To see what I mean, here are some examples from places that I have experience of:
The EU:
(1) That Europe is the centre of world civilisation (still) and that apart from maybe North America and Australasia, the rest of the world is a wholly undeveloped mass of poverty and subsistence.
(2) That knowing about different parts of the EU makes one particularly cosmopolitan, and that thus Americans are particularly closed-minded and insular. Europeans will often push the low passport ownership in the US in support of this claim, but it seems to me that only a small proportion have travelled outside the EU, even to nearby places like Israel or North Africa.
Japan:
(1) That the rest of the world is very dangerous. Now, Japan is very safe, but people are always shocked to find out that UK police don’t carry guns.
(2) That Japan is the most expensive place in the world.
The USA:
(1) That other countries, especially European ones, are ethnically and culturally static and homogeneous. This drives me nuts: it’s almost as if they see different countries as (potential) ingredients for the ‘melting pot’ and nothing else. Relatedly, that your great-grandparents emigrated from a certain country means that you have much in common with me, a citizen of that country.
American: “I’m Irish”
Me: “Oh cool, where are you from, Dublin?”
American: “Uh no, Boston”
(2) That Iran is some kind of ruthless dictatorship that would be incredibly dangerous to visit. When I mention to USian friends my hope to go there this year, you can really see how much even left-wing graduate students have swallowed the propaganda.
Er… it’s sorta kinda hard to NOT feel that way when there’s a Big Scary Travel Warning about Americans going to Iran. If nothing else, our two countries don’t have decent enough relations that the US can even provide any protection or help via their embassy if an American runs into trouble there.
Propaganda or not, my feeling is that there’s plenty of places to vacation where the population doesn’t have really good reasons to not like Americans, and where if I do run into trouble, there’s an American Embassy with the power to help me out if needed.
Interesting, though, that the warning doesn’t mention any threats to non Iranian-Americans? (In any case, I know several Iranian Americans who split their time between the two places).
I’m not saying it’s completely danger-free, but it seems to me that USian people believe that Iran is something on a par with North Korea or Iraq, which genuinely would be very repressive and dangerous.
A lot of my fellow Americans tend to believe that every other country in the world is a dangerous hellhole compared to the U.S. Many of the people I now hang out with are quite internationally savvy, but the general attitude in my hometown region was that international travel is an inherently dangerous thing. My parents refused to let me travel internationally–to Austria–when I was a minor because of this. Some of my relatives thought I was nuts to go to Mexico on my own, and they couldn’t conceive of the fact that I felt safer there than I’d ever felt anywhere in the U.S.
Then there is the ‘‘hellhole’’ thing – they seem to imagine every non-U.S. country as filled with poverty and crumbling infrastructure, when that’s simply not the case. And even developing countries are further along than they imagine.
An American without a passport has never left his own COUNTRY, an entirely different issue that a european who has never been outside the EU. You can travel to plenty of other countries within the EU, in some cases even without a passport.
And neither Israel or North Africa are “close” to most european countries. I’d say it’s easier to get to America, and I’ve been there (pre-WTC, but still…)
Got to disagree with you here: the EU is about the same size as the USA (very roughly!) and you don’t need a passport to travel within it (well, within Schengen or between UK and IRL). Until recently, I think, you didn’t need a passport to travel to Canada from the USA. Aside from language barriers, I think travel within Schengen/Eurozone is quite similar to travel within the USA: no passport checks, same currency, takes a few hours.
So it does smack of hypocrisy to mock USians for not owning passports (ie, for not travelling outside North America) whilst never or rarely travelling outside of the EU.
I think you’re way off here - sure, Israel’s a bit far, but easyjet flies to North Africa and there are regular and fairly cheap ferry services. How many EU citizens have even been to Ukraine or Turkey?
The US is much, much further away than any of these places, even from the UK.
That will be the case in the future, with tightened border restrictions. However I visited both Canada ( more times than I can count ) and Mexico long before I ever got mine.
Does one need a passport to enter Canada and Mexico? I’ve always kind of had the impression that you need ID and nothing more. (Come to think of it, I’ve been to Canada and I didn’t have a passport then.) Also, I don’t have a passport now–it’s expired–but I have been to a bunch of other countries. Statistics of valid passport ownership won’t reflect the number of people who have been abroad but whose passports have expired.
I think you’re missing the unstated assumption in that conversation. An American who wants to state his ancestry will say “I’m Irish,” which really means “my ancestors came from Ireland.” Since it’s usually completely obvious that he is not actually from Ireland–the lack of accent, the fact that he’ll tell you he’s from Boston–it doesn’t need to be stated. It’s just a point of interest, it doesn’t mean you’re now blood brothers or anything.
I know now what it means, but the above conversation took place in China, and it wasn’t obvious that he was born in the US. I thought he really was telling me he was from Ireland (as for the accent, I was thinking maybe he moved to US/Canada when he was younger or something).
I’m not having a go or anything, but it was just something that tripped me up. I do think, however, that USians often think that ancestry carries more weight than it actually does.
A couple of weeks ago, when I was vacationing in Rhodes, my wife and I struck up a brief conversation with a Dutch couple whose freakishly tall 3-year-old was playing with our son. They asked us where we were from, and when we said “Israel”, they looked surprised, and said: “That’s very far!”
Well, no, we said.
Look at a map. The Netherlands are about three times as distant from Rhodes as Israel. Now, Rhodes may be the easternmost point of the EU (I think), but still - we’re not that far away.
Part of it is due to size. If I drive 11 hours east of El Paso, I’m still in the same state. Where do you end up if you drive 1200 km from Paris? Florence, Madrid, Dublin, Copenhagen, the borders of Poland or Slovakia. The scale difference is tremendous. I remember an Irish girl I met New Haven CT who was trying to wrap her head around driving to Rochester, NY. You can’t drive 600 km west from anywhere in Ireland!
As for passports, I’ve come back from Mexico plenty of times without even an ID. I don’t think you can do that now, but for a while you just said “American Citizen” and that was that. You certainly didn’t need any forms or IDs to get into Mexico.
North Africa isn’t close? Berlin to Gibraltar is 3000km. Is there a ferry across? Boom, you’re in Africa. When I started grad school I drove from El Paso to New Haven. That’s 3600km. A flight from Paris to Israel looks to be less than 7 hours. Hardly arduous, and you’re barely changing time zones.
One questionable assumption I can think of is that Americans think that the UK is completely metric, and that we’re the only country that still uses the Imperial measurements.
This isn’t the case; many UK things are if not officially, then still informally set in the Imperial system- beer (pints), road mileage & speeds(miles/mph), weight(stone or lbs), etc…
Another misconception that many people have is that all Mexicans are like those poor guys who mow lawns, bus tables, etc… News flash… there are well-to-do, and even some middle class Mexicans who are much like the rest of us, just that they speak Spanish.
I think you’re misunderstanding the role that ancestry plays in American culture. It DOES carry a lot of weight here. I understand that a person in Russia wouldn’t really give a hoot that my great-grandparents came from there, but another American of Russian ancestry probably would.
Furthermore, people generally try to find commonalities when they’re meeting new people, as in “you went to Pitt? I went to Carnegie Mellon!” This wouldn’t be a point of commonality in Pittsburgh, but to two people living in New Jersey, it would be.
Therefore, it doesn’t surprise me that an Irish-American in China would say that, because to him, being Irish is a very important part of his identity, and therefore, it is something that to him you legitimately have in common.
I’m a Canadian living in Canada and I’ve noticed that many Canadians think that most Americans are rude, stupid idiots. It’s not true, of course, but that’s the impression people have here.
But I suppose this backs up my original claim: Europeans smugly think that Americans are insular, but rarely travel outside an area less than half the size.
Whilst I agree with your point about many Europeans wrongly stereotyping Americans (and being self-satisfied dicks sometimes), I don’t think this is a decent comparison. For a start, in the US you have the same language and culture throughout the states. Not so in the EU. Other EU countries really are foreign to most travellers despite the distance being the same or less.
In the UK, for example, you are likely to get more traveller points for visiting somewhere relatively close by like Warsaw than you are by visting somewhere like Florida where the culture is pretty similar to the UK.