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PaperclipPerfector  10mo ago (text post)   31446 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of July 10, 2023

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The last gasp of the europoor

For years, I've been treated to a steady diet of smug elitism coming from effete liberal Europeans laughing at obese, gun-toting and bible-thumpin' Americans. This reached its crescendo during the George W. Bush administration, took a lull during the Obama years and was resurrected after Trump took office.

The American was an ignoramus, a loud-mouth, a religious fundamentalist and irreversibly stupid. Hopelessly inferior to us sophisticated and cosmopolitan Europeans. Did you know half of Americans don't even own a passport? Most don't even know a second language!? Ha! And don't get me started on their healthcare, their gun crime and all other sorts of social pathologies. America, you see, is a third world nation masquerading as a first world one.

But as the years went by, these smirks felt increasingly hollow. The economic distance - and with it, standard of living - between the two major partners is growing wider by the day. A young French econ professor at Wharton lays out the bad news over just how deluded his fellow Europeans are on this question. Prominent FT columnists have noted the same.

Yet, perhaps there is still time to save the last shreds of honor for us poor Europeans. For one, the gap in PPP terms doesn't seem to be changing much. Europe has been behind for a long time. In terms of total GDP, the situation is much the same. Another aspect is that Europeans tend to work fewer hours.

While some of these arguments may have some validity, they all feel like desperate excuses. I for one am very much happy to see the insufferable elitism of Europeans slowly being wiped off our collective smug faces. The uncouth and primitive barbarian across the ocean turned out to be smarter and harder-working all along.

Perhaps this can also lead to a more pro-capitalist liberalism in the US. For much of my upbringing, liberal Americans were typified by folks such as Michael Moore and his obsessive admiration of the European welfare state. Colbert's snark about the embarrassing Red State American always felt like an underhanded way to gain favor with declassé elites across the ocean. Ann Coulter's observation that liberal elites in the US loved soccer because it is European surely hit closer to home than many in the media were willing to admit.

Of course, there is still some amount of liberal American simping left in the bag. This is perhaps most obvious whenever there are discussions on urban policy and the words "walkable city" invariably comes up. (To be clear, I actually think Europe gets this part better than the US).

Outside of an increasingly narrowing set of areas where Europe still outperforms, we are slowly witnessing a reshuffling of the deck. The old illusions are slowly coming undone and reddit-tier arguments about the US being a third world hellhole are convincing fewer by the day. At long last, after years of insufferable and unjustified smug elitism, the europoor is finally unmasked as the sham living on a lie that he always was. And I couldn't be happier.

Some of this does seem to culture warry.

And I have a different thought is this actually controversial or just a truth everyone knows and you just built a strawman?

There was a period when this was less truthy and I’d guess 1980-2008. And then Europeans did have a bit of looking down on us as close to economic equals and better lifestyles.

Since then two big things happened. Shale oil happened making America no longer a petro beggar and a big terms of trade change when you’re not shipping off a few billion a day to import oil and big tech took off. I think shale oil is extremely underrated for boosting American wealth.

Also, everyone in the world sees Americans middle/lower class. We export voyeurship of that. Americans see pretty European capitals. I assume there are more but off the top of my head I only know of two media properties that show Europeans underclass. Trainspotting I forgot the whole plot but something something Edinburgh and Heroin. And Gomorrah shows a lot of Italian slums in Naples and poverty. Poverty America doesn’t have with white people.

Passport stuff anyone smart realized at some point going to France from Germany is just going to Pennsylvania from NY and same with languages.

I assume there are more but off the top of my head I only know of two media properties that show Europeans underclass.

'La Haine' is a good one for the French context.

The British have a fascination with their underclass. 'Fish Tank' was decent iirc and there are a load of Cockney gangster movies, movies about racists in the 1980s and more recent stuff about the migrant descended underclass. For the second and third ones the film 'This is England' and the first season of 'Top Boy' were pretty good.

everyone in the world sees Americans middle/lower class. We export voyeurship of that.

This is a good point. The export of shows like Jerry Springer in the 1990s and later exposés of how poor whites (derisively called "trailer trash") live their lives gave an unfounded impression that America is far poorer than it actually is. In a way, it's inadvertently proving US cultural dominance.

It reminds me of 4th of July LARPing in Eastern Europe. Yes, it's actually a thing and as you can see, many are going for the "redneck living in a trailer aesthetic". Which is ironic given their own position in the world's income ladder.

I think shale oil is extremely underrated for boosting American wealth.

US energy prices are absurdly cheap compared to the EU, even before the 2022 war broke out. I'd also add that the US is the world's largest magnet to top talent from all around the world. It's often the very high-end who are driving prosperity and everyone else is just sort of going along for the ride.

It reminds me of 4th of July LARPing in Eastern Europe. Yes, it's actually a thing and as you can see, many are going for the "redneck living in a trailer aesthetic".

The weight gives them away. They're all at least 50 pounds underweight, or 30 pounds over if they're going for the methhead look as #3 might be.

It reminds me of 4th of July LARPing in Eastern Europe. Yes, it's actually a thing

On a quick glance all I found points back to some people setting up a theme park for people to roleplay in. Expansive tickets, fewer than 100 people, a lot of photos. I assume this is not really your threshold for something being 'a thing', and at least in my experience, 4th of July does not register for people in Poland beyond the mentions of it in the news.

The export of shows like Jerry Springer in the 1990s

Have they actually been exported? I'm probably the poster boy for thorough Americanization via TV, and I have never seen Jerry Springer, only heard about it second hand. When we imported reality TV, it was usually through adaptation.

It reminds me of 4th of July LARPing in Eastern Europe. Yes, it's actually a thing and as you can see, many are going for the "redneck living in a trailer aesthetic". Which is ironic given their own position in the world's income ladder.

I have never seen anyone miss the point this badly. You never heard that imitation is the sincerest form of flattery? Their position on the world's ladder (and status is a lot more relevant than income here) is probably why they sympathize with, and LARP as Rednecks to begin with.

Their position on the world's ladder (and status is a lot more relevant than income here) is probably why they sympathize with, and LARP as Rednecks to begin with.

The people who do it are usually liberals, and I doubt they feel sympathy for their LARPing targets. It's a form of mild mockery, the way some kid might dress up as an English aristocrat snob and fake an exaggerated accent. There's an underlying sense of poking fun at your target, but fascination might not necessarily be excluded either. People are complicated.

Have they actually been exported?

There was plenty of daytime Jerry Springer when I was growing up. This was early 2000s. But Jerry Springer is really a red herring. US cultural dominance over Europe is near-total. Virtually every European knows about the redneck, trailer trash stereotypes etc. You don't need Jerry Springer for that.

The people who do it are usually liberals, and I doubt they feel sympathy for their LARPing targets. It's a form of mild mockery

Well, I don't want to go all "source?" on you, and in fact I won't fight you on this if you lay any claim to any sort of knowledge on this event, "I know a guy who went there", or even "I know a guy, who knows a guy..." will suffice, but how do you know? That's not how this reads to me at all.

In the article is a quote from the LARPing group’s own self-description:

"Our LARP explores the mythos of the American Dream - or more so the Broken American Dream. Players experience human stories, portraying characters with unique backgrounds. They face their daily life and the issues that come with it. Some are universal or similar to the ones in Poland (such as struggling to provide for your family or combating addiction), and some are specific to the U.S. (such as reliance on private health care or the prevalence of firearms). We wanted to create an immersive experience about facing those hardships both as an individual and as a community, about making impossible choices, about finding your place in your small homeland.

Emphasis mine. Whether it’s outright mockery or something more sympathetic isn’t so easy to tell from just the article (the quoted description makes it seem the latter, the donut-wielding cop provides evidence for the former), but even if the LARPers talk about the universality of the American redneck struggle, I still don’t read this as an identification with redneck culture itself. And it’s certainly not a celebration.

Yeah, the Polish redneck LARP thing seems like a normal case of intercultural fascination, rather than mockery. In Nordic countries there's a whole subculture who take their visual cues from American rednecks, and they certainly don't do it as a mockery.

I've seen a fair amount of cases where Euros are obviously engaging in what within European contexts would be harmless joshing or cultural exploration, so to say, with American cultures, and Americans then get genuinely angry and start ranting about why the smug elitist Europoors (who are a lot poorer than Americans, yes, if one actually participates in American online forums it would seem impossible to not learn this fact) hate Americans despite being a lot poorer than them.

(who are a lot poorer than Americans, yes, if one actually participates in American online forums it would seem impossible to not learn this fact)

I think the scale of the gap is still missed on many, and if you do bring it up people just assume ruinous healthcare and tuition costs level the playing field.

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I've found Europeans get really weirded out when you tell them about drywall.

What, are they still using plaster and lathe? It's admittedly thicker but it takes much more labor to put up. Drywall is perfectly fine.

I'm weirded out by drywall. I always thought people were fucking up their fists by punching a hole in the wall, and then I learned it's practically paper-mache compared to good solid brick and cement.

No wonder you people make regular noise complaints, there could be an orgy with loudspeakers going on next door and I wouldn't notice as long as we both had windows shut.

Well I don't need to break out the hammer drill to put a picture up on my wall. Also the noise issue can be solved by having a house instead of an apartment.

  1. Garret Jones broadly disagrees that it’s “just the top end”. He thinks average intelligent matters a lot.

  2. Regardless of whether American energy prices are “cheap” or “expensive” one big thing is it’s basically all internal now. Even if oil was $1000 a barrel that money goes from US citizen to US citizen and the profits etc are taxed. It doesn’t increase the trade deficit if energy goes up or down in price.

Not even just Jerry Springer and trashy lower class. They see Homer Simpson. Average middle class silly dude. Americans see Paris but only the good parts not their suburbs where they rioted.

America has a white underclass. The difference in wealth manifests in the middle classes, so a doctor or department or region-level manager or independent tradesman in the US is quite a lot better off than his counterpart in the UK, who makes less money, is less likely to have a car or big house.

Do we? Do we have white people living in projects like naples with violence etc? We have poor people in West Virginia that do too much heroin but without crime or projects.

Someone else replied with this

https://www.boredpanda.com/roleplaying-4th-of-july-larp-poland/

That’s what the west of the world thinks our poor white underclass looks like. It’s not the same as the stuff seen in southern Italy.

You know euro crime rates are way lower than American white crime rates, right? Same for illegitimacy and divorce.

There’s lots of 100% white trailer parks full of dysfunction and welfare fraud. It’s not something unique to Italy.

People are pushing back on this point. But media wise America shows a lot. I don’t know anything like Gomorrah in America and public housing for whites. Maybe it’s just media. But usually America shows more.

We have Appalachia. They do a lot of heroin etc but crime isn’t a problem. Like white corner boys don’t exists but Italian media showed that in Naples.

Because they’ve been inducted into drug gangs. Americans are the most down to business people in the world, even when it comes to crime.

We do have gangs. These gangs are LARPers. Claims of gang membership from the white underclass in Appalachia are the number one way to separate the wheat from the chaff so far as who is a legitimately dangerous criminal and who is a degenerate with delusions of grandeur. These 'gangs' rarely create many social problems in Appalachia relative to other, more serious criminals.

The murder rate per capita in Napels is about a quarter of the white American murder rate.

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