My Opinion on the Subject of Ignorant English People Who Think That All Americans Are Fat, Stupid, Insulting, Aggressive, and Utterly Pointless, etcetera..
People with this opinion really make me angry. They generalise about these people and make judgements based on what they see on TV, when they know nothing. Somehow they manage to be pessimistic and disbelieving about many things, and yet all of the exaggerations and stereotypes they see depicted on TV, they are gullible enough to believe. It really gets on my wick. What’s more is they dare todo it in the presence of one of those who it’s aimed at, expecting to get away with it. I speak from experience here, having both visited America and been confronted by one such person of this “opinion”.
As a bit of a teaser, joker, and generally “normal” teenagers, I may make little (although admittedly, sometimes frequent) jokes at the expense of welshmen(or women)/ginger people etc, however the difference is, when I and those others participating in the same friendly banter do this, we do it as FRIENDLY banter, and those whose turn it is to be the butt of it this time know we’re kidding. They know nobody actually means it and that it’s just a bit of harmless fun, whereas those that criticise Americans in this way meant it, they make it UNfriendly “banter” (but it’s not really banter, more like uneducated guesses in a narrowminded and judgemental fashion) and they are completely ignorant and know nothing of the truth about what Americans are really like.
And some even have the nerve to argue that somehow this twisted, judgemental opinion based on their own narrowmindedness and TV’s OTT depictions are actually truth?
I am sorry, but I find this hardly acceptable. I don’t mind them having opinions, they have a right to. I just wont tolerate criticisms aimed at my father nation when there is not one ounce of truth or knowledge behind what was said.
If you are going to have an opinion, you have to have information or knowledge, or something – anything legitimate – that gives you reason to believe your opinion is plausible. If it’s impossible, it’s a lie, a false belief. It’s hardly an opinion, that all Americans are fat and stupid and ignorant, because it cannot be possible. SOME may be like this, but not the majority, and certainly not ALL of them. It is not an opinion. It is a lie taught by the ones who are actually ignorant, to those who put their faith in the wrong place because they think that evidence-TV-supports it.
Those who agree with me have every right to be angry, just as everyone has a right to an opinion. The right to voicing opinions in the wrong place though? In the wrong way? No.
Those who have been led to believe this, have been led astray, and granted they may not mean all too much by it. They just made the mistake a) of having a the beginnings of/gullibility to take on such a stupid “opinion”, and b) voicing an opinion in the presence of numerous people who know quite a bit more on the subject, some of them (including myself) having actually been to the USA.
Surprisingly, I personally am not offended by the opinions of the truly ignorant, just angry that some people actually believe these opinions to be true when they know nothing. At least nothing on this subject.
Fair enough to those who have met the odd American who fits in to the stereotype, but is one or two Americans a sufficient basis to make such an assumption? I think not.
