Should we Americans care what the world thinks of us?

[j2k4]

Hell no we shouldn't care what others think.

Oh, come now, I think we should, absolutely.

Trouble is that others occasionally need to be taught how to think.

Emend - I have just received a very gracious invitation to dinner; I shall attend later...

[bigboab]

No. Why change the habit of a lifetime?

[chamaeleo]

Hell no we shouldn't care what others think.

Oh, come now, I think we should, absolutely.

Trouble is that others occasionally need to be taught how to think.

Emend - I have just received a very gracious invitation to dinner; I shall attend later...

a fund raiser I suppose

[lynx]

Are you saying that the US should be allowed to act like an arsehole because there are bigger arseholes around the world?

[j2k4]

Are you saying that the US should be allowed to act like an arsehole because there are bigger arseholes around the world?

Not at all..

Please, brother lynx, tell me I don't have to explain it to you.

[Skiz]

You have to wonder, who are the pollsters talking to when they "discover" that North Korea is viewed more favorably than the USA?

[j2k4]

You have to wonder, who are the pollsters talking to when they "discover" that North Korea is viewed more favorably than the USA?

Well, a few things sort of leap out at me:


Auntie Beeb is in charge, so the poll must be a fair, pure, and representative (our British friends insist that this is so, after all), and the 34 countries polled (I admit I have no idea which countries were included) gave the United States a failing grade, as compared (most notably) to China and North Korea.

Now, though the BBC cannot be cast as adhering to the British government's allied stance (remember - the government throws the funding into the Beeb's playpen, then turns a blind eye) one can, without undue charity, assume the BBC knows how to conduct a proper poll, which in turn means that a great majority of those polled who expressed disdain for the U.S. expressed substantially less of same for North Korea and China.

For starters I'd like someone to reconcile (however symbolically) these two, umm, positions...

[Snee]

And the United States? Well, we've conducted a difficult, frustrating, but essentially benevolent five-year effort to liberalize and democratize two very tough customers: Afghanistan and Iraq. And we've imprisoned several hundred known and suspected terrorists -- giving them medical care, culturally sensitive food, prayer rugs, a Koran and a dental plan.

Somehow, I sense a bias.

[barakokula]

[I][COLOR="Blue"] Let's see, there's a brutal crackdown on Tibet, constant threats toward Taiwan, complete repression of political and religious liberty, forced sterilization and abortion, military and diplomatic support for the genocidal regime in Sudan that has destroyed Darfur, and thousands of other violations of human rights and human dignity.

And the United States? Well, we've conducted a difficult, frustrating, but essentially benevolent five-year effort to liberalize and democratize two very tough customers: Afghanistan and Iraq. And we've imprisoned several hundred known and suspected terrorists -- giving them medical care, culturally sensitive food, prayer rugs, a Koran and a dental plan.

Actually, these international polls may not mean much. If the U.S. were truly unpopular, would we be building fences to keep immigrants out? Would the U.S. be the world's third most popular tourist destination? And would the world's people be glad to not have the U.S. available when another catastrophe like the Asian tsunami or the Bosnian crisis looms?

Contra Pat Leahy, we do not need to reintroduce America to the world, we need to remember that the world's moral focus can be strangely distorted.

It seems much of the world hasn't a clue...

This article takes for a fact that every person on the world thinks like an average american. That having a fast food restaurant nearby and a wide variety of channels on your tv is the most important thing in life. Oh,yeah,and a dental plan.

So important that it's imperative to invade a country and totally destroy the government,position yourself over oil wells and leave the country in shambles,so that a million ppl died since. Because of the dental plan,sure. Worlds oral hygiene is US #1 priority.

Article's biased,and that's an understatement.

[Quylui]

Of course not. Their perspective is controlled by what they see and what they don't, and in most cases their only outlook is the media. It might as well be high school... did you care about what everyone who didn't know you thought about you in school?

We could make all the great decisions we wanted, but even doing this couldn't dictate people's perceptions of us. It's not a battle worth fighting, either.