• I definitely don’t? I was just providing my experience for the place I live. Obviously not all places are the south…? And good for you on your ‘more civilized place’, but we’re not talking about those areas.

    Seems to me that, to solve rent crisis, Americans should just move into Europeans’ heads, since we seem to live there rent free already.

    • I think that was a stab at you saying “living in the south” as if it automatically meant south of the USA. So your US-centric world view shines through. I think no one wanted to attack your world view per se, but rather your bias.

      And regarding your second comment, why so passive-aggressive? Obviously the US lives in everyone’s head rent free because it messes around with the whole world. Don’t get offended by people trying to point out that there is more in the world than one single country.

        • I guess it adds to the problem that it’s very context specific. When you are in your country talking in your mothertongue with someone, you would probably only say “the south” to refer to the south of your country (or another by society predefined south).

          And while we are on a mostly English-speaking platform inhabitated by mostly US people, I’ve heard US people throwing around US specific terms in a lot of different contexts/countries without checking the context they are in.

      • Right, but if the person I was talking originally to had said “I’m not from the US so I know nothing about it” it woulda been fine and I would have immediately apologized and we’d go from there. Having a nice chat.

        That’s not what happened. Someone new chimed in with a pretty rude non-sequitur in the vein of ‘stupid Americans’. I don’t think I was particularly defensive or angry, but maybe it came off that way.

        • The phrasing of “more civilised places” in the comment you mention seems highly problematic to me, yes. I think the “stupid Americans” is your biased interpretation though.

          Oh, btw I wouldn’t call people from the USA “Americans”, because it is just one of many countries in the Americas. Another blind spot in the US perspective.