relatives who are always on the defensive, even with me (and I like Oakland!)
Yup, getting into a hooker’s car is not a wise idea - ask Hugh Grant. In this instance, listen to your Yank friends!