Something that really grinds my gears online is the way in which Americans treat other countries' citizens online.
There is such a heavy Americanisation online that when I look up simple terms like "politics", I get a spreadsheet of how the American Senate is organised. I look up "laws Ireland" and I get a discussion around the rights of Irish-Americans or a list of lawmakers in America who are Irish. If I talk about the postal service being crap, I get told that UPS is trash and a detailed explanation of federal funding cuts to American postal offices. No matter what it is, you will automatically get information from an American perspective. Same with identity. If I say I am Irish, people assume that I am Irish-American in such a way that it implies Ireland just doesn't exist anymore as a place. Same with Italian. Also with the Spanish language, I have to bring up, because I've seen people ask perceived white users on here or TikTok why they're speaking Spanish if they aren't Latinx as if Spain isn't a country.
Yet, here's the flip side. If I talk about bad healthcare or a lack of abortion rights, I get Americans jumping in to tell me how much worse it is there and how I have nothing to complain about. If I talk about constructs of whiteness from a European perspective, I'm told that that isn't how racism works (when it does. In Europe). If I talk about crooked politicians, America is worse. Talk about taxes, America is worse. Talk about violence, America is worse. No matter what I may have to lament about from my point as an Irish person living in Ireland, I'm wrong because some state in America is worse. I once gave advice for buying vegetables and was told I was lying about the price of an Avocado even though I can literally buy them for 59c depending on the week deals in Aldi. I talked once about how to make cheap hearthy meals last longer to someone who was struggling & was yelled at because they lived in a particular area which didn't have access to shops as if I was meant to know these details about that specific part of America. I was trying to help someone & got yelled at because I didn't know that somewhere in the middle of Milwaukee or something had bad public transport. Yet I mention the inability to get top surgery in Ireland and am told to "just go to the next state over" like I can hop in a bus and suddenly have access to different surgery options. Going to Kilkenny won't fix the fact we don't have a surgeon here.
How come people are allowed to talk on American contexts and American events and American history and American politics but any time someone from not America speaks from their perspective, we are told it's irrelevant or not needed or told we're wrong (when we aren't)? Americans are allowed to bring their politics or history into conversation without anyone batting an eyelid but when someone else does it, it is apparently some form of attack on them or an attempt to silence them? No. We are giving the perspective from another country.
It feels very much like that Cut video where African Americans were ranking people on how black they were based on African American concepts of black, to the point they told a South African man that he was not black when he... Literally is. Your experience is not universal. Your understanding of situations are not universal.
Why does American ideals override every other countries? Why does American beliefs get held as truth? Why does America get to define everything and everyone else is wrong?
I wish Americans would step back and acknowledge the fact that many Americans refuse to hear someone else's opinion or situation because they aren't Americans, especially when it comes to political or socio-economic issues. If someone brings up politics in France, in the UK, in Spain, in Belgium when talking about politics elsewhere it isn't them trying to take over a conversation but simply giving another opinion with examples from their country. We have our own history of struggles, political or socio-economical, and sometimes those examples can help put other struggles into a different perspective. Sometimes the only way we can personally discuss issues is through our lived experience in another country that isn't America, so we need to compare to give context to how we perceive it.
American perspectives aren't the only opinion that matters.
I never got yelled at but what irks me most is discussion about law. I often hear "That's not illegal." It's not illegal WHERE Kenny?! Do you know that all 190-ish countries in the world have their own legal systems shaped by their own beliefs and lawmakers? There is no universal law. I wish Americans would stop coming into posts and say "Actually, this concerns §89 on the Patriotic American Act of 1973." Thank you Sahra, I live in Bavaria.
