Did anyone else laugh at this??
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rkb12 — 15 years ago(May 14, 2010 12:22 AM)
Yeah, to answer your question, I laughed as well and I am American. It was definitely meant to be funny. Or at least it should have been. I'm sure there are some Americans, though very few, who might actually think that they are untoucable becuase they are American. These would be very confused individuals who have a lot to learn. That is why the line is laughable; becuase some Americans would actually think this and they are so stupid for it. And, this is a little besides the point, but I don't think people who take a trans-Siberian train trip are the kind of people who would think such a naive thing. Typically Americans desiring to take such a journey would be more educated and open-minded than that (blunt I know, but I am just sayin it like it is).
Also, the person who said they were "American too" but from the continent and not the counrty is silly. Do Canadians and Mexicans really say that? Do they get offended when people say American meaning from the USA?? Becuase that just seems ridiculous. If that is how you feel you should call yourself North American. I mean really, if we are being so correct, then you are North American. And this actually points to the fact that the statement doesn't really make sense at all because there are two American continents. There is South America and Noth American. So, I guess I was assuming that you were from Mexico or Canada, and I might be wrong. But when you said THE continent, I assumed you are talking about the same one that the USA is on. Point being, you just shouldn't be difficult and snarky by pointing out that you are American too when you in fact are not from the USA, which was clearly what the original poster was talking about.
And to the person who said that the US is much better than the other person's countryyou suck. Go to your hole and don't come back out. You are the type of American that gives the rest of us a bad name. I apoogize to all of you non-Americans out there reading this. We are not all so arrogant. And no to all of you bleeding heart American-exceptionslist conservatives, I am not saying that I don't love my country, I am just saying that I don't necessarily think that it is the BEST in the world. And even if you do happen to think so there is no reason to throw that in other people's faces. Others may think that their country is the best in the world and they are entitled to that opinion. They don't need to go around rubbing it in our faces. How many other countries have you lived in anyway? What gives you the right to judge other countries without living in them, and seeing what they are really like. You can't just take what you see in American media as the absolute truth. I challenge you to actually test out your ridiculous theory. All countries have their fine points and their less than fine ones. There is NO NEED to say one is better than the other. -
LiveTogetherDialAPhone — 13 years ago(June 05, 2012 11:25 PM)
The "America the Continent" is more a cultural perception than anything else, and it's clear to me that the poster who said that is from somewhere in Latin America. In Latin America, the perception is that North America and South America are not separate continents, but one continent together - "America", simply put. They're taught that "American" means everyone who lives in each country from Canada south to Chile and Argentina, including the Caribbean islands.
To make matters more confusing, many people from Latin America think that United States citizens call themselves Americans out of an arrogant colonial mindset, not simply a different cultural perception. They think we call ourselves American as a way of saying we're better than every other nationality in the single continent of "America," or that we think we own everyone else. In reality, it's just about language - We call ourselves Americans because we come from "The United States of AMERICA," and "America" by itself has no larger meaning in our culture ("North America" and "South America" are separate continents to us and the idea of a united "America" comprising both of them is not part of our everyday speech). -
andrea-kathleen — 15 years ago(July 08, 2010 11:54 PM)
I definitely laughed at that comment myself.
I took a school trip to Russia and during the orientation, the director of the group taught all the non-Russian speaking students to say "I'm an American" in Russian. This is one of the things they were supposed to stay if a Russian started shouting at them and they didn't understand. Of course it sort of makes sense in that context - it's supposed to imply "I don't speak Russian"
But we still ALL laughed at that. I don't think MOST Americans are ACTUALLY that naive (though some certainly are.)
Then again, we were a group of students choosing to spend all our extra money on a trip to Russia. I'm not sure if that makes us a good cross-section of America.
But, on the other hand, doesn't the detective later kind of sat the same thing? When the other guy wants to shoot the husband doesn't the detective repeat "They're Americans."
Did anybody see that movie 'Hostel'? I think they paid extra to torture the Americans. I guess most American directors just think we are worth more.
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Screen-7 — 16 years ago(September 28, 2009 08:03 PM)
They said something like: "You can't do this to us, we're American!!" I watched this in Spain and here the audience laughed at that line, and I think it wasn't supposed to be funny.
I think it was supposed to be humorous but in an "insider" way.
Like how some conservatives don't realize that The Colbert Report is actually mocking them. It makes it all the funnier knowing that. -
buddy6102 — 16 years ago(September 29, 2009 10:48 AM)
As an American I can tell you that we are truly spoiled by our Constitution. We've never had to worry about our homes being invaded or being "questioned" by corrupt police officers. Most of us have never known poverty, starvation or desperation. Things like kidnapping, organized crime, and human trafficking are federal crimes and they rarely enter our personal radar and if they do it's only on the news and we are only shown how the FBI has "broken it up". Never that it's ongoing.
But as my wife, who's from Mexico City, says all the time, "Gringos never think that anything bad can happen to them."
So yeah we chuckled a little bit but kinda understood it. -
ganiscol — 16 years ago(October 12, 2009 07:02 AM)
All the points you state are also true for most of europe - I guess we're also spoiled by our countries
I'm saying this, because you (from my point of view) seem to imply that this is an almost exclusive privilege of being a US citizen, which is of course false and sort of nails the point home of the thread starter.
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buddy6102 — 16 years ago(October 12, 2009 07:53 AM)
No no no, please don't get me wrong. I didn't try to say it's an exclusive privilege of being a US citizen. Even though I've been to other countries, I feel I can only speak on my views and observations and things that I've witnessed in my home country. As well as casual conversations I have had with foreign nationals. I possess no education or experience in Foreign Governments and was simply trying to offer up my opinion as an everyday, John Q. Public American as to why the character said what he did out of desperation.
Plus, if you watch a lot of movies like The Ruins, Turistas, Trade, Taken, or Hostel you will see a lot of Americans in foreign countries making really bad, incredibly naive choices and then say, "But we're americans?"
And for the people that say, "Oh these are just bad movies.", think of the 18 year old American girl from Alabama who went missing in Aruba back in 2005. She appears to have been a gullible, ignorant girl who smoked pot and drank with some locals and now she is gone forever because she most likely thought "that nothing bad could happen". We know her story because she came from money and her parents offered up a huge reward and her stepfather had a little political influence. Imagine all the stories we don't hear about. -
Screen-7 — 16 years ago(January 10, 2010 10:20 PM)
As an American, I totally got your original point that many Americans have an almost abstract view of catastrophe. It's something that happens to other people.
It not only makes us feel invulnerable, I think it also makes us insensitive to the suffering of others outside America.
Of course, this is probably not just an American thing but we should only speak for ourselves. -
Dollhouse_89 — 16 years ago(November 01, 2009 12:15 PM)
i am an american. when i heard that line i sort or raised and eyebrow and chuckled. i thought "is that supposed to mean something"?
i didn't know if they were supposed to be under the impression that their american origin somehow made them important or if they wanted the other people to think "hey someone is going to come down hard on this place if these americans go missing". -
Sabracad — 16 years ago(November 07, 2009 07:29 PM)
Yes it was meant to be funny and yes there is a perception that all Americans think they are untouchable and the words "we're American" will solve all problems.
I'm not sure where this perception came from.
I almost came as a Shark actually, but then I realised that an Eagle was slightly better. -
g-463 — 16 years ago(December 06, 2009 03:30 AM)
It's meant to be kinda funny, yes. But it's also something someone might say in a situation like that. They're under the impression that this is how Russians take care of business. They don't yet know that Ben Kingsley's character is a crooked cop.
Plus, the movie recognized that this was a humorous line. That's why Ben Kingsley's character said, "They're American. Shoot him in the knee."