Europeans think of any European country as an equivalent to America as a whole. That’s simply stupid. America as a whole is equivalent to Europe as a whole, and American states roughly equivalent to European countries. States are on average half as big as countries in Europe, but America as a whole is roughly equivalent to the EU. So, yes, a European should know what the capital city of Florida is if they expect an American to know the capital of Poland. (Only Germans and people from Montana can reliably tell you the state capital of Montana, though.)
I tried to make a very similar point in one of the European communities on Lemmy earlier this year (in response to a post about Americans being bad at European geography) and basically the whole community jumped on me for it. Watch your back. They’re rabid over there if you dare suggest that a US state is comparable to a European country. :P
They’re like states, if the states each spoke their own separate languages and had spent the bigger part of the last 2,000 years constantly at war with each other.
The issue was never about cultural differences or history (though I would argue that different US states have quite different cultures, too) - it was purely about geographical knowledge. In that case specifically it was Europeans ragging on Americans for not being able to find smaller European countries on a map. I tried to compare being able to point to a country like Moldova as a European to being able to point to Kansas as an American and that was apparently the wrong thing to suggest, let me tell you, but the point I was trying to make is that of course Americans aren’t going to be as well-versed in European geography as a European, because we simply don’t need to know where those countries are regularly. Meanwhile I’d wager most Americans can point to Kansas or Colorado on a map, but I wouldn’t expect Europeans to be able to.
I mean most American states are shaped as rectangles, have nothing notable in terms of geography or culture to tell them apart, and are under 2 million inhabitants.
It’s like if Europe had Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania and then 15 more of that, but they’re all shaped the same and speak the same language and their capitals are made of cinder block and plaster.
You’re objectively right, I was being hyperbolic. It’s a lot of states that are rectangle-shaped with quite small populations though. I mean if I had given the cutoff of “4.3 million inhabitants”, then that would cover half of all states.
And easily more than half at least one 90 degree angle.
Europe also has a lot of small states to be fair, and I don’t think we can expect people in general to keep track of all these.
This isn’t really relevant to the conversation, but your comments made me curious and I’ve just discovered that San Marino is actually a full 61km2. I had no idea, I thought it was about the same size as Monaco. The other mildly interesting tidbit is that Luxembourg is about the same size as Rhode Island - and both fill the role of “vortex of unknowable financial hijinks” for their respective region. I wonder what it is about small regions that breeds both tax havens and a shockingly high density of chocolatiers.
Yeah these small independent states are really strange. At least Rhode Island isn’t landlocked, but Luxembourg depends on all of its neighbors using it to launder money, and I’m not sure why that’s tolerated. Maybe it’s the chocolate.
Appreciate the warning! I think the real problem is that Europeans never accepted they are becoming a single political entity and still don’t necessarily consider themselves European. I think that’s sad, as Europeans are extensively closer to each other than to nations outside of Europe. Also, the EU is a decent model for how smaller entities can work with larger ones without being suffocated or absorbed.
Europeans think of any European country as an equivalent to America as a whole.
Half of the problem with that phrase is that this line of thought is far more common from Americans than Europeans. No European think France = US in any other context than geopolitically, maybe. But a lot of US citizens do think that way. The phrase “Americans think 200 years is a long time, and Europeans think 200km is a long distance” is of US origin. It’s literally the result of US ignorance that compares the geographical distances of a single European state, like Germany or France, to the entire extent of the continental US. Europeans are perfectly aware that 200km are 200km anywhere on the planet. Whether you are driving to another country or another state, it is irrelevant.
The other half of the problem is that the political dynamics of the European Union are fundamentally different to the United States federation. Just by the fact that the US was forged in war while the EU is an economics first agreement. Their nature is vastly different and not comparable at all. Maybe one day in the future the EU will just be a federation of states, a single country with a single constitution, but today that’s not the case. There’s no executive power in the EU that can override a country’s authority. That alone sets them so very far apart.
Europeans are perfectly aware that 200km are 200km anywhere on the planet
There is a difference in the way distances are perceived; I was talking to a British person bemoaning that airfare was 200 lbs more expensive in Manchester than London, and treated the notion of driving just 4 hours as if it was crazy. I’ve heard similar stories about not visiting family because they’re just a few hours away by car.
The classic saying “In Europe, 100km is a long distance. In the US, 100 years is a long time” holds a lot more truth about perceptions in the respective cultures than you’d expect. I’ve had a very pleasant 100km daily commute - seriously, I quite miss that - and at the same time, there’s a building down the street that’s just been added to the historical registry and was built in the late 80s.
Meanwhile I’ve had German friends offer to book me a hotel when I went from Cologne to Essen to give them a visit (admittedly this might have just been learned pragmatism, I was taking the trip on DB…) and said hotel dated back to before my ancestors had a written language.
That really just depends on the scale they are personally used to though, for a fair few years I lived ~5 hours from my family (relatively far within the country), but it didn’t feel like very much because I/we visited my partner’s family on the other side of the continent at least once a year. Prior to that, I don’t think that I would have visited anywhere near as frequently.
The lack of Schengen and now EU membership may make British people more prone to being on the smaller side of this.
Sure, perception can change. When all you have is a car and a highway. It seems outrageous to want an alternative. When you are used to high quality public transport, driving there is a chore.
Driving four hours is an effort that you have to actively take. Plus costs for ownership or rental, fuel and lodging. Americans treat these factors as mundane (and the cultural romanticization of road trips that doesn’t exist anywhere else), but they have real costs. Sure, a plane or a train are more expensive. But it offloads a great deal of cognitive costs as well.
Are things really that bad in Europe? In Japan, non-HSR is cheaper than driving, in China HSR is slightly cheaper than gas, and in vietnam I can even put my motorcycle on the train for less than it would cost to drive.
Trains being more expensive than driving sounds like what happens when you have politicians trying to kill your train system.
Totally depends on the country and the route. I don’t live there but have family. They say some train lines are comparable to a plane ticket. Some are cheaper, some are more expensive. The most expensive ones are usually the ones that cross national borders. Though overall the train will always be considered a tiny bit more expensive, it will also be a lot more comfortable. Since the airlines with tickets cheaper than trains usually offer the tiniest seats with zero amenities.
Some countries are better than others as well. In England, trains can get you almost anywhere relatively comfortable and fast (yes, some caveats exist). Spain is rather good in the central regions but many places have spotty coverage. While in Switzerland you can go virtually everywhere except the alps without ever sitting in a car.
The big comparison, that most people fail at, is not just the price of gas. Cars are taxed heavily almost everywhere in the EU. And the tight emissions regulations also require a lot of regular maintenance. So the train will always be more expensive than just the gas, but not more expensive than the bigger picture of car ownership. Plus, if you drive, you’re the sod stuck driving the whole way.
I meant like paying someone else to drive the plane/train/bus. Not the AI kind.
Having to drive everywhere makes people misserable.
Edit: we take for granted the infrastructure required to support a society that drives everywhere in personal cars. That is what is actually driving the species to extinction via climate change.
Being trapped and anxious makes people miserable; lots of people are scared of driving (because they’re bad at it and/or have attached anxiety), and sitting in traffic is frustrating. There’s lots of very good reasons to choose mass transit. The unwillingness to be engaged with the task of driving a car for a few hours is not a good reason, it’s a symptom of a totally cooked attention span.
A car is not freedom. And the absence of a car is not being trapped. Those are false equivalences. I’ve been perfectly free and lived a fulfilling anxiety free life without a car. I know how to drive, just never owned one. Because, I’ve never had a financial or otherwise incentive to do so. You can own a car and still be a trapped and anxious ball of cooked nerves, as I’ve met many people who are. And on top of all of that they are financially trapped by owning a car they can’t afford to pay but also can’t afford to not own.
I tried to make a very similar point in one of the European communities on Lemmy earlier this year (in response to a post about Americans being bad at European geography) and basically the whole community jumped on me for it. Watch your back. They’re rabid over there if you dare suggest that a US state is comparable to a European country. :P
They’re like states, if the states each spoke their own separate languages and had spent the bigger part of the last 2,000 years constantly at war with each other.
I’ll explain. People get annoyed because you are proudly ignorant of 2000 years of history and tons of cultural differences.
The issue was never about cultural differences or history (though I would argue that different US states have quite different cultures, too) - it was purely about geographical knowledge. In that case specifically it was Europeans ragging on Americans for not being able to find smaller European countries on a map. I tried to compare being able to point to a country like Moldova as a European to being able to point to Kansas as an American and that was apparently the wrong thing to suggest, let me tell you, but the point I was trying to make is that of course Americans aren’t going to be as well-versed in European geography as a European, because we simply don’t need to know where those countries are regularly. Meanwhile I’d wager most Americans can point to Kansas or Colorado on a map, but I wouldn’t expect Europeans to be able to.
A better comparison to Moldova would be Belize.
I mean most American states are shaped as rectangles, have nothing notable in terms of geography or culture to tell them apart, and are under 2 million inhabitants.
It’s like if Europe had Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania and then 15 more of that, but they’re all shaped the same and speak the same language and their capitals are made of cinder block and plaster.
Objectively false!
Objectively false!
I don’t know why anyone is upvoting you
You’re objectively right, I was being hyperbolic. It’s a lot of states that are rectangle-shaped with quite small populations though. I mean if I had given the cutoff of “4.3 million inhabitants”, then that would cover half of all states.
And easily more than half at least one 90 degree angle.
Europe also has a lot of small states to be fair, and I don’t think we can expect people in general to keep track of all these.
This isn’t really relevant to the conversation, but your comments made me curious and I’ve just discovered that San Marino is actually a full 61km2. I had no idea, I thought it was about the same size as Monaco. The other mildly interesting tidbit is that Luxembourg is about the same size as Rhode Island - and both fill the role of “vortex of unknowable financial hijinks” for their respective region. I wonder what it is about small regions that breeds both tax havens and a shockingly high density of chocolatiers.
Yeah these small independent states are really strange. At least Rhode Island isn’t landlocked, but Luxembourg depends on all of its neighbors using it to launder money, and I’m not sure why that’s tolerated. Maybe it’s the chocolate.
NIMBYism, but for financial criminals? Oh well. At the very least they’re not boring, I suppose that counts for something.
Appreciate the warning! I think the real problem is that Europeans never accepted they are becoming a single political entity and still don’t necessarily consider themselves European. I think that’s sad, as Europeans are extensively closer to each other than to nations outside of Europe. Also, the EU is a decent model for how smaller entities can work with larger ones without being suffocated or absorbed.
Half of the problem with that phrase is that this line of thought is far more common from Americans than Europeans. No European think France = US in any other context than geopolitically, maybe. But a lot of US citizens do think that way. The phrase “Americans think 200 years is a long time, and Europeans think 200km is a long distance” is of US origin. It’s literally the result of US ignorance that compares the geographical distances of a single European state, like Germany or France, to the entire extent of the continental US. Europeans are perfectly aware that 200km are 200km anywhere on the planet. Whether you are driving to another country or another state, it is irrelevant.
The other half of the problem is that the political dynamics of the European Union are fundamentally different to the United States federation. Just by the fact that the US was forged in war while the EU is an economics first agreement. Their nature is vastly different and not comparable at all. Maybe one day in the future the EU will just be a federation of states, a single country with a single constitution, but today that’s not the case. There’s no executive power in the EU that can override a country’s authority. That alone sets them so very far apart.
There is a difference in the way distances are perceived; I was talking to a British person bemoaning that airfare was 200 lbs more expensive in Manchester than London, and treated the notion of driving just 4 hours as if it was crazy. I’ve heard similar stories about not visiting family because they’re just a few hours away by car.
The classic saying “In Europe, 100km is a long distance. In the US, 100 years is a long time” holds a lot more truth about perceptions in the respective cultures than you’d expect. I’ve had a very pleasant 100km daily commute - seriously, I quite miss that - and at the same time, there’s a building down the street that’s just been added to the historical registry and was built in the late 80s.
Meanwhile I’ve had German friends offer to book me a hotel when I went from Cologne to Essen to give them a visit (admittedly this might have just been learned pragmatism, I was taking the trip on DB…) and said hotel dated back to before my ancestors had a written language.
That really just depends on the scale they are personally used to though, for a fair few years I lived ~5 hours from my family (relatively far within the country), but it didn’t feel like very much because I/we visited my partner’s family on the other side of the continent at least once a year. Prior to that, I don’t think that I would have visited anywhere near as frequently.
The lack of Schengen and now EU membership may make British people more prone to being on the smaller side of this.
Sure, perception can change. When all you have is a car and a highway. It seems outrageous to want an alternative. When you are used to high quality public transport, driving there is a chore.
Driving four hours is an effort that you have to actively take. Plus costs for ownership or rental, fuel and lodging. Americans treat these factors as mundane (and the cultural romanticization of road trips that doesn’t exist anywhere else), but they have real costs. Sure, a plane or a train are more expensive. But it offloads a great deal of cognitive costs as well.
The distance itself doesn’t change though.
Are things really that bad in Europe? In Japan, non-HSR is cheaper than driving, in China HSR is slightly cheaper than gas, and in vietnam I can even put my motorcycle on the train for less than it would cost to drive.
Trains being more expensive than driving sounds like what happens when you have politicians trying to kill your train system.
Totally depends on the country and the route. I don’t live there but have family. They say some train lines are comparable to a plane ticket. Some are cheaper, some are more expensive. The most expensive ones are usually the ones that cross national borders. Though overall the train will always be considered a tiny bit more expensive, it will also be a lot more comfortable. Since the airlines with tickets cheaper than trains usually offer the tiniest seats with zero amenities.
Some countries are better than others as well. In England, trains can get you almost anywhere relatively comfortable and fast (yes, some caveats exist). Spain is rather good in the central regions but many places have spotty coverage. While in Switzerland you can go virtually everywhere except the alps without ever sitting in a car.
The big comparison, that most people fail at, is not just the price of gas. Cars are taxed heavily almost everywhere in the EU. And the tight emissions regulations also require a lot of regular maintenance. So the train will always be more expensive than just the gas, but not more expensive than the bigger picture of car ownership. Plus, if you drive, you’re the sod stuck driving the whole way.
“Offloading cognitive costs” for the sake of convenience is ruining this species.
I meant like paying someone else to drive the plane/train/bus. Not the AI kind.
Having to drive everywhere makes people misserable.
Edit: we take for granted the infrastructure required to support a society that drives everywhere in personal cars. That is what is actually driving the species to extinction via climate change.
I wasn’t just talking about AI.
Being trapped and anxious makes people miserable; lots of people are scared of driving (because they’re bad at it and/or have attached anxiety), and sitting in traffic is frustrating. There’s lots of very good reasons to choose mass transit. The unwillingness to be engaged with the task of driving a car for a few hours is not a good reason, it’s a symptom of a totally cooked attention span.
A car is not freedom. And the absence of a car is not being trapped. Those are false equivalences. I’ve been perfectly free and lived a fulfilling anxiety free life without a car. I know how to drive, just never owned one. Because, I’ve never had a financial or otherwise incentive to do so. You can own a car and still be a trapped and anxious ball of cooked nerves, as I’ve met many people who are. And on top of all of that they are financially trapped by owning a car they can’t afford to pay but also can’t afford to not own.