If the US didn't exist (physically), what country would you choose to live in?

[nicname]

I'd like to live in some tropical locale, not too touristy, but a little.  I'd live out my days owning and operating something like this

[Kat Kid]

As far as racism goes, you are just wrong.  There is no modern U.S. equivalents to the kind of crap that is going on in Italy right now with regards to how people are treating their immigration minister.  You could argue that people in the U.S. are just as likely to believe or say racist things on twitter, but the lack of social norms about public displays of racism in nearly every Euopean country in at least one major social context (sports, politics or both) is wholly different from the way unrepentant racists are treated in the US.

bullshit.  a)  italy is on an island in terms of unrepentantism re. public racism (although, it's still entirely unfair to paint the northern wackos as representative of the country as a whole).  there is no other (western) euro country that is similar.  b)  part of what you perceive is through the prism of your own us centric perception of racism, europeans don't have the history of subjugating a specific skin-color defined class of people within their own country, so they understandably lack the petrifying fear of being considered racist.  c)  those same northern wacko are as likely to call a sicilian a monkey as an african.  in southern spain, i heard considerably more negative commentary about the "northern barbarians" and the roma than about asian or african immigrants.  to jump on anti-immigrant sentiment and/or ethnic/cultural chauvinism and consider to be comparable with us style racism is wrong and ignorant.

You really think that Naples or Rome are not racist?  LOL ok then.  Speaking of Spain, I was at a truck stop with a dark skinned teenage African-American and it might as well have been Jim Crow Mississippi as far as the patrons of the place were concerned.  She was insulted by multiple people for no reason at all.

And I love how your excuse is "its not racism, its just subtle ethnocentric prejudice based on their own set of historical and cultural practices!"  I mean, is this a rough ridin' parody? 

Let me re-state some first principles. When I say racism, I mean they are being racist.  Just because the ethnic groups they are racist against don't perfectly match the U.S. doesn't mean there isn't rampant racism.  Anti-semitism is much worse for instance, you mentioned the Roma or Africans or Indians or or or and on and on it goes. 

The founding concept of nearly every country in the E.U. is, on a pretty base level, the maintenance of their majority ethnic group.  Of course context matters, but that does not excuse racism.

[Kat Kid]

As far as racism goes, you are just wrong.  There is no modern U.S. equivalents to the kind of crap that is going on in Italy right now with regards to how people are treating their immigration minister.  You could argue that people in the U.S. are just as likely to believe or say racist things on twitter, but the lack of social norms about public displays of racism in nearly every Euopean country in at least one major social context (sports, politics or both) is wholly different from the way unrepentant racists are treated in the US.

bullshit.  a)  italy is on an island in terms of unrepentantism re. public racism (although, it's still entirely unfair to paint the northern wackos as representative of the country as a whole).  there is no other (western) euro country that is similar.  b)  part of what you perceive is through the prism of your own us centric perception of racism, europeans don't have the history of subjugating a specific skin-color defined class of people within their own country, so they understandably lack the petrifying fear of being considered racist.  c)  those same northern wacko are as likely to call a sicilian a monkey as an african.  in southern spain, i heard considerably more negative commentary about the "northern barbarians" and the roma than about asian or african immigrants.  to jump on anti-immigrant sentiment and/or ethnic/cultural chauvinism and consider to be comparable with us style racism is wrong and ignorant.

Not sure which is better:

"a specific skin-color defined class of people" side-stepping the Holocaust or "within" disqualifying European history from the Age of Exploration on.

[chum1]

Another contentious part of KK's position:  Europe is significantly more racist than many other places in the world. 

[sys]

i never said it was subtle.  i said it wasn't comparable with us racism.  when there are groups of people of the same skin color as well as a shared language, religion and nationality that are treated in every way as much like outsiders as are people of different races and nations, then that is not racism as it in the same way as racism exists in the us.

antisemitism almost doesn't exist in the us.  it is (still) far, far, far worse in europe than here.  i agree with that.


and give me a break about what you may have overheard at a truckstop.  i lived in spain for a goodly part of three years.  i taught at a school (one attended by a reasonable % of 2nd gen immigrants) there, i have a pretty rough ridin' good idea of how racist or not racist they are.

[steve dave]

I'm white as crap. racism will not effect where I choose to live post USA exploding or whatever.

[Kat Kid]

Another contentious part of KK's position:  Europe is significantly more racist than many other places in the world.

Pretty much every person is more racist than me.  It is a problem.

[CHONGS]

The only people more racist than the Spaniards are the Italians and Argentinians (and its close).

[sys]

Not sure which is better:

"a specific skin-color defined class of people" side-stepping the Holocaust or "within" disqualifying European history from the Age of Exploration on.

i'm not trying to place a value judgment on either european or american behavior.  i'm trying to place current attitudes in context.  rightly or wrongly, europeans don't consider themselves jointly responsible for the holocaust.  that was germany and no one else as far as the development of gentile guilt goes.  "within" matters, because just like americans don't fall over themselves apologizing to the unseen, unheard masses harmed by our own imperial pretensions, modern european psychology spares no more than a "such a shame" cluck of the tongue for whatever atrocities passed beneath imperial banners in centuries past. 

[Kat Kid]

i never said it was subtle.  i said it wasn't comparable with us racism.  when there are groups of people of the same skin color as well as a shared language, religion and nationality that are treated in every way as much like outsiders as are people of different races and nations, then that is not racism as it in the same way as racism exists in the us.

antisemitism almost doesn't exist in the us.  it is (still) far, far, far worse in europe than here.  i agree with that.


and give me a break about what you may have overheard at a truckstop.  i lived in spain for a goodly part of three years.  i taught at a school (one attended by a reasonable % of 2nd gen immigrants) there, i have a pretty rough ridin' good idea of how racist or not racist they are.

Fine.  I think we are an impasse, but more in agreement than we were.  I still think you are full of crap about housing and I think I was having a hard time expressing what I meant by bureaucracies, but I think we covered most of it in the ethnocentrism part.  I still don't like monarchies as quixotic as resistance to America's political oligarchical fiefdoms already is.

[steve dave]

oh crap, we've just turned into the final straight away and the argument is down to who is least racist. let's see what they decide. ok.

[sys]

I think we are an impasse, but more in agreement than we were.

fair enough.  i need to go recharge my computer anyways.

[Kat Kid]

Not sure which is better:

"a specific skin-color defined class of people" side-stepping the Holocaust or "within" disqualifying European history from the Age of Exploration on.

i'm not trying to place a value judgment on either european or american behavior.  i'm trying to place current attitudes in context.  rightly or wrongly, europeans don't consider themselves jointly responsible for the holocaust.  that was germany and no one else as far as the development of gentile guilt goes.  "within" matters, because just like americans don't fall over themselves apologizing to the unseen, unheard masses harmed by our own imperial pretensions, modern european psychology spares no more than a "such a shame" cluck of the tongue for whatever atrocities passed beneath imperial banners in centuries past.

I almost completely agree, but those are all explanations/justifications for the current phenomena that I call racism and you call something else.

[Emo EMAW]

why in the world would you think you'd dislike living in europe?

high cost of living, small homes/weird appliances, really weird, annoying, old institutions/bureaucracies/townie cultures, racists.  Obviously there would be a lot of plusses, but I'd rather visit than live there.

most of those are your imagination.

No they are not.

[Rams]

ireland until I learned enough italian to live comfortably in italy and then I would probably move to italy.

[K-S-U-Wildcats!]

I certainly cannot attest for all of Europe, but holy crap, Italians are incredibly racist. It's also perfectly acceptable to dress in blackface in many European countries. The racism actually appears to be getting worse, not better, with the influx of North African immigrants that many European countries have allowed to get completely out of control. I can personally attest to the many conversations I've had with Europeans of many different nationalities, professionals, mind you, who will suddenly say something completely racist without batting an eye.

As for cost of living, the cost of energy is through the rough ridin' roof in most European countries. That cost creeps into everything else. As a result, shitbox little European cars, shitbox little European apartments, no little extravagances like ice in you drink, a free refill, cold air conditioning, are very much the norm. Europeans have mastered the art of living with less. That's not to say many aren't perfectly happy - it's what they know.

And of course these are generalizations, but they're generally true.

[kim carnes]

I bet you guys get along swell.

[michigancat]

It would be kind of fun to open a factory in Africa or something. But probably really hard

[Kat Kid]

It would be kind of fun to open a factory in Africa or something. But probably really hard

You and I have very different definitions of fun.

[bubbles4ksu]

ireland until I learned enough italian to live comfortably in italy and then I would probably move to italy.

wtf? you guys are insane. italy is a horrible place. it's corrupt besides being racist. what other country has its leaders getting bagged for sexing up underage prostitutes? it's a shithole and i can't believe sys defends it like he does.

[Emo EMAW]

Italy is also one of the places in Europe with more litter than St Louis.

[420seriouscat69]

New Zealand, Jamaica, & Ireland.

[eastcat]

After reading about Salt water crocodiles and how aggressive they are, I no longer have any desire to live in Australia.

[sys]

corruption is one of the things that makes mexico, italy and to a considerably lesser extent, spain, such nice places to live.  largely due to said corruption, people in those countries don't have the nauseating respect for, and deference to, authority and public institutions that make the us and germany so intolerable.

[wetwillie]

Thailand