• hark@lemmy.world
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    1 hour ago

    Americans may be surprised to find that foreigners actually don’t pay as much attention to US elections as they think. Even many people in the US don’t care, they’re just inundated with media coverage of it. At most about 66% of eligible voters even vote and the people that do vote aren’t necessarily informed. You may have seen interviews with undecided voters. They turn up to vote but haven’t necessarily put much thought into it.

    As an aside, I find it funny when Americans scream about other countries empire building and carrying out provocative military exercises when the US has so many military bases everywhere. You don’t need to officially annex land to control it, that’s old style thinking.

  • Eugene V. Debs' Ghost@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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    8 hours ago

    America: Establishes military bases, missile silos, CIA blacksites, international espionage agreements to violate the rights of the citizens in dozens of countries, has invaded and overturned governments because they disagree with what the president wants, calls itself the world police.

    Americans: “Why are so many non-Americans invested in what goes on in our country? I know we’re a big deal, but why would anyone be interested? Must be paid actors and bots! I don’t care about French elections, why would they care about American?”

  • Dear Earth,

    The U.S. is about to fuck over humanity.

    Zero fucks about climate change.

    Leadership connections with the worst ass hats on the planet.

    I apologize.

    I wish y’all the best.

  • samus12345@lemmy.world
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    1 day ago

    Americans: Why don’t foreigners care about every aspect of America every second of every day?

  • theunknownmuncher@lemmy.world
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    2 days ago

    American exceptionalism is ingrained so deep in most people here that they would never even consider or doubt why the world pays attention to them, just: “Duh of course they do, because we’re America!”

    • modifier@lemmy.ca
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      2 days ago

      Correct. I think the entire premise that an American would question this idea is an indication that the meme was made by somebody from a country with one of these pins in it.

      Don’t get me wrong, I’m not defending this mindset. I am myself an American making this observation with a sense of shame and mild horror.

      • theunknownmuncher@lemmy.world
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        2 days ago

        Yeah, I abolutely agree. In American culture, this is treated more like a natural law, like the Sun rising each day or objects falling down when dropped. It is just something self-evident and isn’t even a thought that occurs in most American’s heads.

      • ByteJunk@lemmy.world
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        1 day ago

        Going by experience here, the American WILL question this idea the very seconds the foreign has a diverging opinion or calls them out on something.

    • blazeknave@lemmy.world
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      1 day ago

      👋 yep… Tbh, I just never thought through the “their shit is next door” part… just the “they have a lot of shit” part

    • TrickDacy@lemmy.world
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      2 days ago

      Or they could realize the reality of the situation without making it about taking credit for being “the best”. As an American I know our country sucks, especially now, and also that it’s important for global stability.

      Nah, it’s probably what you said. I just truly think the US is way better than any other country. /s

      Edit: I missed that they wrote “most”. In my defense though a lot of users are currently cruelly shitting on Americans unconditionally. A lot of us didn’t want this bullshit

    • alphanerd4@lemmy.worldOPM
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      1 day ago

      Huh. 🤔 . They do of course. https://militarybases.com/alaska I also see 9. :T well that’s annoying. Now that I look closer I do see Closed military bases on this list and the scale is absolutely horrendous. Decidedly not effective for communicating information specifically, but great for reaffirming the general you know like the US has a bunch of them and it operates troops and such out of them

    • frezik@midwest.social
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      1 day ago

      Certainly does. My father-in-law served up there, which he thought was a much better assignment than Vietnam. It was pretty important for early ICBM detection from Russia, since the shortest path to the continental US is through the arctic circle. Still is, so yes, there’s bases up there.

    • AnUnusualRelic@lemmy.world
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      1 day ago

      If the US bought Denmark, they’d probably get Greenland with it. Just saying.

      (now some idiot is probably going to try this)

      • anon6789@lemmy.world
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        1 day ago

        In 3 months we’re going to have a Secretary of Defense that’s on the Fox and Friends B-Team, and a panel of MAGA generals purging the ranks. I am not ruling anything out of the future timeline we’re on…

        These are some of the same people who don’t know who the president of Puerto Rico is, so they might just move in thinking the place is abandoned.

    • masquenox@lemmy.world
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      2 days ago

      Iirc the way these bases work is with the agreement from the host country country’s government and most definitely NOT the people of said country.

      FTFY.

      • JoYo@lemmy.ml
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        1 day ago

        to be fair, most of these countries allow usa bases because of the countries that explicitly dont have usa bases. see map.

        they use expensive infrastructure and most countries would rather fund their own bases.

        oooo cake 🎂

    • TankovayaDiviziya@lemmy.world
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      1 day ago

      You got down voted because some folks are either ignorant of wider geopolitics, or of certain inclination and don’t want to hear the inconvenient truth.

      I am originally from Philippines which hosted a major US military base. Despite the protests, the Americans did not leave until a major volcanic eruption nearby prompted them to do so in the early 90s. I am anti-imperialists as much as the next guy and the overseas American military presence is an on-the-face sign of imperialism, but the fact of the matter is that many countries literally “free ride” under American protective umbrella. It saves the country money and deter rivals. That being said, in hindsight the Americans should not have left, as China has now started claiming an entire sea region and bullying Filipino and Vietnamese fishermen. China has also literally set up a military base within 200 nautical miles of Philippine exclusive economic zone without permission, which the international court deemed to be illegal.

      Many Filipinos changed their tune from “go home Yankees” to “Yankees come back! You should have stayed” because hindsight is 20/20. Right now, American soldiers are dripping back slowly to the Philippines since the Chinese military is still squatting.